Crater Update
Posted October 31, 2003
The chainlink fence around the hideous crater in front of the
Central Library was recently been draped with vinyl screening in
preparation for another one of Hooker's "donor luncheons" at Central.
Library staff remember well the previous "donor luncheon" and the silly
hoopla surrounding it: valet curbside parking for the few invitees who
showed up (and banishment of library employees' vehicles from Central's
parking garage), a catered gourmet luncheon attended by so few people
that the administration hastily drafted Central staff into filling the
room's empty chairs, and a notorious PowerPoint presentation fiasco.
MKH hasn't turned out to be the "donor-magnet" she advertises herself
as. Quite the contrary: why would the close-knit local donor community
be interested in giving money to an organization headed by someone
who's been found guilty of race discrimination? The unsuccessful disguise
of the crater in front of the Central Library is a perfect symbol of Hooker's
also-unsuccessfully-disguised ineptitude, and the crater itself is a
perfect symbol of the fate of the two library systems whose boards
Hooker bamboozled into hiring her.
Perhaps the AFPL Foundation will join the ever-swelling ranks of those
calling for Hooker's long-overdue termination, so the Foundation can
begin raising money for improving library services with the credibility
it needs to do this crucial and difficult work.
November 5th Update: Hooker's office failed to
realize until November 3rd that the scheduling of Hooker's latest "donor
luncheon" conflicted with the monthly meeting of library managers. The
latter was then postponed. It was also not until November 3rd that
managers received urgent instructions to provide information that Hooker
wanted distributed at her luncheon three days later. Wouldn't AFPL's
potential donors be thrilled to find out how well-planned these luncheons
are?
Problem Takes 18 Days to Correct
AFPL's Web Site Hijacked
by Persons Unknown
Posted October 29, 2003; updated October 30, November 5, November 14
For almost three weeks, hundreds (thousands?) of library users were
unable to access AFPL's catalog. And because $500,000 worth
of online databases the library pays for each year are accessed through
the same URL that displays the catalog, AFPL patrons could not use those
databases, or even find out which ones AFPL (normally) offers.
On October 26th, the library system's web site was appropriated by
someone calling himself "Karim." Instead of obtaining access to AFPL's
holdings and online databases, would-be AFPL web site users--both the
actual ones and the "virtual" kind--were suddenly confronted with a
very nice photo of the earth from space and a rambling screed about
the inordinately high prices Earthlings pay for gasoline. By the second
week of the hijacking, this screen had been replaced by one labeled
"Under Construction" (although minus a photo of the apparently
permanent crater in front of the Central Library).
While AFPL staff gamely tried to operate the county's three dozen
libraries without a catalog--and made lame excuses to
flabbergasted citizens for this latest example of stellar library
service--the few AFPL administrators who hadn't fled the
organization in recent months scrambled to figure out what went wrong
and how to correct the situation.
Fortunately, the situation was not as dire as it appeared to most
library patrons. As the library system's webmaster promptly pointed out in an
e-mail to library staff shortly after the hijacking began, there was
an alternate way of accessing the catalog. Because the official web address described in all the library's
publicity--including its library cards--merely re-directs traffic to
another web address, the actual library web site (http://www.af.public.lib.ga.us
)
was still functioning. The bad news was that most library users didn't
know this, and most of the users who tried to access the catalog from home
between October 26th and November 13th, when the problem was resolved,
did not call or visit the library to find out about the work-around,
or didn't have the good luck to speak to a library employee who knew
about it.
AFPLWATCH speculates that this latest technical gaffe was yet another
highly embarrassing result of library director Mary Kaye Hooker's
obstinate refusal to replace the Technology Manager she ran off over a
year and a half ago. (Hooker reportedly had grown weary of abusing him
and needed a handy scapegoat for one of her oversights-du-jour.) One
thing a technology manager does for an organization as large as AFPL
is making sure that the registration for the organization's web site
(and its service agreements governing any referring URL's, which is
what, technically, "afplweb.com" is) are renewed each year. Without a
full-time tech manager on staff, it would be spectacularly easy for
this particular ball to be dropped--as so many others have been during
Hooker's competence-phobic tenure.
In addition to coping with bouts of frustration and chagrin as they
tried to render services to the public without an easily-accessible
catalog, some AFPL employees wondered whether "Karim's" hijacking of
the library's web site was perhaps not a totally random hack. Buried
within "Karim's" diatribe was this uncannily appropriate passage:
"We cannot afford to wait for the corrupt cowardly government
leaders to make the very necessary and essential changes that are very
crucial to the peace and harmony for all of us and our planet earth -
we need to bring these changes now, today."
One thing is certain: This three-week-long technology hostage-taking
incident will be completely eclipsed by whatever awaits library staff
and their hapless customers as library administrators adopt an entirely
new automated catalog/circulation/acquisitions system without having
this staggeringly complex conversion coordinated by an on-staff
technology manager.
Meanwhile, relieved patrons and staff can now again access the
library's a profoundly user-unfriendly
catalog and its collection of online databases.
The SIRSI Saga Begins...
- Yet Another Reason AFPL Needs a Full-Time Public Information Officer?
Posted October 30, 2003
The library's conversion to a new integrated automation system
will wipe out huge globs of data about the status of certain items
(temporarily converted records, lost books, etc.) in AFPL's
collections as well as various records about patrons whose borrowing
privileges are restricted for various reasons. Minimizing the confusion
created by the migration to the new automation system apparently requires
a period where overdue fines and lost-book fees (among other things)
are ignored and/or deleted. In a move that AFPLWATCH hopes isn't a
harbinger of the way the migration will be managed, the Powers That
Be decided to begin the library system's month-long Amnesty for patron
fines the day before a county holiday. It doesn't take a rocket
scientist to realize that patrons being told to take their long-overdue
books to their branch libraries so they can have their delinquent
records cleared are not going to be pleased to find those branches
closed the very next day. Why oh why didn't the Wise Ones advertise
that the library's amnesty on fines and fees would begin the day AFTER
the holiday instead?
- Ted Koppel, Where Are Ye Now?
Posted October 29, 2003
The Fall 2003 “Netconnect” supplement to Library Journal contains
a timely
article entitled “Migrating Successfully: 8 Points to Keep your
System Migration on Track,” complete with a bibliography of additional
books and articles. Too bad AFPL doesn’t have a Technology Manager on
staff to read articles like this one. Unfortunately, Hooker ran off the
library system’s former Technology Manager over a year and a half ago,
and has apparently decided she doesn’t need to replace him, despite the
size and complexity of the library system and the fact that AFPL
is adopting early next year an entirely different integrated automation
system--a decision that will affect every public service library employee,
every borrower from every library facility, and every on-site or remote
user of the library's catalog and/or online databases.
The Myth:
The Reality:
Now’s Your Chance to Speak Up!
Posted October 22, 2003
"The powerful suffer from the delusion that human beings have no memories...
that people forget acts of infamy as easily as their parents' birthdays."
Stephen Vizinczey
If you’re one of the many library employees, former employees, or job
applicants who know where a few bodies are buried, don’t wait for the
consultants hired by the trustees
to "look into the climate of equal employment opportunity" at AFPL to
contact you. Take the initiative to tell Elarbee & Co. what you know or what you’ve heard. Give them
enough details about the circumstances so the consultants can follow
up on your leads. Send in your information anonymously if you need to;
the consultants’ web site allows you to send a confidential e-mail
message.
This is one time virtually everyone familiar with the library
could make a difference. You can either try to improve the situation
by letting the investigators know what you know (or have good reasons
to believe) about potentially illegal personnel actions, or you can do
nothing and risk the continuation of the way things are.
You should consider contacting Elarbee & Co. immediately if
any of the following things have happened
to you or if you know of someone else currently or previously employed at
the library who any of these things happened to.
Mail whatever information you have to:
Elarbee, Thompson & Trapnell, LLP
800 International Tower
229 Peachtree Street, N.E.
Atlanta, GA 30303
or send the firm an
e-mail message.
Questions AFPLWATCH believes Elarbee & Co. should look into beyond
whatever they find out through talking with employees, former employees,
and job applicants who have been discriminated or retaliated against:
- How many EEO complaints have library employees filed since Mary
Kaye Hooker’s arrival at AFPL in August 1999, compared to the four
years before her arrival?
- Are there patterns of race, sex, or age discrimination in the
library administration’s approval of employee requests for travel
funds over the past few years?
- Are there patterns of race, sex, or age discrimination in the
library administration’s approval of off-site training opportunities
for employees (specifically, attendance at SOLINET-sponsored training
sessions) the past few years?
- Are there patterns of race, sex, or age discrimination in the
library administration’s appointments within the past few years of
library employees to systemwide library committees and task forces?
- How many library employees suffered career-damaging retaliation
because they objected to Hooker’s May 2000 transfers of Central
Library managers and subject specialists?
- What is the number and percentage of white employees at the Auburn
Avenue Research Library? Were white applicants for vacant positions
there turned down in favor of less-qualified black applicants? Has any
white employee there been asked to find work elsewhere or been passed
over for promotions, committee assignments, off-site training,
conference attendance requests, etc.?
- Is racial bias revealed by the failure of the library’s board of
trustees to adhere to its own policy prohibiting the naming of branch
libraries after individuals?
It’s conceivable that the trustees will use their consultants' findings
to justify firing Mary Kaye Hooker, certainly a universally desired
objective among the rank-and-file at AFPL. In any case, employees and
others with first-hand or even hear-say knowledge of discriminatory practices
by library administrators should make sure the "independent
investigators" earn their $112,000 fee--and that they receive so much
information that they cannot reasonably conclude that a healthy
climate of equal employment opportunity can be restored throughout the
library system until Hooker is removed.
Taxpayers' Group Demands Hooker's, McClure's Removal
Posted October 10, 2003
Read the October 9th Atlanta Journal-Constitution
story.
Central Library Administrator Susan Earl Resigns
Posted October 9, 2003
Although employees were not notified about it officially until October 23rd,
Central Library Administrator Susan Earl departed AFPL October 24th.
Earl resigned to take a position at the Nashville Public Library.
Reader reaction to this news is encouraged.
Read the reactions to Earl's departure from:
Read one of Earl's famed impenetrable memos.
Once Again, the Library Circumvents
Fulton County Policies and Procedures
Posted October 7, 2003
“The Board resolved to hire an outside consultant to advise the Board
on EEO related matters and a committee will be appointed to identify
resources and persons or entities who can serve as that consultant…The
Board resolved to instruct the Director to have the Human Resources
Department provide the Board with copies of all EEO related personnel
actions that are presently pending and any that arise in the future….”
[Minutes of the Library Board of Trustees, July 23, 2003, pages 82-83]
Why is the Board hiring an “outside consultant” to investigate library
Equal Employment Opportunity issues?
The immediate cause was the finding by the Fulton County EEO office
that the library had discriminated and retaliated against two of the
plaintiffs in the lawsuit against the library. As reported in the
Atlanta Journal-Constitution of August 10, 2003:
The county EEO conducted the investigation after Starck and Kelly
filed complaints. At an emergency meeting of the Atlanta-Fulton County
Public Library Board of Trustees on Thursday to deal with the findings,
June Green, an assistant county attorney, said the EEO determined the
library system retaliated against the pair.
Annette Steed, the library board chairwoman, said Saturday the board
voted to follow an EEO recommendation and give Starck the job she had
sought. The board also voted Thursday to hire an outside investigator
to look at Kelly's case. Steed said that case was less clear cut....
Steed said she had read both EEO reports and had no quarrels with
their conclusions. When the library board made the earlier personnel
decisions, Steed said they had incomplete information and did not
realize their actions were discriminatory.
Thus, Fulton County’s own EEO investigation concluded that the
library had retaliated and discriminated, and the library’s board
chair said she had “no quarrels” with the conclusions drawn by the EEO
office. Yet, rather than the library apologizing for, and
rectifying its actions, it continues to obstruct by planning to hire
its own EEO consultant to review these cases and others filed by
library employees.
This is simply the latest example of how the library flouts Fulton
County’s policies and procedures. The most egregious instance was the
blatant racial discrimination that resulted in the discrimination
lawsuit, but there are endless others. Judging by events over the past
three years, the library does not consider itself bound by, among other
things:
- Fulton County’s policies on discrimination,
- the county’s rules on rehiring employees at their old salary,
- the rulings of Fulton County’s grievance committee,
- Fulton County’s process of progressive discipline,
- rules requiring the hiring process to be free from influence or
intimidation (such as that exerted by Ms. Garnes and/or the Board).
If there are alarming numbers of grievances and EEO complaints being
filed by library employees, this will come as a surprise to no one
except the library board, who, despite the black eye they received
from the lawsuit and again from this EEO finding, continue to interfere
in personnel decisions that are none of their business. And now, the
board intends to once more do an end run around the county by bringing
in their own EEO investigator, and by examining for themselves employee
EEO complaints.
If the Board wants to get to the bottom of the ongoing personnel
disasters in the library, there is no need to bring in an outside
consultant. Any employee can identify the problem. What is needed is a
solution. Fortunately, the solution is breathtakingly simple:
- Fire Ms. Hooker.
Given her total disregard for the law of the
land, it is no surprise that Fulton County rules and regulations are
nothing more than minor roadblocks that, in her tank-like way, she
simply rolls over. She must be held accountable for the results.
- Get out of the personnel business.
The Board is responsible for
the hiring and supervision of the Director and Deputy Director, period, full stop. No other
personnel action falls within their responsibility. The board ignores
the two areas of responsibility unique to a board - those of setting
policy and raising funds - and chooses instead to spend its time
micromanaging personnel actions on every level. That would be bad
enough, but when their micromanaging is combined with their complete
incompetence in personnel issues, they open the door for legal action.
Given their awful record of interference in personnel, why should they
now begin to further interfere by reviewing employee EEO complaints?
If the board brings the EEO process within the library, no employee
can feel safe from retaliation. Once more, the protections allegedly
guaranteed by the county to its employees will be meaningless to
library staff.
- Examine the role of Sylvia Culver, the manager of Human
Resources.
These grievances and EEO complaints have happened on
her watch, as did the two episodes against the plaintiffs. Whether she
has been unwilling to rein in Ms. Hooker and the Personnel Committee
of the Board, or simply unable, she too needs to be held accountable.
If she was unable to stop all that has gone on, she had a duty to
bring it to the attention of Fulton County. As she apparently did not,
but rather appears to be a willing tool of Ms. Hooker and the
administration, she must share the responsibility.
- Review the entire hiring process to bring it back into line
with Fulton County procedures
to keep it free of outside (e.g.
board) influence. Managers need to be able to hire staff without
having library administrators interfere in the process to achieve
pre-determined results. To have managers go through the entire process
of interviewing and recommending for hire, only to be told that they
must produce a different result is a violation of the very concept of
the civil service, as well as of Fulton County’s own rules.
As long as the library is as politicized as it currently is, no
outside investigator can do anything to solve the problem. The library
has had study after study, survey after survey, about its problems.
Yet nothing changes. Until there is reform of the library’s basic
structure, the library will continue to fail in its basic mission
while seething with employee discontent. If a $17 million lawsuit and
a murder/suicide have not been sufficient to produce reform, neither
will an outside consultant reviewing EEO issues.
Staff alert!
Be Careful What You Say...
Posted October 3, 2003
From: Sylvia Culver [mailto:sculver@af.public.lib.ga.us]
Sent: Tuesday, September 30, 2003 3:28 PM
To: allman@af.public.lib.ga.us [All AFPL Managers]
Cc: Mary Kay Hooker [and Human Resources office personnel]
Subject: Human Resource Branch/Department Visits
I will be visiting with employees in all branches/departments in
the Library System to find out how they are doing.
My schedule for the remainder of this year is attached. I will
communicate in advance any necessary changes.
The purpose of these visits is to have informal, round-table
discussions with employees regarding their overall Library work
experience. We will talk about such things as working conditions, work
relationships, communications, etc. I also want to tour each facility.
Prior to my visits, I will work with each manager to schedule
specific times for the tours and group meetings.
I am sending a memo to all staff informing them of these visits.
The feedback received from the employees will be summarized and
shared with the managers in order to facilitate necessary change
throughout the Library System. The employees' names will not be
included in the synopsis.
If you have questions, please let me know.
AFPLWATCH Comment:
Is Hooker really naive enough to belive that library employees are
going to open their hearts and minds to a personnel official who has
consistently countenanced the frequent and flagrant violations of
Merit System rules and procedures that have marked Hooker's regime? Is
there any doubt that Hooker has sent Culver out on a spying mission?
Any doubt that information or confidences divulged by employees to
Culver in her belated trip around the county's libraries won't
eventually be used against employees and/or their managers?
Any doubt that Hooker will not demand the names of persons who make
unflattering remarks about her? Any doubt that Culver will promptly
comply with that demand? Any doubt that Hooker, with Culver's guidance,
won't retaliate against those employees (and/or use their comments to
punish their managers)?
Given the untrustworthy administrators involved and the toxic work
environment fostered by Hooker, Culver's chats with "the little people"
are likely to be a profound waste of a highly-paid staff member's time.
(Nothing new there, of course...)
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