Have you considered Zero based budgeting?  Reallocate your funds.  Ask
each department to start the selection process from scratch.  They must
choose the titles they want given their new budget.

Sherry Palmiter
Bibliographic Control Librarian
Lemieux Library
Seattle University
<PALMITER@SEATTLEU.EDU>

-----Original Message-----
From: Peter Washkevich [mailto:washkevich@MARSHALL.EDU]
Sent: Friday, January 14, 2000 11:54 AM
To: SERIALST@LIST.UVM.EDU
Subject: Serials Cuts Strategies

Our library is currently facing drastic serials subscription reductions,
due to costs we can no longer hope to keep up with.

I'd like to know how other libraries have come up with strategies for
deleting subscriptions.

We've talked about a departmental survey, in hopes of identifying core
journals.  In fact, we pulled out the last one, done around 5 years ago.
Problem is, one department we looked at identified nearly all their
journals as core titles!

We've discussed using electronic resources that include full-text titles
we subscribe to in hard copy, as replacement for the hard copy.  But what
if the electronic title disappears from the online database?

We've talked about going from department to department on campus, and just
laying out the numbers, asking for suggestions for cuts.

I'm sure other libraries are faced with this same old story...serials
costs rising at a rate too fast for budgets to keep up with.  When cuts
become a necessary reality, what strategies have others come up with to
reduce costs, without compromising the collection's ability to support
curriculum?

Peter Washkevich / Marshall University
 <washkevich@MARSHALL.EDU>