City Government Partners with AFPL for "Atlanta Reads"
Posted April 27, 2006; postscript added April 28, 2006
Atlanta mayor Shirley Franklin has joined the mayors of other cities around
the country (including, since late last year,
Roswell, Georgia) whose local governments are promoting "community-building"
by encouraging their city's citizens to read and discuss the same book.
Details of the campaign are available in a recent Atlanta Journal-Constitution
feature story, in a recent AJC
editorial, and at the campaign's
website.
AFPL libraries (as well as several popular merchants) are voting sites for
the five nominated books, and a portion of the library system's Floating
Collection funds will reportedly be used to quickly stock AFPL shelves
with multiple copies of the book selected by voters.
As of this morning, AFPL's website
did not include information about AFPL's involvement with "Atlanta Reads,"
did not include an announcement of the April 30th voting deadline, and did
not include a link to the campaign's website.
April 28th Update: We checked again
this morning, and were relieved to see that information about the "Atlanta
Reads" campaign is now prominently posted
on AFPL's website.
Another Hooker Sighting
Posted April 26, 2006
We heard that former AFPL director Mary Kaye Hooker was spotted recently on the 10th floor of the
county’s headquarters. Word is that she was wearing one of her signature red “power suits.”
This reported sighting is consistent with a rumor we first heard from a
source outside the library system well over a month ago that Hooker had
filed yet another lawsuit against the county, that the county had hired
outside lawyers to defend itself against the “high-powered lawyers”
representing Hooker in the suit, and that several county employees had
already given formal statements to the county’s lawyers.
If anyone can confirm this rumor about a Hooker-instigated lawsuit, we’d
love to post the details and/or the relevant court filings, so please
consider contacting us (anonymously if
necessary).
Meanwhile, those of us who remember Hooker with revulsion are holding our
collective breath hoping that no spineless legal factotum in county
government is advising the County Powers That Be to settle
this alleged lawsuit - especially if a settlement would result in
transferring a single dime of county funds into MKH’s (or her lawyers’)
bank accounts. Hooker has cost the taxpayers enough already.
We say let the suit go to trial - and we hope someone will notify us of
the trial date so we can post that also. There are plenty of Hooker’s
victims who might want to avail themselves of ringside seats at any
Hooker courtroom appearance. Perhaps a few attendees would be willing to
transmit their daily notes of the trial for immediate posting at AFPLWATCH,
as was done in
the race discrimination lawsuit resulting from the “reorganization” of
AFPL’s Central Library that Hooker orchestrated six years ago? If
the testimony at that trial and statements
MKH made during the last year of her five-year tenure as AFPL library
director are any indication, the testimony at a new lawsuit instigated
by Hooker is bound to be remarkable.
Busiest Branches Still Understaffed;
Least Busy Branches Still Overstaffed
Posted April 14, 2006
Last month's circulation figures,
distributed earlier this month, show what they always show: a handful of
branches handling most of the library system's lending (and reshelving).
Unfortunately, AFPL administrators have done nothing for over seven years
to adjust branch staff sizes - dictated by "facility type" designations
created by library trustees seven years ago - to reflect current workloads.
The upshot: library employees at some branches are working much harder
than they would need to if they had more colleagues to help them with their
work, while other branches employ more staff than they need to handle the
miniscule amount of lending (and reshelving) they do.
John Szabo Talks to the Library’s Trustees about…
Posted April 3, 2006
At the February 22nd meeting of the library board (whose minutes were
distributed to library staff earlier this week), John Szabo, then ten
months into his tenure as AFPL library director, briefed the trustees
about some of the topics he routinely addresses when he speaks in public
about the library system. Among the most interesting (and encouraging) of
those comments:
- …the understaffing of the Technical Services Division:
“…[The previous library administration] completely gutted our Technical
Services operation - not completely but almost completely gutted that
operation. And we have a tremendous amount outsourced….” [Minutes, page 27]
“…There were many more…[employees previously working in Technical
Services]….They were put on the front lines in public service settings….My
goal is to accomplish the tech services function…preserving the
bibliographic integrity of our online catalog, making certain that it is
not a database of junky records and information [so] our patrons can find
what they’re looking for easily. And there are…many, many libraries that
have outsourced some of that work. And it is done well, efficiently, and
at a good cost - a reasonable cost by an outside company. That has not
happened here with our outsourcing. And I think part of that is that we’ve
outsourced too much and part of it is that we’ve not managed the
outsourcing that we have done well. And also some of it is communication
with our vendors. And so when I talk about Tech Services and needing to
evaluate it, it’s talking about how much we pull back and, going forward,
how well we manage what it is we do outsource with our vendors and making
certain that we manage it well. And also are conscious of the time it takes
to manage the outsourcing….
It’s tough, though, when we have put all of
those Technical Services staff…out on the front lines. They are working
[at public service sites] and doing a great job and serving the
public…somewhere now. But how do we beef [Tech Services] up in order to
assume [ourselves] what we’ve previously outsourced? You know, once you
outsource and move those people out [of the jobs they were hired to do],
it’s hard to go in reverse.”
[Minutes, pages 36-37]
- …the need for more centralized selection of library materials
“…We need to look at how we spend our collection dollars….And…we can do
some things centrally and still meet local needs….We…can take a more
centralized approach to collection development and [to] adding materials
to the collection.” [Minutes, page 27]
- …the need to improve the library’s website:
“…Our website must be much more than a bulletin board for library programs
and a listing of what it is that we do and where our locations are and
what the hours of operation are. Our website should be - and is to other
library systems like ours - every bit as important as a physical location.
We want [it] to be a dynamic, ever-changing site where people are coming
and using it as a gateway to good, valuable, authoritative information….”
[Minutes, page 28]
- …the value of the library system’s telephone reference service:
“…[The library system’s telephone reference service] was eliminated [before
I was hired], it was gone. This is something that has been reconstituted
in the last 10 months. Because it was a beloved service of this library
system, people loved it. People had been trained to use it and made calls
and learned about it. And we at one point had - I don’t know: five, six,
maybe as many as eight, I don’t know - librarians on telephones answering
questions that were coming in and [were] helping people....
…I’ve not added staff to a new area of the library system, but [we at
least need to]…start publicizing it. We have a librarian now who…is
dedicated to answering [these telephoned-in reference questions]. …If this
gets popular [again], we’re either going to have to take staff off
something else or get new [staff]….” [Minutes, pages 33-34]
- …the purpose of the Central Library:
“…One thing that is sorely lacking and needed that we will work on is a
mission for the Central Library. The Central Library is an important
entity within this library system, an entity that can serve the entire
library system and be important to residents of Alpharetta and be important
to residents of Palmetto, not only residents that live in and around this
building or work downtown….It is more than a downtown branch or a warehouse
of material. And that [mission] has been lacking in the past and I think
that’s reflected now in this building and its organization. So that’s
important.” [Minutes, page 27]
- …the need for more collaboration with other Georgia library systems:
“...We need to work on our relationships with other metro-area libraries….
In recent history, we have been completely and totally isolated from our
library counterparts….What we do with them may be very simple and small to
start out with, but it’s important that we start that [effort] and we
already have…in the last 10 months…. [Minutes, page 29]
These issues, among others, have
been plaguing the library system’s users and employees for years now. It
is reassuring to see that Szabo is aware of their seriousness.
Despite the inevitable daily distractions that will continue to claim his
attention over the next year or so, we hope it won’t be too much further
along into Szabo’s tenure that he manages to substantially address these
matters.
Continue reading previously-posted AFPLWATCH stories
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