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Vol. 19, No. 3/Spring 1997

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Notes from the Chair

Well, it's just the same old same old in the news business. Nothing but change, change, change. If there is a universal truth in this industry, it is that none of us knows exactly what we might be doing tomorrow.

Luckily, I will not be writing a "Notes from the Chair" column tomorrow, but will have moved on to the much more pleasant task of party planning for Indianapolis. Don't get me wrong -- chairing the news division has been a breeze with the help of such a wonderful and dedicated membership. In fact, the only bad part has been writing this column, as my staff and anyone else who has to deal with me near deadline time can testify!

Barbara Hijek, despite changing jobs and moving to the opposite coast (well, the opposite coast of Florida) has done a fine job creating our membership directory. She very diligently made sure we have up to date information, including email addresses. Special thanks go to Angela Stafford at Datatimes who is handling the production of the directory.

John Jansson and Jim Hunter have been riding herd on the NAA/IPTC committee as the lone voice for sanity in the field of photo archiving and keywords. Expect to hear more about this at conference and beyond.

You'll read throughout this issue the exciting plans for Seattle. I'm pleased to see the continuation of the newbies meeting, an idea that sprung from some sidewalk brainstorming by Sperry Krueger and Justin Scroggs.

There's a renewed interest in regional programs for news librarians. Florida, of course, has led the way in this area, ever since Bob Isaacs, Louise LeGette, and Judy Grimsley collaborated in 1984 to form the Florida Newspaper Librarian's Association. While the Florida group continued to thrive, most of the rest of us have watched in envy.

But it didn't take long for Kathy Foley in her new job to start organizing those Texas librarians. Now Northern California is getting into the act, and there's a very active group of DC librarians. We're even trying to get something started in NC/SC/VA.

This is a wonderful opportunity for news librarians to network and to extend those benefits to folks who seldom get to attend the annual conference. Librarians from smaller organizations and staff members from larger ones can have the chance to meet and learn from each other. There's always something good to bring back home.

Teresa Leonard can be reached at tleonard@nando.com. She is Director, News Research at The News & Observer, Raleigh, NC.


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