aahsl_survey_of_current_budget_situations1

August 22, 2003 The following are remarks from primarily Directors of the Association of Academic Health Science Libraries regarding current budget situations names have been removed unless people specifically mentioned that it didn’t matter if their names were mentioned Additional minor edits were made to the messages Jean Sayre, Hardin Library, University of Iowa My deficit of $449,000 last year was softened by one-time funds My deficit of $671,000 this year, must be made up in cuts For the second year, we will not be buying any books, but will cut serials to save the e-books We cut Web of Science last year and some ejournals This year, we are also considering UpToDate, MD Consult, MedInfoNow, Journal of Chromotagraphy, J of AChemS, and after speaking with my boss last Thursday, I must cut another $50,000 more He is appointing a library advisory committee to help make these hard decisions So, not sure what will happen, but we must it by Sept It is just terrible After all of these years to build a collection of respect, we take short years to dismantle a good bit of it ************************************************************************ See our web site www.hsl.unc.edu We have drastically cut back our Ovid ports, pushing folks to PubMed through various means We have been doing this gradually for several years so the outcry is not too loud This spring we cancelled MD Consult - we sought a lot of user input, asked them to evaluate MDC versus Up to Date, InfoRetriever and another PDA product (I forget it at the moment!) - anyway everyone wanted either MDC or UTD Of course UTD is more expensive, but people had been lobbying us for that also and we could not both The result was that we cancelled MDC and got UTD - we were able to get a reasonable deal with them that included off campus access, after lengthy negotiations One thing that brought them around was that we had done the user survey and we had data to show that our users chose them over MDC so they asked us to show that (in summary form on our web site) and we did We also are asking for cost sharing with some depts (some of them already had purchased UTD for their depts on their own so this is a good strategy I think) Also we did a very useful cross-over chart (see: http://www.hsl.unc.edu/mdconsult.cfm) that shows people how to get to virtually all the MDC resources another way, or something comparable With one or two exceptions we were able to provide substitute access That was one of our arguments - that we were duplicating access to MDC resources that we also had in other ways I think this cross over chart won most people over We still provide MD Consult through the AHEC Digital Library through a separate license That is accessible to the students, residents, preceptors and community practitioners and is a statewide product with its own budget Since the other three med schools in NC still have MDC this makes sense Who knows what will happen, though? ************************************************************************ I met with the Dean last week to present an overview of our 2004 budget needs He said the library will receive the same amount of state funds as last year, but we not know how much additional funds will be available from our Board of Regents Last year, we received $293,000 from the Board If we receive the same, we will still have to cut approximately $100,000 We have not cut our databases or large services such as Ovid or MD Consult We have reviewed our continuations, reference collection and audio-visual collections and have decided on some cancellations there We met with the library Committee last week and in September will conduct an online journal assessment I believe that because we went through the Faxon crisis and educated our faculty through this process, they are more aware of some of the issues and challenges that face libraries as they relate to shrinking budgets and increase journal costs Not that journal cancellations are easier, but perhaps a little more accepted This library has never had a "Friends" Group and but the establishment of a "Friends" Group is one of the priorities of the new Library Committee The next meeting will be focused on off-budget funding I believe that XXXXXX is having to cut approximately $200,000 from its materials budget and in speaking with someone at another library, they may also have to cut $200,000 from their budget Times are not good ************************************************************************ We have changed authentication to require going through our proxy server for remote AND using the libraries barcode Then we added a new "e-only" category so individuals never have to come to see us physically if they prefer not to Amazingly enough, we have discovered that we can lower our MDConsult license level Apparently we had huge numbers of former college students, etc.etc that used our resources And, also amazingly enough, the "value-added" licensed resources are now used more heavily by our hospital-based faculty And they are willing to pay Our hospitals now contribute to our collection development budget And, we were very lucky to have had our collection devt budget increased substantially ************************************************************************ Nearly everything available online has been cancelled in print We have only about 20% of our collection left in print, only because they are unique We have not cancelled popular databases because the students use them heavily We got the Provost to pick up MD Consult on her local monies last year and this year We can manage the others for now Last year we made a presentation to the faculty senate about the looming disaster if we are cut again This year we were the only unit I know of that was not cut So it helped But next year we start the crisis planning all over again I have to say that OhioLINK has been a godsend Besides having credits from the 'flip' from journal vendor to it, OL has negotiated lower inflation increases than the national average That saved our bacon ************************************************************************ We've cancelled Web of Science so far this year and are looking at other big-ticket items as well as some more journals ************************************************************************ I'm interested in what others are doing Especially MDC as the quality of texts (by far and away the primary use where I just came from) is being compromised Ovid I'm not at all a fan and we never had it at XXXX except for the books and then reinstated journals as they moved over as part of the Kluwer deal We have Ovid Medline and that I'll drop asap and any dup titles that we can get directly through the primary publisher as fast as possible ************************************************************************ We made the decision to cancel Web of Science in June It is saving us over $60,000 So far, we have heard not major screams, but it is only August We will be making many other cuts and we will certainly rely on the Library committee to help shoulder the burden on this ************************************************************************ So far we have not cut any large services but we are certainly cutting journals! Our University Libraries went to the all electronic version of Science Direct for 2003 It is not saving us any money, but is actually costing us an increase rate per title However, several of the science libraries did not want to be held to the "no cancellation" policy in effect with our print + electronic agreement So, we are actually getting much less for more $ We have cut a few seats on IPA and some other smaller items We will be cutting journal titles between 10-20% for 2004 I was pondering yet another go round of discussions with UpTo Date We have never licensed it, primarily because the company wanted to charge us for every hospital in the state! We not have a university hospital any more Previously they also informed us that they did not issue site licenses for educational institutions only for hospitals They have some new reps and we may be able to get educational/academic pricing However, they are reluctant to offer remote access Given the outrageously high estimates they have hinted at in the past, I'm not sure we can afford it But, it certainly is popular with students and faculty Up until now I've been telling our patrons that the company refused to deal with us -and also, that their individual subscriptions are much cheaper than what we would have to pay, should they be willing to sell us a site license ************************************************************************ We had a 12% budget cut this fiscal year (July-June) All our e-resources are shared with the main university library and cost shared as well Unless things change, ie the provost decides to slip us some extra bucks, we will be canceling Web of Science when it comes up for renewal in a few months This is a new resource for us, but we cancelled Current Contents when we got it last year, so we will have to go back to doing mediated searches of SCI on dialog for users and charging them for the service We plan to consider each resource as renewal dates arrive, see where we are financially, check usage data and no doubt make some hard decisions We're hoping the resulting outcry will generate some additional funding ************************************************************************ We haven't hit the wall yet, but have been under some stress through budget caps significantly below inflation and salary range adjustments for a couple of years and will have a flat budget next year We have cancelled some electronic resources, e.g., BIOSIS and will be canceling 300-500 print journal titles this year plus additional ones and more electronic resources next year ************************************************************************ Strategies of canceling print and going with "cheaper" online access is probably pretty universal This year we have elected to go with E-Choice from ScienceDirect We save the 10% on print but what happens next year? I preach and alert faculty about this dilemma but the real message comes out that we always manage to find the resources Is that good or is that sending a wrong message? Right now I have doubled my efforts at collaborative ventures With the launching of the web-based pathway PharmD program here we are getting much more support from the School of Pharmacy and Health Professions This has freed up some money for us to put into other resources I feel as if I am always just one step ahead of major cancellations and cuts It is an ongoing and never changing dichotomy As to canceling big ticket e-resources to date we have not done that Of course, we don't have MD Consult or UpToDate Too expensive upfront However, we have AccessMedicine, which gives us e-access to McGraw Hill books At some point I'll have to say, we can buy two copies of these textbooks in print, cancel AccessMedicine, and still be thousands of dollars ahead The only strategy is more money and the only way we'll get more money is through fund-raising, endowments, cash gifts These are not easy solutions but ones that I will be aggressively implementing this year Faculty demand online access What are we to do? I believe the regional medical library program needs to step in with aggressive archival plans to help the individual AHSL We can't all be archives of rare stuff or even keep all back volumes to volume one ************************************************************************ We not subscribe to MD Consult They keep telling us we are the only med school library who doesn't I tell them that keeps us unique! We subscribe to Stat Ref! and that seems to work for our institution Our main library has some sort of OVID subscription, but we not So far, our med students are getting through and our faculty haven't made any noise Maybe they just don't know what they are missing! ************************************************************************ We're making some cuts We're still canceling print and cutting monographs and binding to a bare minimum We nearly cut MD Consult, asked the dean for more money, were rejected, then reduced the number of seats instead (from 10 to 8) We're dropping small pieces of OVID, but not the whole thing As PubMed gets better and better, it's becoming harder to justify the added expense Micromedex is under consideration for next year (renewal isn't until next summer) The "big deals" through the University of XXXX system are both blessings and curses We're on a biennial budget, so we know this problem won't go away next year either ************************************************************************ After years of trimming journals in order to keep within budget (strained by a much higher inflation rate for materials than our very modest-to-low budget increases), we did start to look at "big" resources this year We've trimmed the margins for journals - now any cuts are starting to eat away at the core We cut two smaller databases this year - AltHealth Watch (Ebsco) and Health and Wellness Resource Center (Gale) We also trimmed two expensive print indexes from ISI And we cut BIOSIS - we also serve the biological sciences programs That came out of our funding from the Arts and Sciences, undergraduate College which was level-funded this year We looked very hard at MD Consult, hoping to replace it with STAT!Ref, Access Medicine, and/or Ovid's Books@Ovid, but the Clinic much preferred MD Consult and pay for half of the subscription We did cut back on concurrent users, though, reducing our cost but increasing "busy signals" We are now looking hard at Ovid, particularly at de-emphasizing Ovid MEDLINE We probably will substantially reduce the number of concurrent users on our user license and MEDLINE license We will emphasize PubMed in training medical students, residents, and other new users on MEDLINE We will keep some Ovid because we need it for digital access to many journals, and there are other full-text products we may want from them in the future We are de-emphasizing Ovid both for financial reasons and because we think that we are better serving life-long learners by teaching them an interface (PubMed) that they will likely have access to throughout their career rather than one (Ovid) that may not be available to them when they leave Dartmouth (or even at Dartmouth.) We looked at our Journals@Ovid and cut some titles that we also had from the publisher: Nature, Science, PNAS We've also transitioned most journals from big packages like Elsevier, Blackwell, Wiley, Springer, Kluwer, and Oxford to digital-only subscriptions beginning in 2004 This will save some money in subscription costs, binding, and labor, and will ease our space problems, but is a risk for long-term access and loses browsability But we feel we don't have a lot of choice since we have a geographically dispersed user base and can no longer afford to maintain multiple formats On the good side, we were able to add UpToDate last year and it is wildly popular ************************************************************************ We have run out of gas are going on the fumes now! We were functioning at such a low level of support, but it's getting worse, and I fret that administrators only see us an extraordinary overhead cost It's amazing at how some institutions place such a high priority, with accompanying financial support, on the library, and others make it by with what appear to be sub-standard programs It has literally become exhausting to continue to justify, encourage, educate about libraries and their importance - when it should be a given in the first place I had to have a talk with myself to try and calm down, not take it personally, and continue to try to what I can with poor staffing levels and a minimal collections budget And on top of it, I think that sometimes we are viewed, at the highest level, as administrative assistant types who work in a stress-free environment ************************************************************************ We've just been discussing our cuts here We're cutting $75,652 of journals from assorted publishers and Ovid products this year, including BioMed Collections 3&4, Clineguide and PsychINFO We are getting PsychINFO through our statewide consortium for a much lower price, and are also getting CINAHL through it (although we haven't dropped Ovid CINAHL yet because of the full-text journals with it) We will probably have to cut at least $200,000 of journals, etc for 2005, so we're trying to prepare for that now We're studying Up-to-Date, MDConsult, StatRef and some other clinical info products to see which ones are the best, and to see if there is a lot of duplication We will probably cancel at least one of these products next year We are also considering whether we will cancel more of the $200,000 in Ovid products we still get We may have to go with accessing these products through PubMed and other sources - our reference librarians will study alternatives over the next several months We are still paying for Current Contents through Ovid, and are considering whether PreMedline will be a good enough substitute for CC (we don't have Web of Science, which some people say they use as an alternative to CC) We're currently renegotiating with Elsevier for the journals we get through Science Direct (we only get about 200 journals, MDConsult, and BioMedNet Reviews from Elsevier) and want the price increase to be capped at 6.5% for the next three years, but don't want to be tied to maintaining our $300,000 spending level with Elsevier I've been promoting open access, BioMed Central, Public Library of Science, etc throughout the campus and have several more presentations scheduled, and we recently purchased an institutional membership in BioMed Central so that XXXX authors not have to pay the $500 per article fee to publish in BMC journals We hope that the open access movement will progress quickly, but it won't happen quickly enough to keep us from really hitting the wall next year We've cut 10 positions in the past few years, and cannot cut more and still keep the place open, so that's not an option ************************************************************************ We've been pretty fortunate that our budget has held steady, especially in light of our institutional finances However, prices continue to rise and there are new things we want to add that we can't often afford We have moved to electronic only access whenever possible and reallocated funds in this manner We have also reduced the number of simultaneous users for MD Consult We have never been big OVID users and have offered full text journals from them that are not available elsewhere - we've no duplicates in OVID and anywhere else We've also looked to Cambridge and others wherever possible to avoid using OVID We have never been able to afford UpToDate and are now looking to see if we can find money to add it even though our cost will be over $100,000 annually We have licensed eMedicine for us and our affiliate libraries and it has very good content, but a poor user interface ************************************************************************ We have had SCI on CD for many years We cut it for 2003 (about $25,000 if I remember correctly) There were a few complaints from regular users If someone wants a search the reference staff will it through whichever 3rd party mounts it, but we will charge it back to the individual We were going to cut Chem Abstracts (hard copy) but there are too many people who still use it Chem Abs is also in the neighborhood of $25,000 When users complain we tell them to let the Dean know that we need more money ************************************************************************ Yes, we've hit the wall Our current approach is to review the big packages such as Wiley, ScienceDirect, Blackwell and Oxford We're reviewing use statistics for each package We intend to ask for pricing on only those titles with use above a benchmark (not yet established) Because we purchase these packages with the rest of the university libraries system this review is a bit complicated Our usage of all electronics is so much higher than that of any other unit in our system Anyway, we have all agreed that if we cannot get acceptable pricing on our high use titles, we are prepared to cancel these packages and rely on document delivery and ILL In the meantime we've curtailed almost all new book/AV purchases and cannot entertain requests for any new subscriptions PS - At this point we aren't reviewing OVID or MDConsult Our usage for both of these is extremely high ************************************************************************ I cancelled Ovid about a year and a half ago and almost cancelled MDConsult Picked up Up-to-Date and went electronic only with quite a few things and will be doing more of the same there Renegotiated for better pricing, dropped some other resources Use Pubmed only now for the last year and a half or more Etc ************************************************************************ We hit the wall when we were told that we would lose 25% of our budget over years The budget cuts were further exacerbated by significant drops in our revenues, which offset material costs We will actually be losing about 30% of our budget and about 40 to 50% of our purchasing power when you factor in inflation The first year we cut the fluff from journals and databases and took a hard look at staff But even with a smaller collection, fewer books, and fewer hours the faculty thought the cuts were no big deal I realized that the journal cuts would catch their attention and would directly impact work at this institution, so instead of spreading the pain over several years, I decided to take the majority of the cuts this year, effective January 1, 2004 Coupled with a 12% price increase, we will have to cancel about 30% of our subscriptions (paper and electronic) and renegotiate almost all our electronic licenses I postponed further staff cuts and deep cuts in databases, hoping the journal cuts might restore support and at least prevent the projected future cuts I have repeatedly warned them that we might lose all electronic access to some publishers, but I really don't think they believe it We have said no to some of the new contract prices from major publishers such as AMA, Pediatrics, and Cell Press We will say no to other increases as well In terms of databases, we decided to cancel Ovid and move to other platforms for the non-MEDLINE databases We told Ovid this was happening and they came back with a deal that we could support at least for the next two years MD Consult is our next target for possible elimination We will soon start a review process for that contract I am also asking departments to help share the cost of some specialty databases We were able to obtain UpToDate through such shared funding and a very low price quote I am also seeking low contract prices for to years I am being harsher about the health system members They not want to pay, so they are not getting access to services If they complain, I send them a price quote and they disappear Whenever possible we have had our contracts extend to them when there is no extra charge But for most clinical resources, there is an additional fee, which we are not paying Books will be cut to a minimum amount next year in order to further protect staff positions, but some layoffs may occur And we have already started charging back the full fees for all interlibrary loans (including royalty fees) Again, the faculty have not felt the impact of the cuts that dramatically, but in January we will lose hundreds of subscriptions, including many e-journals, and at that point I think the institution will become aware of just how much our cuts will impact the ability of the institution to support clinical and research activities I actually hope the faculty start complaining loudly ************************************************************************ We have not yet hit the wall so to speak, but we are within a stone's throw This year we made major cuts in print holdings while retaining electronic access Next year, like you, we'll need to find other ways to reduce our expenses We probably won't cancel our Ovid services outright, but we may trim components No doubt our serial collection will also take a hit at least those not included in our "big deals" ************************************************************************ I was debating answering this question, but decided that our good news might help you I received a 5.6% collections increase this year from the medical school We have been cancelling print in favor of online, but have not had to worry about cancelling large services We don't have much $$ for staff, but there is usually $$ for the collections we have also been helped by this as we have a separate science library ************************************************************************ We have been cut 13.5% (that 5% is real important) We may receive yet another cut this year, but are being told that next year might be worse (how I can't think about yet) We cut OVID last year and moved to PubMed It is going great The links work and the searching via EBM is doing better all the time We hustle for funds and will attempt to charge for services that were free last year While information was never free, it goes against my grain to charge students for information, but that is what we may have to We have not seen any inflationary increases for the last couple of years, so in effect we have seen the budget cut around 4% for the last few years Our users want more information, our ablitliy to provide it is limited I wish you well, REVENUE FOREVER!!!! Additional comment regarding canceling OVID: Last year's 3.5% cut was my opportunity to separate myself from an expensive service which seemed to always promise more than you got PubMed is available to our graduates and residents when they leave here, OVID my not be That was my first argument My second was $ My third was the linking (we tried OVIDs a couple of years ago and got around 80% link and 65% print if they linked) The OVID folks worked with us but felt it was a problem on our end We didn't think the same, so we stopped the service ************************************************************************ Colorado has been one of the hardest hit for libraries because of state budget reductions The Governor line-item vetoed most state funding, so the publics are in a tailspin and the school libraries are also hurting Then he insisted on major reductions to higher ed., and in our case that led to a base budget reduction of about 25% being passed to the library in a 15 month period So, I've layed off staff and we dropped $400,000 of print journals for 2003, retaining them in e-form Now we are about to ask faculty for input by month end about cancellations for the coming year, to the tune of another $400,000 We are proposing dropping more print to retain electronic, drop some journals in both print and e-form, reducing book buying, and scaling back on databases Among the items that are sure to get some attention: dropping e version of AMA, NEJM and PNAS publications print only to remain dropping all or most of our Ovid databases and full-text dropping MD Consult (Uptodate and StatRef would remain) dropping Audiodigest and NCME videotapes In January we reduced hours because of layoffs, from 110 to 87 hours per week Our Boulder campus is talking about closing the library one day every weekend, and our downtown Denver campus is looking at closing the library on the other weekend day Because of the way our funding flows, the schools have not had the same cutbacks that were passed to those of us in central admin., so I think many of the faculty are going to be shocked at our numbers and the implications Oh, well, time for a wake up call! I actually think we might have been in worse shape if I hadn't quickly layed off staff and cut hours last fiscal year students screamed bloody murder, and I think the chancellor wanted to avoid a concurrent uprising of faculty so we didn't get hit as hard in the last round of cuts ************************************************************************ Fortunately, we haven't had to go this route just yet, but I would be very interested in seeing a summary of the responses you get ************************************************************************ We had some big cutbacks about years ago, and at that time I cancelled Chem Abstracts (print version totaling over $21K at the time) I substituted Beilstein's online, and although the Pharmacy faculty were unhappy at the cancellation, I did provide them with online access to at least some of the chemical information they needed We discontinued SilverPlatter and replaced it with OVID about years ago I cancelled BRAIN RESEARCH around years ago, after a lengthy process during which we posted the impending cancellation in our newsletter, via our website, and I wrote to each appropriate department chair and asked for rationales as to why we should continue this $15k plus family of journals Only one chair objected (and weakly at that), and so we cancelled it, but arranged to get needed articles via interlibrary loan Every year we constantly drop and add journal titles We have asked departments to suggest journal titles to cut if they wished to add titles (dentistry has been very good at doing this) We have a Collection Development program, where each library faculty member is assigned specific departments within a college, and I write in their faculty goals that they must contact their assigned department every year, present on library services, and solicit input regarding the collection (additions as well as those things that might be cancelled) This has worked well We also have a very active collection development policy The electronic databases have different renewal times and so advance planning is needed to cancel contracts (some of which require months advance notice) We have considered whether to cut OVID in light of how many faculty and students on campus are using PubMed, but OVID has a very good search engine and interface, plus useful links to our full-text journals, and so for the time being we will continue OVID (although we have looked at EBSCO Host) We try and cut journals only once per year in advance of our early fall payment I would not cut MD Consult here, as the usage statistics are so high plus it is one of the most useful online resources supporting clinical medicine We just increased from to user seats (although I have read that several HSC libraries are cutting back the number of seats but they seemed very high to me), but we have cut some of their special collections (and they discontinued Cardiology this year) We added a number of online journals and databases last year (e.g., Science Direct, SciFinder Scholar) since I was given an annual recurring addition to my base library budget, and I am just trying to hold on to what we have this year in light of a possible 10% fiscal impoundment ************************************************************************ 10 We are still up in the air as to whether or not we'll drop Science-Direct, Wiley, SpringerVerlag etc as we're waiting for final word on our 2003/04 budget (to begin Oct 1) We had planned to cut OVID which had been running us about $90,000 annually However, when we told OVID we were dropping they "worked with us" and let us drop some of the full text titles we didn't want anyway, plus they reduced the charges in a number of areas to bring our total bill down to about $38,000 A HUGE difference so we're keeping it We would have switched to PubMed We plan to keep WOS as of right now Originally, when we were given the bad news that our budget was being cut and that our "nest egg" from our foundation grant of over $800,000 was being taken by the dean, we were really shaken up Over and above our regular budget of $2mil plus, we had been spending $250,000 - $300,000 per year out of our Foundation money With that gone we've had to a nearly $400,000 shift downward Much of it was relatively painless as we had been using those monies for such things as a compact shelving project, getting the backfiles for WOS, etc Still, we had about $100,000k in electronic journals etc that we've have to eat up or cut As mentioned, we're still up in the air as to exactly how much more we'll need to cut We're waiting on a Sept 9th state vote on the Governor's revolutionary tax plan If the vote is in favor, then education will get a good shot in the arm If not, I shudder to think Right now the polls are running two to one against ************************************************************************ We are only subscribing to OVID CINAHL right now- all we could afford Thankfully I can go in with other libraries to access other databases Primarily we are using Ebsco as they have given us the best deal overall but this, of course, includes their business, etc If we were going it alone (as a medical) I'd really be having trouble 11