2026-06-01 Resource Access Meeting Notes

Date: Jun 1, 2026 

Recordings

NOTE: RESOURCE ACCESS SIG USES EITHER ZOOM’S AI NOTES FUNCTIONALITY OR GOOGLE GEMINI TO PROCESS THE TRANSCRIPT. If you would prefer that we do not use AI any session you attend, we are happy to! Please alert the convener at the start of the meeting.

Find all recordings here: https://recordings.openlibraryfoundation.org/folio/resource-access-sig/ (pw: folio-lsp)

Zoom

https://zoom.us/j/337279319 (pw: folio-lsp)

Attendees

@Susan Kimball

@Katie Rahman

@Scott Peterson

@Olga Kalachinskaya

@Jacob Dudley

@Amelia Sutton

@Erin Weller

@David Bottorff

@Magnus Andersson

@Joseph A Molloy

@Steve Strohl

@Martina Tumulla

@Cornelia Awenius

@Thomas Trutt

@Robert Heaton

@Anja Kakau

Discussion Items:

Meeting Notes

AI-Generated minutes (pardon any errors)

Discussion Points:

• Announcements and Upcoming Schedule (00:03:14 – 00:07:20)

  • Susan Kimball opened the meeting and shared the link to the session's meeting notes in the chat.

  • There will be no Resource Access meeting on the upcoming Thursday (June 4, 2026) due to a German holiday.

  • On Monday, representatives from Missouri will join the agenda to present and discuss desired adjustments to the user interface modal/pop-up window that appears when an item is already checked out.

  • On the following Thursday (June 11, 2026), the committee will reconvene to continue its systematic review of the historical JIRA ticket backlog.

• Item Cost Field Evaluation: JIRA:UXPROD-4776 vs. JIRA:UXPROD-4987 (00:07:20 – 00:38:00)

  • Katie Rahman introduced a cross-group coordination point from a recent Metadata Management SIG meeting regarding JIRA:UXPROD-4776, which is the Resource Access ticket for an item cost field on the item record written by Joseph Molloy. The Metadata Management group observed that with the new Trillium release, JIRA:UXPROD-4987 successfully implemented an "acquisitions accordion" on the item record, which includes an "item cost" field. They requested clarity on whether this completed work satisfies Resource Access needs, which would allow JIRA:UXPROD-4776 to be officially closed.

  • The Resource Access SIG identified a critical, non-negotiable gap: the item cost field delivered via JIRA:UXPROD-4987 is a non-editable, materialized view pulled dynamically from the acquisitions module rather than standalone data written directly to the item inventory record.

  • Joseph Molloy detailed that the Trillium field calculates cost by dividing the expended amount from encumbrances by the total order quantity. This calculation results in an inaccurate average cost that fails to reflect actual retail or replacement value. For example, when libraries purchase a bundle of five distinct items under a single Purchase Order Line (POL) for $100, FOLIO currently applies the full $100 charge to the first item and $0 to the remaining four when generating lost item charges. This results in a single patron being overcharged $100, which subsequently forces staff to pull secondary reports and perform intensive manual corrections.

  • Thomas Trutt and Joseph Molloy raised substantial data migration and systemic gaps. Migrating institutions (such as Cornell or libraries moving off systems like Horizon) frequently choose not to ingest historical acquisitions metadata into FOLIO, or they simply do not possess it.

  • Susan Kimball and Thomas Trutt pointed out that circulating non-book equipment (such as a $150 camera, a media bag, or a charger) is rarely processed through standard acquisitions workflows. Because these objects bypass acquisitions, they do not generate an acquisitions accordion on the item record, rendering it impossible to track or levy replacement fees via the new field.

  • Joseph Molloy highlighted the legal compliance issues faced by public libraries, which are statutorily required to report annual accounts receivable and precise total collection values (both inside and outside physical facility walls) to state regulatory agencies. Relying on an uneditable, average-based acquisition value fails to meet these legal accounting standards.

  • David Bottorff and Thomas Trutt concluded that editing acquisitions data directly from an inventory screen is a fundamental workflow violation ("anathema") for acquisitions departments. Therefore, rather than altering the logic of JIRA:UXPROD-4987, the committee agreed that the business needs of acquisitions and fee/fines are fundamentally incompatible. JIRA:UXPROD-4776 must remain open to secure a dedicated, decimal-based, staff-writable item cost field in inventory that operates independently of acquisitions telemetry.

• Fee/Fine Working Group Update (00:38:00 – 00:40:20)

  • Thomas Trutt provided a status update on the small group established to review Fee/Fine enhancements. Their final meeting was a streamlined session focused on consolidating direct user feedback and operational frustrations.

  • Having mapped out the core concepts, Thomas announced he will transition into generating a comprehensive set of standalone JIRA tickets to address these pain points.

  • Because the primary exploratory work is complete, Thomas proposed that the small group dissolve its regular recurring Thursday sessions. The small group will move to an ad hoc meeting model, reconvening exclusively when individual topics require focused development work or targeted reviews.

• WolfCon Presentation Planning (00:40:20 – 00:42:00)

  • Thomas Trutt informed the group that he and Laura Daniels intend to collaborate on a presentation proposal for the upcoming WolfCon conference.

  • The presentation will focus specifically on detailing the lifecycle, design logic, and current behaviors of "Item States" within FOLIO.

• JIRA Ticket Prioritization Strategy and Gap List Integration (00:42:00 – 00:53:16)

  • Susan Kimball and Katie Rahman outlined a new framework to tackle Resource Access's massive backlog of historical JIRA tickets. While other SIGs (such as ERM) manage small, fresh backlogs from inception, Resource Access is burdened with hundreds of legacy tickets, rendering standard prioritization practices ineffective.

  • The SIG agreed to use the existing Resource Access "Gap List" document as an initial baseline representing high-priority community desires, despite its operational flaws. Susan noted that the gap list is not a clean one-to-one match with JIRA; a single requested community feature frequently maps across four separate JIRA tickets, which can cause user confusion.

  • The new prioritization process will involve labeling a specific set of tickets from the Gap List in JIRA and instructing community members to apply native "thumbs-up" voting reactions to the features they want developed. This dynamic approach replaces a rushed exercise from last year where members were given 25 points to manually distribute across a spreadsheet to satisfy a Product Council request for a "Top 5" list (with a quick turnaround time).

  • Concurrently, the group is engaging in routine backlog maintenance ("care and feeding"). They have successfully identified tens of legacy, duplicate, or obsolete tickets for proposed closure. Olga noted that at the conclusion of this purge, if an institution discovers a closed feature they still require, they retain the right to submit a clean, updated ticket. All Thursday meetings will be dedicated to group JIRA ticket reviews now that the Fee/Fine Working Group is pausing regular meetings.

  • David Bottorff highlighted an institutional concern, noting that universities with multiple active representatives (such as UChicago) must internally coordinate their voting behaviors to ensure they do not double-vote or inadvertently skew community metrics.

• Shelf Reading and Stack Maintenance Inventory Tools (00:53:17 – 01:03:35)

  • Jacob Dudley asked whether there was a shelf reading and stack maintenance inventory functionality in FOLIO. He questioned whether the Resource Access SIG should officially document this within their Gap List.

  • Thomas Trutt mentioned that Lehigh University had developed an application, which utilizes a Python and Google Sheets architecture. He clarified that two separate tools were launched concurrently, with one explicitly built around Google Sheets. He raised a sustainability warning: open-source community additions often face an operational bottleneck where initial developers complete the build, but no secondary development team is assigned to provide long-term code maintenance and version upgrades to ensure it stays functional as FOLIO matures.

  • Katie Rahman remarked that stack maintenance and inventory operations frequently slip through organizational cracks within the FOLIO governance structure. Collection management and materials selectors lack a dedicated SIG, Metadata Management personnel do not oversee physical stacks, and Resource Access members are rarely involved in collection development, meaning stack coordinators occupy an isolated space on the periphery of these modules.

  • Jacob Dudley and Susan Kimball debated consortium voting dynamics under this new JIRA-centric model. Using the Five Colleges consortium as an example, they questioned whether a shared network should vote as a singular installation or as five autonomous institutions. Susan resolved that since voting requires an active JIRA or Confluence account, participation will naturally self-regulate, counting individual active contributors within the community rather than forcing rigid institutional block voting.

✅ Decisions Made:

• Decision on JIRA:UXPROD-4776: The Resource Access SIG explicitly decided not to close JIRA:UXPROD-4776. The uneditable average-cost field delivered via JIRA:UXPROD-4987 in the Trillium release serves acquisitions visibility but fails to meet the operational, legal, and multi-item billing requirements of Resource Access fee/fines and actual cost workflows.

• Decision on Small Group Schedule: The Fee/Fine working group will pause its recurring weekly Thursday meetings. The group is officially transitioning to an ad hoc schedule, reconvening only when specific design elements or development-ready tickets require immediate collective attention.

• Decision on Prioritization Method: The committee agreed to adopt the Resource Access Gap List as their baseline framework for organizing the JIRA ticket backlog. They will utilize native JIRA thumbs-up reactions for active community voting, replacing standalone scoring spreadsheets.

📄 JIRAs:

• JIRA:UXPROD-4776

  • Name: Item cost field on item record

  • Type: Feature (Epic)

  • Specifics Discussed: This ticket represents the core Resource Access requirement for a dedicated, staff-writable decimal field directly on the item inventory record to support actual cost billing, equipment tracking, and fee/fine workflows. The committee reviewed it against newly completed acquisitions features and determined it must remain open, as an uneditable acquisitions view does not satisfy circulation needs.

• JIRA:UXPROD-4987

  • Name: Acquisitions accordion / item cost field in item record (Trillium release)

  • Type: Feature (Epic)

  • Specifics Discussed: Recently completed and deployed in the Trillium release, this feature pulls live, non-editable data from the acquisitions module to display average cost (expended amount divided by quantity) inside an acquisitions accordion on the item screen. It was heavily analyzed by the group and deemed inadequate for actual cost billing because it cannot be modified by circulation staff, fails to display data for legacy items lacking a FOLIO order trail, and does not render for non-purchased equipment.