The association’s 75th anniversary took place in 1984 in Billings, Montana.  Reflecting the issues that were critical to its members, the conference theme was “High Tech, High Touch.” Michael Annison of Megatrends fame provided the keynote address, titled “Global Trends – Information Technology and Changing Social Patterns.”  Sessions included topics on the convergence of technology and human values in our profession and workplace.  A preconference led by Dr. Ruth Patrick from the University of Montana focused on the impact of automation on library organizations.  With over 920 members, PNLA played an important role in regional library activities.  Indeed, throughout the 1980s, membership remained high, reaching a peak in 1986 when nearly one thousand individual and institutional members filled the ranks of the association.

The eighties proved to be a productive and active decade for PNLA and its membership.  In 1979 the W.K. Kellogg Project grant of $300,000 was used to create the Career Development and Assessment Center for Librarians.  It was a pioneering effort that demonstrated technology can be an effective tool for change.  Sponsored by the UW’s School of Librarianship, the Washington State Library and PNLA, the three year project provided 89 librarians in the NW with an assessment of present and potential management skills and career development guidance. With the goal of identifying and strengthening the basic elements of management at every level of responsibility, the project resulted in more the addition of library management courses to library school curriculum as well as marking concerns related to discrimination against women as library managers.

At the annual conference in 1983, at Sun Valley in Idaho, the membership was notified of a $3.5 million grant from the Fred Meyer Charitiable Trust to support academic library mobilization of resources throughout Alaska, Idaho, Montana, Oregon and  Washington to satisfy research and scholarship needs, and LIRN – Library and Information Resources for the Northwest was created with Douglas Ferguson as director.

As a dynamic organization of committed library professionals PNLA continued to evolve well into its middle years.  At the 1985 conference in Eugene, for example, an Emerging Technology Committee was formed.  The conference included a keynote address by Dr. Terrence Deal of Vanderbilt University on corporate cultures as well as the following sessions: Survey Design and Research Methods, Computer-Assisted Reference Services, Software Evaluation, Data Base Management, Interpersonal Relations and Group Processes, and Selling a Library Media Program to Your Administrator.  A Hot Issues/Tough Topics discussion group reacted to questions about library governance and education, state aid, status of services to institutionalized patrons and censorship.  A post-conference demonstration of a new online catalog took place at the Eugene Public Library

In 1987, the silver YRCA medal was bestowed for the first time on author Robert Kimmel. The President’s Distinguished Service Award was also inaugurated to honor individuals who gave exceptional and long-standing service to PNLA.  The conference, which took place in Tacoma, featured Ken Kesey as the keynote speaker.  The former Merry Prankster spoke eloquently on the role of electronic literature, both for libraries and writers.  The conference theme – “Human Resources…the Essential Piece of the Puzzle” – once again brought attendees back to issues of personnel management and continuing education within library organizations.