MAPE members celebrate Capitol Area Libraries

Minnesota government libraries and librarians are celebrating the 50th anniversary of their membership organization, Capitol Area Library Consortium (CALCO), this year. Several also held parties last week in honor of National Library Week and Governor Tim Walz’s recognition of CALCO’s formation.

CALCO libraries and librarians serve the information needs of employees working in the judicial, legislative and executive branches of Minnesota state government. CALCO’s specialized collections contain more than one million state government resources found nowhere else. They also have professional library staff, provide access to the public and some even host book clubs.

Department of Employment and Economic Development (DEED) Librarian Dru Frykberg said her main focus is serving the DEED staff and ensuring they have the information necessary to do their jobs and materials for professional development.

“I’m a one-person library and my focus is supporting the information needs of my 1,500 co-workers so they can work faster and better. DEED has such a variety of programs and staff including vocational rehabilitation counselors, labor market analysts, the Minnesota Trade Office representatives and many others. Our agency helps prepare the governor before he meets with companies, so I contribute to the research for those briefings,” Frykberg said.

In addition to DEED, CALCO membership includes libraries with the Departments of Education, Health, Natural Resources, Revenue, Transportation and Attorney General, Legislative Reference, Minnesota Historical Society, Perpich Center for Arts, Pollution Control Agency, State Law Library and State Services for the Blind. Learn more about CALCO at www.mn.gov/library.

The Department of Revenue’s library provides research services and resources on state and federal tax code and legislative policy to help agency employees serve their customers. As part of the tax research division, the library has supported Revenue employees with information resources on state tax laws, legislation and policy research for more than 60 years. The library is one of the original CALCO members and its online collection, linked in CALCO, is available through inter-library loan.

Dept. of Revenue Librarian Chris Anning, who does tracking for state and federal tax policy, sends a weekly or bi-weekly general newsletter. “Because I see incoming news, I curate news headlines and articles for people working on different tax categories so they don’t have to worry about missing things.”

The DEED Library is a co-founder of the agency’s Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Book Club, which is now in its sixth year. “We’re a co-facilitator so I am able to make sure

every participant has access to a book,” Frykberg said. “We meet every other month, and even through the pandemic we met virtually.”

This month, DEED book club members will discuss the One Book | One Minnesota statewide book group selection Follow the Blackbirds by Minnesota Poet Laureate Gwen Nell and Solito: A Memoir by Javier Zamora, which is the Hennepin County Library’s Mary Ann Key Book Club selection.

Several years ago, DEED’s book group won a lottery contest offered by the St. Paul Public Library’s Read Brave program to have St. Paul Mayor Melvin Carter join members to discuss the book Burn Baby Burn by Meg Medina.

CALCO members meet every other month. “When I started out as a librarian and was new to state government, CALCO gave me contacts who could answer my questions about catalogues, tools and techniques. We would take turns meeting at different libraries and seeing their collections. Since the pandemic, we’ve been doing more meetings virtually but are now planning some in-person CALCO celebrations this summer,” Anning said.