Libraryland #001
I played on my phone. Facebook, solitaire, the NYT Spelling Bee, email, the news, in a cycle, over and over. My phone tells me how long I spend on it. It tells me at the end of the day, like an accomplishment, around 9 or 10 at night, a “good job” commendation. Over six hours I logged, the other day. It’s totally in my phone’s interest that I spend time with it, glued to it. All the apps depend on me. So yeah, good job from my phone’s point of view.
But it’s evidence, concrete evidence I flip out of view with an upward finger swipe, that I’m in that space between, wandering. The space between something I’ve devoted myself to for fifteen years, and getting on with my life.
I’d like to tell you about libraryland. I left it, and now it’s safe to speak. That’s why I left. I wanted to speak. But working in a library means having to shut up.
Is that how you think of libraries? Well, maybe. The shushing librarian and all. Maybe the real reason librarians shushed so much throughout their history is that they – mostly women – were shut up. They were shushed. So they shushed.
I worked in public libraries for fifteen years, so although I didn’t start working in a library as a shelver at 16 and retire from libraries deaf and shuffling through the stacks at 84, I’m veteran enough to have learned something.
You have to be quiet in libraries. In so many ways I never anticipated. In ways the public hasn’t a clue.
Libraries won’t survive the massive societal changes that have been whirling about them and will continue to disrupt the status quo for years to come, if competent leaders aren’t allowed to speak, and make a few waves, and lead libraries toward evolving. Librarians need to make a little noise. And the boards running them, need to get comfortable with that.
That may never happen. Because many public libraries in the United States are structurally designed to be insular, incompetent, and to lack transparency.
I spent six years in grad school and fifteen years working in six public libraries in New York, to come to this conclusion.
I wasn’t just a librarian. Libraries were my life. I was 100% in. I went to town board meetings to advocate for their funding. I devoted myself to customer service like I was earning $5K (reality check: I earned about $5) for each oddball question I researched and answered, about space suits that can withstand bombardment by invisible aliens, and the reason penguins don’t fly, and the name of that yellow flower on your hike. I took very seriously the conundrum of where to shelve a memoir of sexual assault: in 092/Biography, or in 364.1532 (I chose the latter, so patrons looking for help on the subject would find all relevant books in one place).
It comes down to this: library boards are extremely powerful and are made up of people who often know little to nothing about running libraries. But they think they know more than the directors and librarians with Master’s degrees in Library Science, and years of experience. It’s a situation that is almost impossible to change, because the legal structure supports it.
There are four primary types of public libraries in this country: municipal, school district, special district, and association. The most problematic is the association type, because it is the least transparent and most undemocratic — the trustees do not have to be directly elected. Although only 14% of public libraries nationwide are associations, here in New York, a full 47% are. The Northeast in particular is heavily association in legal structure, with Pennsylvania weighing in with 85% association libraries (see: https://www.imls.gov/research-evaluation/data-collection/public-libraries-survey).
In the case of municipal libraries, the town elected officials are in charge of overseeing library operations, and the staff is covered by civil service protections. There is more accountability built into this structure. It also means, however, that such libraries are subject to political winds, and have their own unique problems. I have never worked a municipal library, so I won’t offer further opinion on them.
I have worked special district and association libraries, and I know them well. Association libraries got their start as subscription book clubs in the 18th and 19th centuries. Only the wealthiest could afford a subscription. They evolved into tax-funded, open-to-all institutions eventually. But really? Some of them are still run like exclusive clubs. Look up the websites of the local libraries in your area. Is it clear when and where the board meets each month? Are you able to access the minutes and the budget? Go to a meeting. Do you feel welcomed? Or are the members flustered, wondering who you are and why you are there, unsure where to seat you, as though they’ve never seen a member of the public at a meeting before? Is there a set time on the agenda when members of the public can speak? The Open Meetings Law governs board meetings for all four types of libraries, but many association libraries in particular act as though they are exempt.
In my home library, where I live, board members are elected at the annual meeting by members of the public who actually show up to the meeting. Which means the board members just elect each other. Only a few of the several thousand residents of the town ever show up to the meetings. And to even get on the ballot? You have to be known and approved by the board. There is no appeal process if they reject your application. Insular.
Those who get on the boards of libraries that hold what are at least nominally “elections”, are those who can round up about 30 votes. That’s all it takes in many towns, if not significantly less. There are usually no criteria for qualification. Claiming “I love libraries” is enough. In many of the libraries I worked in, I never saw half the board members, except at meetings. It’s a common subject of employee gossip, that many library board members rarely or never use their library. Yet they make crucial decisions about budgets, programming, and collection development. Incompetent.
Boards are responsible for hiring and firing directors. In one library I know of, they fired the director . . . but they hadn’t formally evaluated him/her for years. Boards break laws. But unless someone files suit, there is no recourse. The director didn’t sue. Most don’t, because libraryland is so insular, word travels fast. If you sue a board, everyone knows it . . . and what other board is going to risk hiring you, knowing you might sue them, too? So boards keep breaking laws, and getting away with it. Who is looking in on these labor practices? And if members of the public knew about it, could they even do anything? In another library I worked, five or six of us librarians and clerks were fired, one after the other, for nominal violations that were either untrue or insignificant. The public knew about it, and many were incensed. But they could do nothing, other than boycott that library’s children’s programs and bring their children to other neighboring libraries in protest.
In another library I worked, a clerk made a patron with a service dog leave the building. What the clerk said to the patron was clearly a violation of law, but I was nearly dismissed for politely intervening and saving the library from a lawsuit. The board member who chastised me, had himself been fired from a large municipal library for verbal abuse of staff and firing staff without cause. Another board member helped save my position. But this bully remained on the board for years to come. At least five other board members quit because of his bullying of them, too. Yet he continued to damage the board, and the library, without check. No one has the power, in the case of association libraries, to hold trustees accountable. Trustees have to hold each other accountable. That rarely happens in my experience, because most are afraid to confront, to speak up. Certain officials can put pressure on trustees. But I’ve never seen any indication that that actually happens, either.
I have witnessed, on the other hand, countless instances of impunity. For example, the process of voting for trustees is sometimes slipshod. In one library I worked, the president of the board was up for re-election. Who counted the ballots, alone, after the library closed? He did. And he won. It may well have been a legitimate win. But it didn’t look good. There were whispers. But no one said anything openly. These are tax-payer funded institutions. But the taxpayers don’t know much of what goes on, because transparency and accountability are not built into the system.
Do you love your local library? That’s great. They’re fabulous places. They’re the very foundation of our democracy. But that’s ironic, because they’re among the most undemocratic of our institutions.
I bet you have no idea what is really happening there, underneath the beautiful books and lively programming.
Go to board meetings. Find out the qualifications of the trustees. Read all minutes and associated documents. You will know a lot more than 99.9% of your friends who say they love libraries. But you still won’t know what’s really going on. The only way to know, is to become a board member yourself, or to work for a library.
And then, even when you know the reality, you will be quiet. Because libraries are sacred, and few want to risk tarnishing the image — especially in these rapidly changing times, when libraries are struggling to remain relevant. Incompetent, insular, and opaque boards are counting on your respectful silence. And you’re so used to being shushed, you may not even know it.