It’s exciting to see DGI member Naomi House featured in the Library Journal, in the 22 February article Nine Questions with Naomi House, founder of I Need A Library Job.

I Need A Library Job (INALJ.com) is a mega-site for library and archives job postings and resources in the U.S., Canada, and other countries. The site grew out of Naomi’s own job-hunting experience and is now her hobby and passion:

My hope was to help at least one person find a job and now we are nearing 800 success stories and those are just the people who shared their success with me. There are many more.

Naomi started out solo and now has 150 volunteers helping. Some other figures:

 I had 3,700 [subscribers] to the daily email which transitioned to the INALJ Jobs pages in 2013. I have nearly 800 subscribers to the blog, and I will reach 1 million page views in the next month or two. In 2012 fans from 151 countries visited INALJ.com.

But this is just what she does in her spare time. Naomi has a full-time day job as a federal librarian, a job she found on a listserv.

Canadian federal government libraries have been facing serious cutbacks in 2012, and some federal government agency libraries have been closed. For background, see our May 2012 post, Major cuts for Canada’s federal libraries.

A 10 August 2012 article from Canada’s iPolitics, Closing doors on Canada’s history, provides an update and arguments in defense of the libraries:

To date, the Immigration and Refugee Board, Transport Canada, Public Works and Government Services Canada, Public Service Commission, National capital Commission and Canadian International Development Agency libraries have been closed. Other libraries, such as those at Citizenship and Immigration Canada and Human Resources and Skills Development Canada are scheduled for imminent closure. In still others, staffs are being drastically cut. …

The government has also been slowly and stealthily wrecking Library and Archives Canada (LAC), the flagship of Canada’s heritage keepers. At LAC, over thirty archivists’ and librarians’ positions are being axed, which in turn is leading to a reduction in programs, one involving the acquisition of new archival holdings. …

Since interlibrary loans will be completely eliminated by February 2013, readers wishing to consult books found only on LAC shelves will have to consult them on site at 395 Wellington Street in Ottawa. And those who can go to Library and Archives Canada will find that hours and services have been drastically cut.

Comments and additional information from Canadian members of DGI are welcomed.

The Library and Archives Canada (LAC) and other federal libraries and information services are facing severe cuts. Details from the Canadian Library Association (CLA) press release, 2 May 2012:

At Library and Archives Canada, 430 people have been given notices, with more than 200 jobs to be cut over the next three years, representing a reduction of 20% of their workforce. They have also had to cut their acquisitions budget, end their role in national inter-library loan activities, and cut the National Archival Development Program, which has provided funding to Canadian archival organizations to increase their capacity to preserve archival materials and make them available to Canadians. These cuts will negatively impact Library and Archives Canada’s ability to provide front-line services, resulting in reduced access to information for Canadians. …

CLA has also received reports that many libraries in federal government departments will be losing staff; some will be shuttering their libraries altogether. Not only does this result in less support for departmental staff and researchers to access relevant information; but as many of these libraries also provide direct services to the public, Canadians will be prevented from having access to that information. Affected departments identified so far include Agriculture Canada, Citizenship and Immigration Canada, Industry Canada, the National Capital Commission, National Defence, Public Works and Government Services, the Public Service Commission, and Transport Canada. Earlier this year, Human Resources and Skills Development Canada had already announced their intention to close that department’s library.

Canadian archivists plan to protest the cuts with an “On to Ottawa Trek” on 28 May 2012. For details, see: http://archiviststrek2012.tumblr.com/

Check the CLA Government Library and Information Management Professionals Network blog for more information and news updates.

Canadian government librarians, please feel free to comment on this post with additional information.

Did you know that SLA’s San Francisco chapter offers weekly updates on topics such as FOIA, copyright, and open access in their blog feature Intersect Alert?

Intersect Alert takes a broad sweep of the news at the U.S. national, U.S. state, and international levels. Take a look at the most recent issue (19 February) to get an idea of news items they summarize and link to.

Many thanks to the San Francisco Bay Region chapter for this outstanding resource!

We have a pleasant reminder for you. Beginning 1 February 2012, Statistics Canada will offer it’s standard online data and publications for free.

Here is what the December 2011 announcement said:

OTTAWA — On February 1, 2012, self-serve standard products available on the Statistics Canada website—including CANSIM and census data products—will become free of charge.

Statistics Canada will maintain current pricing practices for products such as print publications, maps, CD-ROMs, and custom products and services.

Licensing restrictions for the use of Statistics Canada data products will be removed.

[Hat tip to Amanda of Canada]

From the CIA website, as posted on 28 September 2011:

The World Factbook is expanding! The People category is now People and Society and includes eight new fields: Health expenditures (as percent of GDP), Physicians density (per 10,000 people), Hospital bed density (per 1,000 people), Maternal mortality rate (deaths per 100,000 live births), Drinking water source, Sanitation facility access, Children under the age of five underweight (%), and Obesity – adult prevalence rate.  Additionally, there is a new field in the Economy category, Unemployment, youth ages 15-24. The new datasets focus on the health and welfare of a country’s population, and provide information relevant to a country’s internal stability.

Didn’t make it to the World Library and Information Congress 2011 in Puerto Rico? Not to worry; IFLA was taking notes for you.

The group’s dedicated conference website, http://express.ifla.org/ , has day-to-day blog posts, photos, and videos.  The full programme includes links to the speaker’s presentation slides or submitted papers for the educational sessions.

Did you attend IFLA? Please share any notes and observations with us!

According to the Globe and Mail, “Statistics Canada will no longer collect and crunch numbers on the country’s annual marriage and divorce rates.” As reported in the news article, “The national statistical agency published its last national figures on marriage and divorce rates last week. It has been collecting divorce data since 1972 and marriage data since 1921. It pegs the cost of reinstating the collection at $250,000.”

News coverage:

Statistics Canada to stop tacking marriage and divorce rates, Globe and Mail, 20 July 2011

Statistics Canada to stop tracking divorce rates, Toronto Globe, Toronto Star, 20 July 2011

At the U.S. State Department this morning Secretary of State Clinton and Brazilian Foreign Minister Antonio Patriota announced the new multinational Open Government Partnership (OGP), to be formally launched in September 2011. Yesterday’s State Department DipNote blog post described OGP as “international initiative aimed at securing concrete commitments from governments to promote transparency, increase civic participation, fight corruption, and harness new technologies to make government more open, effective, and accountable.”

The OGP website is online at http://www.opengovpartnership.org/. OGP also has a Facebook page (https://www.facebook.com/pages/Open-Government-Partnership/194822890570242) and a Twitter account (@opengovpart).

We’ll be following OGP to see how it might make more government information from around the world available online.

Canadian open government data guru David Eaves provides some important updates in his blog’s latest post: Lots of Open Data Action in Canada, 8 July 2011. The post describes the new Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA) open data portal. Eaves comments that CIDA’s portal is “a solid start to what I hope will become a robust site” that “would be greatly enhanced if CIDA started publishing its data in compliance with the emerging international standard of the International Aid Transparency Initiative.”

In the 8 July post, Eaves also notes that the license for data.gov.ca has been updated recently, calling it “a step in the right direction, but still behind the open gov leaders.”