During the first half of the 2010 calendar year, representatives of the Alliance, DuPage, Metropolitan, North Suburban, and Prairie Area library systems met to explore ways to mitigate the serious fiscal situation for the state-funded systems and to safeguard services to the Illinois library community.
The strategy chosen is the merger of the five organizations, to begin operations as a single entity on July 1, 2011.
The new system will be named: Reaching Across Illinois Library System.
The pre-merger sites of the five systems are expected to remain online for at least a few months, while additional features are developed for the RAILS website. RAILS staff members will also review each pre-merger site's content and move select information to the RAILS site, the LLSAP sites, and other locations.
Update (29 June 2011, 9:35 p.m.) - Corrected file uploaded for Document 11.1 - RAILS Employee List.
Update (30 June 2011, 3:05 p.m.) - Added Document 14.2 - Paylocity Contract.
Update (30 June 2011, 4:30 p.m.) - Added revised Agenda and Document 9.1; uploaded revisions of several documents.
We have confirmed that there will be a physical quorum at the Burr Ridge facility. At the start of the Board meeting, a policy on participating by electronic means from remote locations will be considered and passed. This will allow the Board members at remote locations to participate in the remainder of the meeting.
There will be remote locations for the July 1 meeting, and they are listed on the board agenda on the Merger Website.
The meeting will also be available as one-way streaming video on the web (Windows required).
Download a 2-page color PDF to print as a handout.
System Staff Login
(Username and Password are needed only by system employees who edit the website.)
