Quantum² : InfoStars : Richard Huffine

Richard Huffine

The United States Environmental Protection Agency's Richard Huffine

The United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) stands apart from the typical institution or agency, as it is charged with both research and regulatory responsibilities dedicated to protecting human health and the natural environment. It is at this unique institution that we find our latest Quantum² InfoStar, Richard Huffine. As Program Manager for the EPA National Library Network, Richard works with twenty-eight EPA libraries across the country in the coordination of library services for Agency staff, contractors, and the public at large. Richard started with the EPA in 1996 as a contractor hired to manage the new Agency home page on the Web and coordinate a new team of "Internet Librarians". Since that time, Richard has been instrumental in charting a continuous course of development for the libraries, and in seeking new ways to define and structure the information center and its information professionals. At the same time, Richard has witnessed firsthand the value of information in action, as well as the increasing relevancy of the information professional.

"Information, and more specifically data, has played a key role in changing the way the United States views pollution and environmental protection." In acquiring and organizing information and data resources, the EPA libraries comprise a nexus of vital information transfer. The libraries range in size, from small, solo libraries supporting highly specialized research, to information centers of eight to twelve professionals supporting as many as 8,000 staff working on an array of projects. Despite the size differences, the libraries all offer traditional library services, such as interlibrary loan, reference, referral, and research, as well as more "cutting edge" services associated with libraries, information centers, hotlines and clearinghouses.

All of the approximately one hundred library professionals are connected by a "Desktop Library" of electronic resources that includes full text journals, and scientific, technical, and news databases. The information centers regularly offer training sessions to informally engage EPA staff in their research goals, and the most popular, Richard explains, is the "keeping up in your field" class, where a diverse group of professionals (scientists, economists, regulatory specialists) come together to learn about the Desktop Library. The Dialog Intranet Toolkit is integral to the Desktop Library, and Richard credits the variety of aggregated resources acquired through Dialog with the success of the resource for both EPA staff and librarians. The potential for integrating Dialog-supplied data with other internal systems using API’s is another exciting option that Richard is exploring now, for the Desktop Library is just the beginning of what will eventually be a "transformation from a set of twenty-eight distinct libraries to a coordinated national capacity for providing information services".

In addition to providing resources and services to the over 24,000 Agency employees and/or contractors, the libraries support the Agency's charge to ensure that the public is well informed about exposure to both natural and man-made toxins. Under the umbrella National Library Network, EPA libraries assist the public in navigating the complexities of environmental science and regulation from their individual locations, and through an expanding web presence.

That web presence is one of the areas where Richard's strategic involvement in the EPA's critical mission is apparent. One of Richard's primary responsibilities is the provision of information science expertise in managing the EPA’s Internet web site, and Richard has been active both in developing guidelines for site management and in defining policy issues that impact the Agency's presence on the web. Under his guidance, EPA librarians are adding metadata to Web sites, and developing and deploying taxonomies that help connect staff research with information of interest to the public. Richard coordinates this development, collecting the activities and subject areas within the EPA, and organizing resources appropriately. This effort has been integrated with the site's search engine, and has substantially improved the accuracy of search results, a direct result of the value added by librarians who understand the perspectives of both authors and potential readers.

Richard is also an active member of the Information Access Team, a cross-disciplinary group of librarians, information specialists, systems analysts, and computer specialists, which is part of EPA’s Office of Environmental Information. The group works with all EPA offices and programs to promote best practices in information management. Richard sees librarians as "translators" — people who understand both users and information systems — and notes how useful his librarian skills are now, with more "techies" leading organizations and making decisions about how systems and information will be managed. Richard has brought the library — and librarians — into the IT discussion and decision-making process, and his skills have been very useful in supporting IT decisions and helping users understand the interactions they must now learn in order to accomplish certain tasks. "After all, Information Technology doesn't do anything if there is no content to connect to!"

Richard feels he has been right in the middle of the evolution of library services into information services, with the potential of growth into something as yet undefined. Adding value to every interaction and every activity is key, says Richard, and must support the Agency's mission. "If we do it right, our library will integrate with our computer systems and knowledge transfers will begin to supplant information flows. Only the value added by librarians can make this transition occur."

Richard's most pressing goal is to nail down a clear cost accountability model of the value of information services for the future. Rather than simpler "cost recovery" schemes, Richard explains, his goals are to "develop workload and capacity planning in order to acquire the right information (and support services), share the costs and at the same time, be flexible in responding to the wide variety of needs our organization has throughout the year. Tying value to costs and, more importantly, ensuring that costs are not the only driver in decisions regarding information access are the most important activities I can undertake right now in my position."

When asked about the future, Richard acknowledges that there are horizons beyond what we've even dared to dream of. He sees the Semantic Web as part of that promise, characterizing it as "a wonderful playground for what may someday be possible." Richard maintains that in the interim, "libraries are about skills, people, and ways of thinking, just as much as they are about resources, books, and citations. We need to capture the intangible contributions of human indexing, filtering, and selection, and we need to understand the critical nature of these services in order to ensure that we will have the right skill sets to make the semantic Web a reality." In the meantime, for this Info Star, "Success today means embracing technology, translating between technical and non-technical users and resources, and finding the right information to connect the dots that ultimately protect the world we live in."