Greetings SGA members! I wanted to take this opportunity to communicate to you all about what the SGA Board has been doing in the first few months of 2022. We’ve had our fair share of Google Workspace related issues, one of which resulted in emails that were meant to go only to the SGA Board being directed to all SGA members. The Board worked diligently to communicate to the membership via the listserv about this issue. Thankfully, whatever the problem was evidently remedied itself and you are all saved from receiving emails related to votes on administrative handbook changes.

Big news to come out from January to April is that SGA no longer has a P.O. Box address! The P.O. Box has historically caused issues for the Board and upset the flow of certain operations. In place of the P.O. Box, the SGA Treasurer will be assuming the responsibility of having mail directed to their home address or opening a temporary P.O. Box for the term in which they serve as treasurer. The Board hopes that this new approach to mailing results in less issues overall with receiving checks in a timely manner. Information regarding the current treasurer’s mailing address has been communicated to members via the SGA listserv. You can also email Josh Kitchens, our treasurer, at treasurer@soga.org and he can provide you with the current mailing address. 

In other news, the call for proposals for the annual meeting this October has been announced by the Annual Meeting Program Committee. I encourage you all to review the CFP and consider submitting a session or poster proposal. For our student members, I encourage you to consider a poster or paper/presentation submission. Last year we held our first student research showcase. It would be wonderful to be able to again highlight the work of up-and-coming professionals in the information science field. The Program Committee has created a Google spreadsheet to connect individuals seeking ideas and/or collaborators for session and poster proposals. While the spreadsheet is not monitored by SGA or the Program Committee and is not part of the official submission process, it can be a quick way to share session ideas and connect interested parties. I encourage you to add your session proposal ideas to the aforementioned spreadsheet. 

Thanks to SGA members’ feedback, the Board is also proceeding to work with the Georgia Library Association (GLA) to discuss the potential for planning a joint conference in 2023 or 2024. As planning talks with GLA become more concrete, I can assure you that pertinent information will be communicated to members accordingly. 

Also, a big thank you to those members who acted on the advocacy call that came out in early April regarding House Bill 1084. Since that advocacy call, the bill was passed by the Georgia Senate and recently signed into law by Governor Kemp. The Board is currently discussing the formation of a statement to be released regarding this action. 

That hits the highlights as to current work of the SGA Board that members might find of interest. Board members will continue to keep you apprised of upcoming activities via the listserv, so stay tuned! And as always, thank you for your continued support and commitment to SGA.