Upcoming 2024/2025 Elections and Voting
2025 Board Member Nominations
Vice President
Chip Halvorsen
I am presenting myself as a candidate for Vice President of koha-US because I value the organization’s work and want to contribute to its continued success. I have benefited from the work of the group greatly in my first year as a Koha system administrator. Koha-US conferences, webinars, SIG meetings, online resources, and group members’ participation on Slack and Mattermost channels are a great asset to the Koha community. My experience with library organizations dates to about 1990, when I volunteered at a small special library and served on its Board for several years – before I decided to change careers from newspaper journalism to public librarianship. Past experience also includes involvement in library technology committees for the Florida Library Association and Ohio Library Council, and attendance at user conferences for Drupal, SirsiDynix (COSUGI) and Polaris ILS (PUG).
Treasurer
Wally Deschamps
Our library migrated to Koha in late 2019 and added Aspen in 2022. I joined Koha-US in 2020 attending my first conference [post-pandemic] in McKinney. I have 30 years of experience in the classroom and education administration, and “retired” from there into the world of the public library where my technology intuitiveness allowed me to shine, especially during the pandemic when I developed alternative workflows and systems processes to manage the uncharted waters of the pandemic world for our library. I believe I channel the ghost of some CPA whose spirit hasn’t yet completely “crossed over” as I am a speadsheet-ophile. I’m neck-deep in Excel every day! I love for puzzle pieces to fit, things to balance, and for everything to be in a state of equilibrium. I have presented at the last two Koha-US conferences and am becoming more and more involved in Koha-US with each passing day. The people are wonderful and are the best resource group I’ve ever known. I am honored to be nominated potentially serve as Treasurer. Working the John Sterbenz will be a joy. Helping the Board develop and prioritize steps towards Koha-US’s next growth spurt is what I look forward to doing in this role as well as simply “being around and helping out” whenever and wherever possible.
Rhonda Kuiper
My name is Rhonda Kuiper and I am running for the position of koha-US board treasurer because koha-US is an organization that has made a difference in my experience with Koha as an ILS. My previous experience as a board member helped me understand the value of community among Koha users and I want to support koha-US with my membership and time so the organization can continue to grow and support more Koha libraries. I also like to encourage new people to get involved with koha-US so I would be thrilled to see a first-time board member elected to this position. (Go Wally!)
Member at Large (Supported)
Ed Veal
My first involvement with the koha community was when I attended Kohacon09 in 2009 and have been member of the community ever since. From 2011 to 2016, I worked with ByWater Solutions, supporting and training librarians in koha. I then joined the McKinney Public Library in 2017, serving as Systems Librarian until 2021, and Branch Manager from 2021 to 2024. I am now serving as the Library Manager for Anna Community Library, where we’ll also be using koha. My varied roles in both administration and systems give me a broad perspective, which I’d love to bring to the koha-US board as Member at Large – Supported.
Member at Large (Unsupported) (1 year term)
Fred King
Fred King a medical librarian at MedStar Washington Hospital Center in Washington, DC, where he has worked since 2005. During his first week there, he asked who the sysadmin for their ILS was. “You are,” everybody replied. As staff dwindled due to retirement and budget cuts, he also became the cataloging department, tech services department, and half of the reference department. To his immense delight staff was expanded earlier this year and he is now only one third of the reference department.
Fred is no stranger to Koha. He migrated his library from another system to Koha in 2013, without a vendor, only supported by information he picked up online. He also created the MedStar Authors’ Catalog, converting Medline records to MARC and modifying Koha’s results and detail templates to display relevant information. He has spoken about Koha at a variety of conferences, including ones for the Medical Library Association, ALA’s Association of College and Research Libraries, Internet Librarian, KohaCon, and, of course, koha-US. Earlier this year he presented his poster “Introducing Koha” at the Special Libraries Association conference.
Fred is no stranger to koha-US, either. He has been a member since the founding of koha-US and served as its first Member at Large, which then split into Supported and Unsupported. He sees the position of Unsupported Member at Large as an opportunity to promote Koha for smaller libraries that can’t afford a support vendor but want an ILS, and has offered encouragement to libraries in the US, Europe, Africa, Asia, and South America. Most recently he built a Koha instance for a library in Thailand.
Fred is no stranger than anyone else who might hold the position, despite being known on six continents for being the travelling companion of a stuffed chicken. Being Member at Large Unsupported is one of the ways he can give back to koha-US and to the Koha community in general.
When Fred isn’t doing his day job or writing about himself in the third person, he enjoys playing with his two dogs, trying to get his home computer network to work, reading or listening to books, and sitting in his favorite chair.
For details about these positions click here. This is a great opportunity for folks in the Koha community to contribute, and it also looks great on your resume. As stated in the Bylaws, nominees must be members in good standing at he time of the nomination. Members that have served on the board have found it educational, and very rewarding. If you have any questions, please let us know.
2025 koha-US Conference Venue Proposals
Option #1: Parma, Ohio (Greater Cleveland Area)
Option #2: Providence, Rhode Island
Option #3: Fargo, North Dakota
Dates: 9/17/25 – 9/20/25 (Wednesday – Saturday)
Host: Fargo Public Library
We hope you will consider the Fargo Public Library for Koha US in 2025. Fargo, ND is an ideal location to host the conference with a central location, service from 3 major airlines and plentiful accommodations. We are eager to meet and collaborate with Koha librarians from all over the United States in 2025.
Conference Facilities: The Main Library has a large room that seats 100 without tables or about 50-60 with tables. There are also two smaller rooms, one of which seats 15-20 with tables and another that seats 10-15.
We are also arranging for the Sky Commons across the plaza from the library. This will seat another 50 people.
Technology: All rooms are equipped with either a projector or monitor and the large rooms have microphones and ceiling speakers for media.
The facilities share a 1 Gbps wireless connection.
Travel: The Hector International Airport is served by Delta, American, United, Allegiant and Frontier. It is a 15 minute drive from the downtown library. Fargo is served by Uber, Lyft, local cab services, and most major car rental firms are available. Hector is also served by the Landline bus service from Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport (about 4 hours).
Accommodations: Downtown Fargo has 3 hotels of varying costs: Jasper Hotel, Hotel Donaldson and Radisson Blu, all of which are within 2 blocks of the library. Closer to the airport and within a 10 minute drive are the Candlewood Suites and Hilton Inn. Farther south there are many other hotels available.
Local restaurants: There are about 20 restaurants within a three block walk of the downtown library. Including:
Pizza: Blackbird Woodfire Grill, Spicy Pie, Sammy’s Pizza
Korean: Little Brother
Upscale: Rosewild, Mezzaluna
American: Vinyl Taco, Toasted Frog, Blarney Stone, JL Beers
Breakfast: Black Waffle and Coffee, Marge’s Diner
Ice Cream: Silver Lining Creamery
Sandwiches and Chains: Erbert and Gerbert, Smiling Moose Deli, BurgerSear
Seafood: Beer and Fish Company