Present: Helene Baumann (Duke University), chair; Lauris Olson (University of Pennsylvania), secretary; Ruby Bell-Gam (University of California, Los Angeles), ALC; Phyllis Bischof (University of California, Berkeley), at large; James Simon (Center for Research Libraries), ex officio; Joanne Zellers (Library of Congress), ex officio.

The meeting was called to order at 9:40 AM by the Chair.

1. The Pre- and Post-Business Meeting Executive Committee Minutes for 11 November 1999 were moved for approval by James Simon, seconded by Lauris Olson, and approved by the Executive Committee.

2. The Business Meeting agenda was modified to assure Bill Pidduck (Adam Matthew Publishers) time for his presentation, for Phyllis Bischof to present on Congolese newspapers, and for a discussion on CRL’s role in cataloging microform sets. Lauris Olson offered to keep time during the Business Meeting.

3. Nominating Committee, consisting of Phyllis Bischof and Lauris Olson, is charged with compiling a slate of candidates to fill three positions: Chair, Chair-Elect (which replaces Member-at-large), and Faculty Representative. The Chair said that David Easterbrook offered to extend his time on the Executive Committee by serving as Chair, so the Nominating Committee must fill Chair-Elect and Faculty Representative. Next year’s open positions will be Secretary, Member-at-large, and Faculty Representative. Olson asked if appointing Easterbrook would comply with the new bylaws. Ruby Bell-Gam offered that this procedure is suitable during a transitional period. James Simon suggested that Easterbrook be elected if the CAMP membership expressed concern. Bischof asked if it were the Executive Committee’s consensus to accept Easterbrook’s offer; all agreed. Bischof said that CAMP members would be asked to recommend faculty members.

4. David Easterbrook’s (Northwestern University) correspondence with Milton Krieger (Western Washington University) during Spring 2000 was discussed. Easterbrook had offered to describe to CAMP Krieger’s proposal to create an archive on Cameroonian democratization efforts, based upon a collection of 1,000 print sources, mainly newspapers, accumulated since 1990 in the Social Democratic Front office at Bamenda, Cameroon, the party’s own papers, and the papers of the party chairman, Ni John Fru Ndi, was discussed. Krieger had presented an earlier version of this project at the Fall 1996 CAMP meeting in San Francisco. Joanne Zellers pointed out the project’s need for both subject and technical skills that went beyond CAMP’s scope and suggested that Krieger be referred to microform publishers for assistance. Phyllis Bischof noted the open-ended scope of the project. Consensus was reached to exclude the Easterbrook-Krieger correspondence from the Business Meeting agenda; the chair will forward the correspondence to Joe Caruso for the Archives task force, and to IDC, Norman Ross, and Adam Matthew.

5. James Simon distributed copies of "Guidelines for executive committees (draft ... 3/20/2000)" amid general acclaim. The document outlines rights and responsibilities of CRL Area Microform Project executive committee members, and describes best practices for each position. Appendices illustrate financial statements and list rules of parliamentary order. Simon asked for suggestions for additions and revisions. He wanted to finish it by the next elections, to be available for new Executive Committee members. He will distribute a CRL brochure, "Best practices for member libraries at the Center for Research Libraries", at the Business Meeting.

6. During an open forum, Ruby Bell-Gam responded to Phyllis Bischof’s request for an update on the Al Ahram acquisition proposal: David Hirsch, UCLA MEMP representative, indicated that the MEMP membership would support the purchase of the older Al Ahram issues; CAMP could put together a proposal with MEMP. James Simon said that MEMP sought a formal proposal from CAMP. Joanne Zellers said that Library of Congress colleagues had been concerned over the microfilm quality of Al Ahram’s own product; she recommended examining the quality of the microfilm at a holding library. It was suggested that the Al Ahram proposal be dropped, as several U.S. libraries hold and will lend the Al Ahram-produced microfilm.

7. Joe Lauer’s request for discussion on CAMP membership dues was reviewed. James Simon said that he had raised the topic within CRL, but that action on dues revision must start within the Area Microform Projects. Lauris Olson said that increasing use of CAMP materials seemed more relevant than revising dues. He described the Interuniversity Consortium of Political and Social Research’s policy of providing members with reports on data set borrowing activity that include list prices for each data set borrowed, and asked for information on borrowing reports and statistics from CRL. James Simon replied that the Innovative system used by CRL will provide reports, if CRL chooses to implement the Innovative circulation module.

8. James Simon distributed copies of "Submitting project proposals to SEEMP", "SEAM and the future of preservation projects", and a related 1976 document outlining acquisition policy as literature to guide future discussion on a CAMP collection development policy. Simon directed attention to the SEAM document, the results of a poll of SEAM members, as a model.

Upon a motion by James Simon and second by Lauris Olson, the meeting adjourned at 10:10 AM.

Present: Helene Baumann (Duke University), chair; Lauris Olson (University of Pennsylvania), secretary; Ruby Bell-Gam (University of California, Los Angeles), ALC; Phyllis Bischof (University of California, Berkeley), at large; James Simon (Center for Research Libraries), ex officio; Joanne Zellers (Library of Congress), ex officio.

The meeting was called to order at 12:30 noon by the Chair.

1. ASA Conference Papers. The Chair will ask David Easterbrook to forward CAMP’s questions to ASA regarding their Conference Papers publication program:

• Are paper copies of the 1996 and 1997 papers extant?
• Will ASA do microfilming from CD-ROM?

The Chair will ask Easterbrook to remind ASA that the current medium for the 1996 and 1997 Conference Papers is not an archival medium. No action by CAMP will be taken until Easterbrook reports.

2. Abantu-Batho proposal. The Chair will ask Kathryn Green to forward to Chris Lowe CAMP’s recommendation that H-Africa be used to canvass for extant issues in print and microform. Gretchen Walsh will collate H-Africa responses. No further action by CAMP until Walsh reports.

3. CRL’s cataloging backlog list. James Simon will pursue a copy of the backlog list to share with the CAMP Executive Board for future proposal to support cataloging analytics.

An interesting discussion ensued on CRL’s 750,000-title dissertation cataloging backlog. James Simon said that most dissertations in the backlog were German- or French-language. Phyllis Bischof expressed the need for access to Africa-source and Africa-subject dissertations; the Chair offered the opinion that CAMP should first be advocating for CAMP’s own resources; Ruby Bell-Gam asked if a CAMP recommendation to CRL to provide minimal-level cataloging would help resolve the problem; James Simon said CRL would "just throw it on the pile", that CRL knows the backlog is a problem. Bell-Gam used UCLA’s workflow to speculate about CRL’s acquisition policy – UCLA checks CRL catalog for the desired foreign dissertation; if the title is absent, UCLA submits a purchase request to CRL – in this case, would CRL order the dissertation or check its backlog first? Phyllis Bischof concluded that obtaining foreign dissertations can be a stressful and lengthy process and that knowing CRL’s holdings would be very helpful.

4. Lusophone CAMP brochure. Ruby Bell-Gam will send a copy of the translated text to Jill Coelho for review.

5. CAMP dues requests will soon be sent out by CRL.

6. Senegal project. James Simon will send out an e-mail ballot in June or July 2000 on the St. Louis colonial court records proposal pending submission by Joe Caruso.

7. Somali reports and newspapers proposal. James Simon will send out to CAMP members an e-mail ballot on the segments offered by Library of Congress Photoduplication Services and not owned by CRL for CAMP.

8. Al Ahram proposal. Joanne Zellers will ask at Library of Congress these questions:

• What are the Library of Congress’s holdings?
• Of the Library of Congress holdings, which parts may be borrowed through interlibrary loan?
• How much may be loaned at one time?

We will wait to make a formal bid offering $4,000 to MEMP pending Zellers’s report.

9. Liberian newspapers project. James Simon will coordinate efforts to complete this project. Simon will compile a list of titles filmed and titles currently under consideration, and will obtain from Joe Lauer a list of newly-proposed titles. Simon will send these lists to Joanne Zellers, who will compare it against the Library of Congress’s recent gift of Liberian newspapers. Lauer will delay microfilming until Zellers can provide an inventory of the gift. Simon will submit a notice to ASA News requesting assistance in completing holdings.

10. Timbuktu digitization proposal. The Chair will reply to David Easterbrook that CAMP and the Title VI libraries are willing to split the project’s cost, but that CAMP desires the proposal to be modified to include preservation microfilming, as well as enhanced imaging for poorly-preserved items, and appropriate metadata.

11. Nominating Committee. To recruit new faculty onto the Executive Committee, Lauris Olson will draft a letter for CAMP members to share with their center directors/faculty chairs, including the CAMP brochure, role description, past faculty representatives, and a list of major acquisitions. James Simon will compile reports of recent CAMP projects and acquisitions and send them to Lauris Olson for digesting.

In a general discussion on collection policy and acquisitions, the Chair asked about balancing saving for large projects against spending on newspaper acquisitions. Joanne Zellers remarked that faculty candidates have commented that CAMP microfilms a lot of newspapers; Zellers asked for a survey of recent CAMP acquisitions and projects. While recognizing the need to save for big proposals, Zellers cautioned that only one CAMP meeting saw few proposals, that CAMP meetings are for discussion leading to more research rather than voting outright, and that large projects demand rigorous monitoring.

11. New Business. Ruby Bell-Gam asked that CAMP follow up on its declared interest in microfilming official gazettes apart from the CRL Foreign Gazettes project. Lauris Olson will attend the CRL Foreign Gazettes project’s Philadelphia meeting in July 2000. James Simon reported that Patricia Finney is compiling lists of materials on microfilm, materials extant but not microfilmed, and so on. Olson expressed concern that foreign census publications are not being monitored now that University of Texas has withdrawn from its aggressive collection program.

12. Promoting CAMP. James Simon remarked on the enormous response – borrowing requests from CAMP members and nonmembers and general reference queries – to posting to H-Africa an announcement of the Paris Evangelical Mission acquisition. Consensus was reached that future acquisitions should be promoted in this way.

13. Mail and Guardian proposal. Purchase of 1990-1998 issues and standing order from Norman Ross was approved at the Business Meeting.

14. Newspapers from the South African Library proposal. Dorothy Woodson will survey Yale’s collection and fill gaps through Norman Ross. No action taken until Woodson’s report.

15. Lesotho Newspapers proposal. James Simon will give a copy of David Ambrose’s (National University of Lesotho) list of titles to David Easterbrook for checking against Northwestern’s holdings. Simon will collate survey responses from Easterbrook, Dorothy Woodson at Yale, and Ruth Thomas on LC Nairobi’s microfilming work for Ambrose. No action taken until Simon’s report.

16. Congolese Newspapers proposal. Ruth Thomas will send to Berkeley issues filled through embassy acquisitions. Phyllis Bischof will send the Nairobi issues and Berkeley’s holdings to CRL, where James Simon will check them against Northwestern’s holdings. Funds up to $1,000 were approved at the Business Meeting.

The meeting was adjourned at 1:00 PM.

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