Post by Chris_Wendt on Jul 21, 2009 10:51:03 GMT -5
The following represents my personal opinion after observing Monday night’s Public Library Board of Trustees Meeting.
The meeting was heavily attended by a widely varied group of Wantaghvians, most of whom were not empathetic with the three Library Trustees who came to conduct their business. That there are serious and fundamental problems afflicting the Wantagh Public Library became painfully evident during the course of the meeting.
My purpose at this writing is not to castigate or excoriate the three Trustees who faced a rather hostile audience last night, but to outline the problems as I now understand them, and suggest some activity which may help solve some of them, as well as to enlist other ideas from fellow readers, intended to help the situation.
Problem #1 – No active professional Director running the operations of the Library. The designated Director has been suspended with pay and is facing charges before the Civil Service Commission, filed by the Board of Trustees. Without a professional Library Director, the trustees are left to attempt to run the Library Operations, albeit with no professional qualifications among them to do so. That is a recipe for failure, if not outright disaster.
Recommendation: I would be willing to personally mediate the dispute between the Director and the Board at no cost, in an attempt to reconcile their differences, recognize and then put aside the past sins of all parties for the greater good, and get the Director back to work rather immediately. This is going to require the Board to admit that the Director is the Library Professional, and that they are not Library Professionals. It is also going to require the Director to recognize and agree to respect the Board of Trustees as being responsible to set policy and establish his budget. Finally, it is going to require each individual Trustee to understand that she or he has no independent authority, and to understand that any authority they do possess only exists when they operate lawfully, as a Board rather than as individuals. I have labor mediation experience.
Problem #2 – Failure of the Library Board to adhere to their fiduciary responsibility and stewardship over the library facilities. This arose from the Trustees keeping facility maintenance & repair items too close to the vest, ignoring the advice of their professional director, applying legal advice to technical and aesthetic issues, and, failing to reach-out to the Wantagh community to tap professional resources available for volunteer service on a Facility Committee, similar or even identical to the School District’s Buildings & Grounds Committee.
Recommendation: In addition to restoring the professional Director to active duty, the President of the Library Board should work with the President of the Board of Education to understand how to form and utilize citizen volunteer committees for such activities as facilities improvements and budgeting.
Problem #3 – Lack of sophistication and lack of awareness of key laws, inadvertent violation of applicable laws by the Library Board of Trustees, resulting in a public relations disaster.
Recommendation: Library Trustees should seek immediate training concerning their responsibilities under the NY Public Officers Law, especially the sections of that law known as the Open Meetings Law, and, the Freedom of Information Law. In order to remediate the public relations disaster in which the trustees find themselves embroiled, they should consider undertaking some staff development activities, preferably with the professional Director, concerning how to anticipate, prepare for, and effectively and lawfully respond to public inquiries, both at public meetings and in writing. I would be willing to help them by providing practical training in “boardsmanship” and dealing with the public.
ALL of their other problems can easily be resolved, IF the Library Trustees will avail themselves of help in the immediate resolution of the above Top Three problems.
The degree of apparent public hostility and aggravation toward the Library Trustees is a threat to the good order of the Public Library and of the Wantagh Public School District of which the Public Library is a subsidiary. While there may be no hard-and-fast connection between the operations of our library and of our schools, public resentment and anger against the Library Trustees could all too easily translate into a voter backlash against the school budget. Such a backlash occurred in Seaford over their Fire Department, which sunk a Seaford Schools’ Bond Proposition and their school budget, a number of years ago. It is in everyone’s best interest in Wantagh to have the Board of Library Trustees get their act together, and regain the trust, confidence, and respect of the public.
I wish to reiterate that the preceeding represents my personal opinion upon having participated in the Wantagh Public Library Board of Trustees Meeting on Juoly 20, 2009.
Seriously,
Chris Wendt
The meeting was heavily attended by a widely varied group of Wantaghvians, most of whom were not empathetic with the three Library Trustees who came to conduct their business. That there are serious and fundamental problems afflicting the Wantagh Public Library became painfully evident during the course of the meeting.
My purpose at this writing is not to castigate or excoriate the three Trustees who faced a rather hostile audience last night, but to outline the problems as I now understand them, and suggest some activity which may help solve some of them, as well as to enlist other ideas from fellow readers, intended to help the situation.
Problem #1 – No active professional Director running the operations of the Library. The designated Director has been suspended with pay and is facing charges before the Civil Service Commission, filed by the Board of Trustees. Without a professional Library Director, the trustees are left to attempt to run the Library Operations, albeit with no professional qualifications among them to do so. That is a recipe for failure, if not outright disaster.
Recommendation: I would be willing to personally mediate the dispute between the Director and the Board at no cost, in an attempt to reconcile their differences, recognize and then put aside the past sins of all parties for the greater good, and get the Director back to work rather immediately. This is going to require the Board to admit that the Director is the Library Professional, and that they are not Library Professionals. It is also going to require the Director to recognize and agree to respect the Board of Trustees as being responsible to set policy and establish his budget. Finally, it is going to require each individual Trustee to understand that she or he has no independent authority, and to understand that any authority they do possess only exists when they operate lawfully, as a Board rather than as individuals. I have labor mediation experience.
Problem #2 – Failure of the Library Board to adhere to their fiduciary responsibility and stewardship over the library facilities. This arose from the Trustees keeping facility maintenance & repair items too close to the vest, ignoring the advice of their professional director, applying legal advice to technical and aesthetic issues, and, failing to reach-out to the Wantagh community to tap professional resources available for volunteer service on a Facility Committee, similar or even identical to the School District’s Buildings & Grounds Committee.
Recommendation: In addition to restoring the professional Director to active duty, the President of the Library Board should work with the President of the Board of Education to understand how to form and utilize citizen volunteer committees for such activities as facilities improvements and budgeting.
Problem #3 – Lack of sophistication and lack of awareness of key laws, inadvertent violation of applicable laws by the Library Board of Trustees, resulting in a public relations disaster.
Recommendation: Library Trustees should seek immediate training concerning their responsibilities under the NY Public Officers Law, especially the sections of that law known as the Open Meetings Law, and, the Freedom of Information Law. In order to remediate the public relations disaster in which the trustees find themselves embroiled, they should consider undertaking some staff development activities, preferably with the professional Director, concerning how to anticipate, prepare for, and effectively and lawfully respond to public inquiries, both at public meetings and in writing. I would be willing to help them by providing practical training in “boardsmanship” and dealing with the public.
ALL of their other problems can easily be resolved, IF the Library Trustees will avail themselves of help in the immediate resolution of the above Top Three problems.
The degree of apparent public hostility and aggravation toward the Library Trustees is a threat to the good order of the Public Library and of the Wantagh Public School District of which the Public Library is a subsidiary. While there may be no hard-and-fast connection between the operations of our library and of our schools, public resentment and anger against the Library Trustees could all too easily translate into a voter backlash against the school budget. Such a backlash occurred in Seaford over their Fire Department, which sunk a Seaford Schools’ Bond Proposition and their school budget, a number of years ago. It is in everyone’s best interest in Wantagh to have the Board of Library Trustees get their act together, and regain the trust, confidence, and respect of the public.
I wish to reiterate that the preceeding represents my personal opinion upon having participated in the Wantagh Public Library Board of Trustees Meeting on Juoly 20, 2009.
Seriously,
Chris Wendt
