"Cowardice asks the question...is it safe? Expediency asks the question...is it politic? Vanity asks the question...is it popular? But conscience asks the question...is it right? And there comes a time when one must take a position that is neither safe, nor politic, nor popular but one must take it because it is right." ~Dr. Martin Luther King

Thursday 26 February 2009

Library Memo

The following memo explains better than I can why a librarian needs to be added this year.

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Council has authority to cut the board's budget. I'm convinced it's been discusssed and decided by a select few before the scheduled meetings. Councillors have typewritten questions on the desk in front of them.

The Library Board's budget is a simple document. We buy books put them on the shelves and open the doors and provide whatever assistance users need. Two-thirds of the population are members of the library.

Like town outside workers, library staff are unionized. Salaries are negotiated. I learned last week a librarian earns about the same as a town labourer. Like schools, salaries are between seventy and eighty per cent of the budget.

Anyone interested in the cost of library services and how they arise would find the budget straightforward and easy to access.

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