To: Esther Grassian, LAUC President
From: Christy Hightower, LAUC Liaison to the CDL User's Council

Spring 2003 Report

I was appointed Liaison to the CDL User's Council in Fall of 2002. In early February 2003 I asked the LAUC executive board to reconsider the effectiveness of this position, because it had become apparent to me that the CDL User's Council is not a decision-making body, and that there already exists an excellent communication mechanism for the dissemination of information from the User's Council to each campus through the campus members of the committee. (An excerpt of my message to the LAUC Executive Board is below.)

Brad Westbrook, the previous Liaison to the User's Council had come to this same conclusion a year ago in his report to the 2002 Spring Assembly. In that report Brad concluded by saying "I hope LAUC will give some due consideration to the nature of this liaison responsibility and either define it in a meaningful way or, if it can not do that, abolish it." In essence, that was what I also recommended to the board. I am currently awaiting their decision.

The CDL User's Council meets once a year in April. The 2003 meeting will be April 28th in Oakland.

Excerpt from my email message to the LAUC Executive Board sent on February 7, 2003:

I would indeed very much appreciate some guidance from the Executive Board on the specific role of the LAUC rep to the CDL User's Council, given that there already exists an excellent communication mechanism to each campus for all of the information that comes through that committee. The recent example of the message from Dan Greenstein regarding the Melvyl-T timetable and plans is a perfect example. In many months that has been the first and only message of broader policy to come from the User's Council (and there have been many email messages in total), and everyone I knew got multiple copies of the message and didn't need me to send an additional copy. Even though I'm new to the group, the former LAUC rep, Brad Westbrook, came to the same conclusions after a full term of service. In his final report he recommended a review of the position with an eye to eliminating the post. I'm not trying to shirk my duties in any way, but one does want to have a clear and useful role.

... so far all the communication from the User's Council has been from them to us members, in the form of announcements of decisions already made in some other forum, or status reports on particular databases or resources. Is there any need for communication to go in the reverse direction that would require a LAUC rep that can't be done by a campus rep? Does the LAUC Executive Board have any issues that they want their rep to pose to the User's Council?

I would be most grateful if you would bring this issue to the board for discussion. Feel free to share this email with the board."