Volunteers Needed to be Studio Audience for Great Day Houston on January 28th

Hello,

Jennifer Schwartz from Programming is asking for volunteers to appear in the studio audience for a taping Houston Public Library will be doing on Great Day Houston. The taping will take place on Thursday, January 28th, and is for a feature on hosted author Wil Haygood, who will be a part of the HPLQ series in February in celebration of African American History Month. They need 20 HPL staffers to be a part of this event.

The group will need to be at KHOU studio by 8AM at 1945 Allen Parkway, Houston, TX 77019. The requirement is for staff to wear their HPL Red shirts and be an engaged and interested audience member. Speaking is not required.

If you are interested, please let me or Jose know so that we can look at coverage on that day for the grouping.

Thank you,

MR

UPDATE: Open Carry Law

Hello,

CitizensNet, the City of Houston Newsletter, just sent an email containing a FAQ handout regarding both new and old information about the open carry law that went into effect this year. Please see below for a link to the attachment:

COH: Open Carry - Frequently Asked Questions

This information has been added as a link under the "Staff Resources" section of the group blog.

Previous information about Open Carry can be found at this link: The New Open Carry Law.

If you have any questions at all, please do not hesitate to ask. Remember that you are responsible for knowing this information, especially since it was sent out to all COH employees.

Sincerely,

MR

Hoopla Accounts & Library Cards

From Marianne Lorio:

Hello:

This e-mail is just to clarify an issue that was brought up by a patron recently.

If you have both a Harris County Public Library card and a Houston Public Library card it is possible to checkout items from using both libraries' Hoopla accounts. This will allow you to have both the checkouts available as a Harris County patron and as a Houston Library patron. To do this you need to create two Hoopla accounts, one under each library card number. The trick is that you have to use two different e-mails to create the accounts. Otherwise Hoopla will automatically assume you are merely updating your library card information, not create two separate accounts. The process is not difficult you just need two separate e-mails. Let me know if you have any questions.

MR

Court Ordered Volunteers

Hello,

This is just a reminder that HPL does not accept, recognize, or honor court-ordered volunteer service.

List of organizations that we can refer customers to can be found at this link: Court Ordered Volunteer Service Locations

I've also added a link to the list on the main page of the blog under Volunteer Resources.

Please let me know if you have any questions.

Thank you,

MR

Ulrich's Database

From Marianne Lorio:

Hello:

We have dropped our subscription to Ulrich's database due to a high cost per use. Please let me know if you or anyone misses it.

MR

How to "Opt-In" to Reading History

From an original posting by Daniel Pillow. Link: "Opting in" to Reading History

Hello,

Several customers recently visited the library wanting to know if HPL kept a log of all their past checkouts. While we do not do that, customers do have the option of "opting in" to a service called My Checkout History (formerly known as Reading History). We cannot pull this information up in Sirsi; rather, customers can retrieve it by logging in to their account on HPL's website. Activating this function records all checkouts made under that card number. This is not a retroactive function, though: it will only log those checkouts that occurred when the function was activated, not before.

There are two ways to do this. 

1. The first way is through the My Account function on HPL's website. Have the customer log into their account and click on the My Info tab, as seen below:

Check the box that says "Record my checkout history." The checkout history list can be found on the Checkouts tab, and is the second option (Checkout History) under Library Checkouts. 

See below for screenshots on how it looks:

2. The second way is the what we do when they have activated this option online but the checkouts are not logging. This means that staff have to go into Sirsi and modify the user's record. First, open the user's account through the Modify User wizard. On the first page, there will be three drop-down boxes. Select the box for the Charge History Rule and change the selection from NOCHARGES to ALLCHARGES. See below for screenshots:

Default Charge History Rule.

Charge History Rule for documenting checkouts.

Again, this is not retroactive, so the customer's reading history is nonexistent, but when we make the alteration to the account, it should record from then forward. 

As always, please let me know if you have any comments, suggestions, and/or concerns.

Thanks,

MR

HOPE Pay Increases

Hello,

Just a brief overview regarding the HOPE pay increases:

• Base pay for employees will increase up to $0.55 based on their pay grade and if they are either below midpoint or at the midpoint of their classification.
• Increases will be annualized to and above midpoint.
• The amounts in the chart below are added to the annual salary, not biweekly salary.

So the way this would work is: 

• Locate your pay grade by looking at your classification (job title) at this link: http://www.houstontx.gov/hr/salary/job-classifications.html
• For easier accessibility, the pay grades for positions in our grouping are below:
• Customer Service Clerk - 10
• Librarian II - 21
• Librarian III - 23
• Library Assistant - 5
• Senior Customer Service Clerk - 12
• Senior Library Service Specialist - 16
• View the midpoint for your pay grade at this link: http://houstontx.gov/hr/compensation/pay_structure.html
• For easier accessibility, the midpoints for the above positions are below:
• Customer Service Clerk - 1461
• Librarian II - 2597
• Librarian III - 2884
• Library Assistant - 1181
• Senior Customer Service Clerk - 1622
• Senior Library Service Specialist - 2000

From there, you would look at the chart below to see if you fall into the top chart (if you biweekly pay falls below the midpoint) or into the bottom chart (if your biweekly pay falls at or above midpoint).

If you want to know how much of an increase that is hourly, take the amount that fits your pay grade and divide by 26 (because there are that may pay periods in the year), then divide by 80 (number of hours in one paycheck). 

• Example for pay grade 11-12: 
• 1040/26 = 40
• 40/80 = .50
• So someone in pay grade 11-12 that is getting the $1,040 because they are below midpoint would see a $0.50 increase in their hourly pay. 

Here is a link to HOPE's flyer about the raise, which contains more information: http://www.hopetx.org/2015/07/about-your-raise/

Here is a link to HOPE's 2015 Meet and Confer Agreement (the section on the increases and compensation can be found on page 37): http://www.hopetx.org/download/5047/

Thanks,

MR