Government Relations Committee Annual Report

Membership

Joe Mitzenmacher, Committee Chair
Eugene Giudice
Sally Holterhoff
Dave Rogers
Konya Lafferty, Board Liaison

Objectives

The main charge of the Committee is to monitor issues of interest to the law library community and report on those issues to the membership. The Committee’s projects for 2016-17 were to update CALL’s “Finding Illinois Law Guide,” to contribute to the CALL Bulletin by updating CALL members on state and federal legislative items of interest, to work with the Continuing Education Committee on a brown bag lunch or other educational session on government information, and to work with Congressman Quigley’s office on making CRS Reports more widely available.

Meetings

The GRC met once this year, via conference call, on September 16, 2016.   All other communications were over the phone or via email.

Accomplishments

  •  Presented (with members of the CALL Executive Board) Congressman Mike Quigley with the CALL Legislator of the Year Award (August 2016)
  •  Hosted Emily Feltren, Director of the AALL Government Relations Office, at Denton’s for a talk on Law Librarian advocacy on April 6, and shared her presentation with CALL members via the CALL Web site.
    o Total attendance: 12 at $5.00 per attendee
    o Total expenses: $92.55 for dessert tray and boxed lunches
  •  Wrote an article for the Winter 2017 CALL Bulletin to promote the Emily Feltren talk.
  • Promoted AALL’s Virtual Lobby Day (April 26) via the CALL Web site and Listserv.
  •  Prepared a letter to Congressman Quigley’s office regarding CALL’s support for his CRS Reports bill (H.R. 2335).