Saskatchewan’s Multitype Library Board Celebrates 20th Anniversary

May 20, 2016

By Melanie Hodges Neufeld

Congratulations to the Multitype Library Board on its 20^th anniversary! J. Michael Shires of the Dr. John Archer Library, University of Regina recently published “Celebrating Co-operation among Saskatchewan’s Libraries: The Multitype Library Board, 1996 – 2016” which provides the history of the Board:

Saskatchewan’s Multitype Library Board (MLB) celebrates its 20^th anniversary in 2016. It was established under the passage of the provincial government’s The Libraries Co-operation Act in 1996 to facilitate the co-operative development of the multitype library system in Saskatchewan. This legislation is unique in Canada. The MLB is a Minister of Education Advisory Board and it provides a forum to promote and facilitate co-operation among over 320 public libraries in 10 provincial systems, 25 post-secondary libraries, 755 school libraries, several special libraries, and other information providers. Major milestones of the MLB include helping to eliminate the Provincial Sales Tax on library subscriptions, establishing a provincial digitization plan, and creating a cross-sector database licensing program that has resulted in a projected value of 14.8 million dollars to Saskatchewan users in 2014. The development of the MLB and the impact of the programs it has initiated will be discussed, and recommendations for developing a collaborative initiative will be provided.

The Law Society of Saskatchewan is a proud member of the Multitype Database Licensing Program (MDLP)created by the MLB. The MDLP is a province-wide program in which libraries pool funds to purchase access to electronic information resources. The majority of these resources are non-legal, but there are a few legal databases, such as LegalTrac, Please see previous posts on how to access these resources and specifically on LegalTrac.