Flood Damaged Items

Just a quick reminder on how to deal with flood damaged items for different accounts via Esther P. Reyes:

Fines and Fees:

• The Symphony system has been set to see 04/18/2016 as a closed date for fines purposes.  No fines will accrue for those days.
• Fines that accrue for other overdue days are legitimate and should be collected.

Items damaged/lost as a result of the 04/18/2016 flood:

• Check in the item from the customer record.
• Check the item out to your locations 160418FLOOD agency record.
• Dispose of the damaged item.

Accounts in Collection:

• Items reported as flood damaged on accounts In Collection will not be forgiven.
• Charges remain owed on these accounts.
• Refer customers in collection with concerns about flood damaged items on their accounts to Circulation Administration.

Flood Damaged Item Discards:

• Look up your location’s Flood Damaged Item account:
• In Check Out, use the User Search Helper to look up the account using the following name: 160418FLOOD, then select the account with your agency’s acronym (ALI, CEN, BLU, etc.).
• Or look the account up by using the following pattern: 160418FLOOD- followed by the agency acronym, such as 160418FLOOD-ACR.
• Check the flood damaged item out to your location’s Flood Damaged Item account.
• Dispose of the flood damaged item.

Holds:

• Items set to expire from the Holds Shelf on 04/19/2016 will be extended to 04/21.

If you have additional questions or concerns, please contact Circulation Administration at circinfo@hpl.lib.tx.us or at 832-393-2222 (choose option 3).

Children's Book Celebration Art Contest

Below is an important announcement from Youth Services about a current contest for our juvenile customers.  Please, read the rules so you're familiar with them.  If you need clarification, you can direct questions (and customers) to Lauren.

CONTEST RULES:

1. Participants must be children in grades K-6.
2. Imaginary Friends may be created using any art medium. Participants will then take pictures with their imaginary friend for contest submission. 
3. Photos will be judged on creativity of poses with your imaginary friend.
4. Original art only. Traced or copied artwork or images will not be accepted. Please do not use copyrighted images.
5. Photos of contestant with their Imaginary Friend should be taken using the free app InstaBooth using the “Original” filter (i.e. No special filter). The 3 picture vertical photo strip should be used. If you do not have access to a smart phone or tablet, you can have your photos taken at any Houston Public Library Neighborhood Library location or Central Library.
6. One person per entry and one entry per person.

SUBMISSION GUIDELINES:

1. Photos of contestant with their Imaginary Friend should be taken using the free app InstaBooth using the “Original” filter (i.e. No special filter). The 3 picture vertical photo strip should be used. If you do not have access to a smart phone or tablet, you can have your photos taken at any Houston Public Library Neighborhood Library location or Central Library.
2. Submissions should be saved or renamed using the following format: Child’s Full Name_Child’s Grade_Parent’s Name_Email or Phone Number
• Example 1: DonnieGold_1_LeighGold_832-393-1313
• Example 2: Donnie Gold_1_LeighGold_lgold@iluvbooks.com
3. Submissions should be uploaded to the childrensbookcelebration@gmail.com Google Drive or emailed to childrensbookcelebration@gmail.com.

FOR STEP-BY-STEP INSTRUCTIONS CLICK HERE.

.

Meyer/Frank FYI

Here's some news you can use from across the system!

• First, from Stella Link's auspicious youth blog:

A printable Flip Kit survey!

• Second, a great tip from Park Place Regional's amazing team blog:

Trick to Fixing Coin Copier Card Reader 

"I figured this would be helpful when a card is jammed in the coin copier card reader. To get the card out hold the top button down while pressing the bottom button three times. If this does not fix the problem, you can unplug the card reader, wait 10 seconds, plug it back in and the card may pop out. If all else fail, call Coin Copier. The number is located on the right panel of the blog."

• Third, from Looscan's awesome staff blog:

Library Card Creation Date 

"Did you know you can see exactly when a customer signed up for their library card by clicking on their name when in Display User? Customers who had cards before we transitioned to Sirsi will have a 7/5/2013 user date created.  This is a handy tool to use when making sure new customers have had their cards for at least 30 days when checking out laptops."

Also

eResource Central (eRC) 

"eResource Central (eRC) allows customers to place holds or download eBooks from the public catalog rather than going to the vendor site. eRC also allows you to see what ebooks you have checked out and what ebooks you have on hold inside your HPL catalog account. 

eRC currently works with the following vendors: Overdrive, Recorded Books, Axis 360, and Hoopla. 

When eRC is implemented the ebook records in the catalog will be coming from a separate SirsiDynix eRC server that keeps track of our holdings with the participating vendors. 

There are significant changes to the electronic resource check out process. See this document posted to the HPL Training Portal."

• And finally, here's some important information from the city's IT team:

[tl;dr: our email server has been updated to stop some messages with sensitive information in the subject, body, and/or attachments of an email.  It will bounce the email back to you and ask for verification that you want the information sent.  If this happens, see the guidelines listed bellow.] 

Server Security Upgrade 

"As part of the effort to secure sensitive emails, our infrastructure that handles email encryption has been updated. The new “Proofpoint” servers now have the ability to scan attachments in outbound emails. When it is determined that an email may contain Personal Health Information (PHI) – dealing with health care, or healthcare coverage,  Personally Identifiable Information (PII) – such as Social Security Numbers or Credit Card Information (PCI-Payment Card Industry information) “Proofpoint” will automatically encrypt the email and notify the sender with a message similar to:

“The City of Houston Data Loss Prevention service indicates that your email probably contained social security number information, and automatically encrypted your message. In the future, add the keyword [encrypt] in the subject line of emails containing this type of information to ensure protection of the data.”

The recipient(s) will receive an email with a link that takes them to the secure server allowing them to view/reply/forward the message.

Additionally, messages sent that are determined to have PII in the subject line will be rejected with the message:
“Your recent email was rejected as it appeared to have SSN data in the subject line. As this part of an email cannot be encrypted, the message will not be sent as is. Please edit the subject line to remove SSN data or potential SSN data and resend your message. If you need assistance contact HITS Security at HITSSecurity@houstontx.gov.”
To ensure all sensitive data is properly protected, before sending any emails that have PHI, PII, or PCI in the email or attachments, the sender must add the keyword [encrypt] to the subject line and force encryption. 

... 

The recipients of encrypted emails will click on the link to access the message on the secure server. If this is the first time they have done so, an account will be created based on their email address as the username, and they will supply the password. The encrypted email will appear as a web based email, and can be downloaded, replied to, etc.

Rejected emails must be edited to meet the compliance requirements and resent.

If you believe emails that do not contain sensitive data are being encrypted or the recipient cannot use the Proofpoint reader to access the encrypted emails, contact HITS Security for assistance."

~BAH