The Federal Library and Information Center Committee (FLICC) continued its mission "to foster excellence in federal library and information services through interagency cooperation and to provide guidance and direction for FEDLINK."
A FLICC working group assisted the new Department of Homeland Security in providing information services for its staff of 180,000 from multiple agencies and hiring a new library services director for the new agency. Other FLICC working groups implemented a leadership and management education series for current and potential federal library managers and addressed issues on cataloging, digital project management, preservation and binding, virtual reference and other information science policy issues.
Held March 25-26, FLICC's annual information policy forum, "E-Competencies for E-Government: Changing Role of the Federal Information Professional," focused on the major information issues ushered in with the E-Government Act and identified the skills needed to address developing trends in electronic content. The annual FLICC awards for excellence in federal libraries were announced on this occasion.
FEDLINK continued to provide federal agencies with cost-effective access to an array of automated information retrieval services for online research, cataloging and interlibrary loan. FEDLINK members also procured print serials, electronic journals, books and other publications, CD-ROMs and document delivery through Congress/FEDLINK contracts with more than 100 major vendors. The program obtained further discounts for customers through consortia and enterprise-wide licenses for journals, aggregated information retrieval services and electronic books.
