From: “Seattle Public Library Puts Books on Bikes”: “The library is a zebra-print lunch box tucked into the back of a pedicab and stuffed with old-fashioned paperbacks and digital LibraryBoxen.”
To: Mobile Mini Libraries Pepper SXSW
To: LibraryBox
Looking for a place to host a meeting in Oregon that enables participation by those who can’t attend in person?
Check out this recently updated guide on publicly-accessible sites that make videoconferencing equipment available to users. Please note that most require a reservation, and some locations charge for the service.
We admit the list is not as expansive as we’d like; please let us know about places we’ve missed and we’ll gladly include them!
If you are a public law librarian, a public law library trustee, or interested in pursuing a career in public law librarianship, here’s a great book and a book review:
“Public Law Librarianship: Objectives, Challenges, and Solutions,” by Laurie Selwyn and Virginia Eldridge. IGI Global, 2012, 281 pages.
We have a copy in our Law Library and your law library may have one, too.
While a lot of JSTOR content is free, not all of it is. However, there are other ways to get JSTOR articles for no direct cost.
1) Your local public library may subscribe to the database. (Current Oregon Statewide Databases available at eligible public libraries. Some public libraries have additional database subscriptions.)
2) JSTOR Register and Read program (currently in beta).
3) College and university libraries usually subscribe to JSTOR. If you don’t have access to these collections, use the Oregon State Library’s virtual reference service L-net (soon to become Answerland) to request a JSTOR article.
You can find the Oregon Department of Revenue’s “Law Libraries: Suggested values for January 1, 2013” report at the Oregon State Bar (OSB) website.
Direct link to the report’s PDF at the OSB.
You might also be able to dig through the Property Tax Division of the Oregon Department of Revenue webpages and find the 2013 report there, but lots of luck with that.
And here’s a link to another one of the Oregon DOR, Personal Property Assessment and Taxation webpages.
An October 25, 2012, Law Librarian Blog post:
“Memphis Public Library Card With Photo Held To Be A Valid Voter ID:
Here’s a bit of legal fun. The Tennessee voter ID law was under attack in that state as unconstitutional. The Tennessee Court of Appeals ruled that the law is constitutional. However, the more interesting part of the opinion concluded that a photo ID issued by the Memphis Public Library constituted a valid ID for anyone attempting to vote under the law. The State had argued against that point. The Court stated ….” [Link to full blog post.]
iLibrarian alerts us to this sensible, and very funny, genealogy research advice, which also applies to Life in General and on the Internet Tubes:
Avoiding Five Common Genealogy Research Errors, from iLibrarian, 10/20/12.
Friday, October 19, 2012, is a furlough day.
Many Oregon county law libraries will be open; we are county, not state, departments (but funded by the state, through the State Courts).
If you are thinking about a career in “legal information” or advancing your career in “legal information,” this is a useful birds-eye snapshot of the profession(s):
“AALL/ILTA Digital White Paper: The New Librarian,” 10/15/12:
“The American Association of Law Libraries (AALL) and the International Legal Technology Association (ILTA) has collaborated to create a white paper on the set of skills needed for today’s librarian and information services professionals. Whether it is Knowledge Management, working with Practice Groups, Competitive Intelligence, Electronic Books, or the evolving trends within Legal Research or Emerging Technology, ….” [Link to full 3 Geeks and a Law Blog post.]
We love voting in Oregon. Not only can we vote by mail, but we get a honkin’ huge Voter Pamphlet to read on long commutes and rainy afternoons, and for pure reading pleasure.
There is even a little comedy in the Voter’s Pamphlet, and I haven’t even gotten past Measure 78 on page 52 (out of 151 pages).
On page 52 of the Voter’s Pamphlet you will find the “Estimate of Financial Impact” of Measure 78, a fairly routine though slightly comic proposal to change some of the language of the Oregon Constitution. (It brings to mind a charming speaker at a county public meeting who said in all seriousness that “he liked Government but does not understand it.”)
The Financial Impact statement says Measure 78 will have no financial impact on state or local government revenue or expenditures. Really?!
Now that is funny. Admittedly it won’t have a huge impact or even a moderate financial impact, but if you think about what happens when you change the name of any business or government entity, it’s not free, it’s not cheap, it’s not easy, and it isn’t fast. Even if a lot of the “name” changes happen online, that takes some serious cleaning up, which is a labor-intensive project, and not cheap labor at that, if you want to do it properly.
Think about it. If you change the name of your business or your government department, or even “just” a street, you have to do these and more, none of which happens without cost. And under Measure 78, we’re talking about changing the names of entire branches of government.
These may be necessary, and as a law librarian I really get that 3-branches thing, but these changes are not without “financial impact.”
Hold meetings about the changes, how and when they will take place, by whom, etc.
Write press releases.
Send out letters (but see below for that letterhead update)
Make new building signs.
Correct old building signs.
Correct directional signs (on roads and elsewhere).
Make new stationary: paper, envelopes, etc.
Change signs on interior and exterior doors.
Change website URLs.
Change website content.
Change business cards.
We can add more to this list, but the point is made.
