PRESIDENT'S REPORT APRIL 2013
By Roy Stone
 
We hope you’ll be checking in on the blog often and there will be quarterly PDF newsletters with articles from the blog coming out quarterly. The new editor Elyse Barrere welcomes all articles from members and past members of the Guild, short ones are just fine. She is probably mentioning that elsewhere.

HIRING--PROMOTING....The Guild has been actively promoting and encouraging Library Management to hire and promote as quickly as possible. And when the Managed Hiring Committee (representatives of the Mayor, Chief Legislative Analyst, City Administrative Officer) continued to obstruct the hiring of new staff, this time the budgeted Clerk Typists, Henry Gambill and I visited some of the key participants, including the Budget and Finance Committee, several City council offices, and two thoughtful people in the CAO and CLA’s offices. Within two days John Szabo called to tell us that we were successful, and that the Managed Hiring Committee had authorized the hiring of the Clerk-Typists. Of course all the hiring was now colliding in the Human Resources office, but as you know we are moving forward.

MIGRATION II....The Great Migration of 2011(or was it 2010?), as it came to be known, caused a lot of people to change their jobs and their home branches as they were forcibly moved to other agencies in an effort to equalize the staffing. It was a very difficult time for everyone. This third major staffing disruption, the first being E.R.I.P. - the early retirement plan that saw quite a few library staff leaving, followed by the tragic layoffs of librarians and clerks and the firings of over a hundred messenger-clerk, was a very difficult time for everyone. Our great library system was continuing its rush on a downward spiral. Service hours and then days were reduced again and again so that the few remaining people could maintain some sort of library service. However after literally clawing our way back by fighting for the passage of Measure L, fighting for the rehiring of laid off staff, fighting for the hiring of regular civil service staff we are facing a new and much happier migration.

Coming Soon! Stopping the destruction of the Pio Pico Koreatown Branch.  Negotiations for our contract are coming up.  Training for the new seniors.  The City budget...the Library budget.