Southside Opening Day Collection Update

Technical Services (Cataloging & Acquisitions) and the Library’s librarians are busy selecting materials for the Opening Day Collection of books, DVDs and CDs for the new Southside branch. Meetings with vendors specifying exactly how we want our materials prepared for the shelf have been on-going. This is a time-consuming process that requires a great deal of documentation, samples being sent back and forth, and constant communication. We are working with several vendors that are providing shelf ready materials for us. The vendors will be storing the materials in their warehouses, and delivering them to the new branch right before the opening (sorted in rough shelving order) in trailers, ready to put on the new shelving.

The new Southside materials will be cataloged on our database, and as the items are added they will show to our patrons on the catalog. Since these items are “Unavailable”, no holds will be allowed until the branch opens.

The first step in the ordering process for this project was to send the vendors a list of current materials that we have here at Main and La Farge branches, so that we can get an additional copy for the new branch. The vendors are then providing us with selection lists based on our criteria to buy additional titles. The children’s and adult librarians are choosing titles in Fiction, all of the nonfiction Dewey ranges, Biography, Reference, and areas of special interest for the Southwest collection. The new Southside branch will have a higher percentage of Spanish language materials, and will also focus on K-12 to serve our young patrons from the surrounding schools.

An additional component to the new collection are Gifts. Santa Fe Public Library receives some incredible gift books and media, and the selectors are busy setting aside lots of great materials for the new branch. These are being processed “in house” by our Technical Services department, and then put into storage boxes until we open. The Bookstop collections will also be incorporated into the new branch. Our goal is to have 78,000 items on the shelf by opening. This should about half fill the shelves, leaving us plenty of room for growth.

This week’s report shows that we have 1700 items completed for Southside showing in our catalog. We’ll keep you posted on the growing total!