Apparently, I am the devil. According to Wednesday's Projo article, "at the same time it is warning of the layoffs, the library has hired at least five librarians recently, angering the union that represents the library employees."
I'm pretty sure* that I'm one of those librarians, and I don't want to seem like a piker, so let me just point out that these librarians, with the exception of one, weren't hired to create new positions. They were hired to fill existing positions --they're not replacing the specialists.
Anyway, the specialists' positions are important, and it's a crime to terminate them. But PPL doesn't want to touch the endowment and the city hasn't done anything to raise funds. And no one else is doing anything because no one thinks they're really going to do anything. So of course everyone at the Childrens' Roundtable today was relating it to The Boy Who Cried Wolf, because we relate everything to picture books.
I don't have much to add to what I said last time, except that in one place, the article says the positions will end in March, and in another place, it says the money will run out in May. Oh, and the last press release on the PPL website is: Providence Public Library Receives $106,230 Grant from The Champlin Foundations.
Oh yeah, and it sucks to read in the newspaper that you're getting fired, before you hear anything about it from your employer.
*Note that I said "pretty sure," because I don't want to be guilty of spreading disinformation. Since no one's officially informing us of anything, I don't know much of anything for a fact. How's that for a disclaimer?
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4 comments:
What does the Champlin Grant have to do with specialists being laid off?
I guess I was trying to point out 2 things:
1. The library hasn't been putting out a lot of information about the process leading up to the potential layoffs. Why hasn't there been any press release about the specialists?
And 2. It's another reminder that there are grants and fundraising opportunities out there, that could help continue the specialists' positions, but the city and library don't appear to be pursuing them.
But the Champlin Grant is a poor example since we receive the Champlin Grants in the form of capitol
or equipment. It is not the type of grant that could ever fund any positions and it is mostly a grant processed by OSL on behalf of PPL.
Ooops. Almost missed this comment!
Anyway, right. I'm not suggesting that PPL use the Champlin grant to fund the specialists' positions. I'm suggesting that PPL seek out other such wonderful grants and that, meanwhile, they provide more information about the not-so-awesome things that are happening (since no news obviously isn't good news) so that people can respond with (hopefully) a show of support (perhaps monetary?) for their local library.
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