There was an expressed opinion of our wonderfully run local liberry in the VND by Miss Sally. Here’s the url.

The Library is Cool

In it she proclaims the virtues and sad, sad problems our super-duper liberry experiences.

After thanking some people (especially Miss Kathy) and boroughs, townships and even the Highlands School District in two sentences, Miss Sally gets right to the crux of her concern, her opinion of a lack of funding ESPECIALLY saying that

“...the state has once again cut funding for libraries.”

We’ll get back to that in a minute. But, according to Miss Sally, what really keeps “us” going is all of “our” donors who bouy (nice spelling job VND or Miss Sally!) us financially AND emotionally. (Last I checked, it was hard to cash emotions.) So all of you who pay that extra bit in tax to support Miss Sally and Miss Kathy don’t seem as important as all their donors. I’m sure she was taking about the generosity of a couple of local school board members and their spouses who once reminded us that a few cents wasn’t too much to contribute to the liberry. But did you ever wonder just HOW much the families of those concerned board members contributed…and wrote off? Me-Too! Anyway, there’s a graphic included here for your perusal and I’ll allude to it to make a few points. Click the picture to enlarge it and scroll up, down and sideways to see it all.



















Miss Sally claims over her tears, that

“We want to thank our staff, which hasn't had a raise in more than three years, and our volunteers.”

If you’ll notice the two pieces in the graphic, the Salaries and Wages and Benefits from 2005 were $206,440 and the Salaries and Wages and Benefits from 2008 were $247,390. You will also notice that the total staff for 2005 was 9.63 people from adding 0.88, 0.52 and 8.23 and that the staff from 2008 was 9.6 from adding 0.88, 0.88 and 8.72 which really equals 10.48 not 9.6. Not sure where the other 0.88 person went! Be that as it may, I have to ask Miss Sally whether she made another mistake or simply decided to lie about those raises. If the total salaries and wages and benefits went up $40,951 between 2005 and 2008…who got that money? According to Miss Sally, the staff sure didn’t. That only leaves the head liberrian Miss Kathy as the lucky recipient of that entire raise! Sure sounds fair to those working as “staff.” (That’s sarcasm for the sarcastically impaired!)

Meanwhile, back at the ranch.

But more egregious than the crocodile tears over staff salaries that weren’t raised is her stated fact:

“Unfortunately, the state has once again cut funding for libraries…” (note the use of the word "again!")

Again looking at that pesky bit of government provided fact, we see that our wonderful state provided $115,804 for Miss Kathy’s liberry in 2005 and $138,121 for the same in 2008! Now to be fair, the figures for 2009 aren’t out yet, or rather the public hasn’t been allowed to see them and we’ve all heard how funding was supposedly cut. But maybe some of you don’t remember that Allegheny Government came to the rescue by appropriating additional funding for the Allegheny County Liberries (to the tune of around $600,000 additional of your tax money) of which Miss Kathy’s is one. So the short coming in 2009, if there was one, was compensated for by, hey! We tax payers…again and in addition to what we already “donated.”

Taking a further look at the two graphics you see that liberry visits went up remarkably over three years from an average of 4.09 visits per person to a whopping 4.31! Almost makes the place too crowded to visit, eh?

And Circulation has increased by 30% Sounds good until you realize that the liberry increased their loaner videos by 33% Could that be a coincidence, that more people are watching “The English Patient” or “Lethal Weapon” than reading Moby Dick or Shakespeare? Well, the requests for reference transactions decreased by 10% so those kids that use the liberry either are smarter now to find what they want without asking or just maybe they aren’t looking for material that need references.

And of course, all of this creative math on the part of Miss Sally is to get the dupes of the Highlands School District ready for another tear-jerking telethon to donate another $10,000 to Miss Kathy’s liberry. But Miss Kathy’s salary went up over $40,000 in three years (she’s not a teacher at Highlands is she? LOL!). So why do we have to shell out extra cash so a Head Liberrian can get raises when her staff can’t? And for the record, a Head Liberrian with an MLS (Master of Liberry Science) degree with Miss Kathy’s experience has a salary range (in Pa.) between $55,000 and $88,000 per year (not counting benefits). And guess who pays for those wonderful benefits?

With all these…mistakes? I can’t help but paraphrase Prizzy from “Gone with the Wind”:


“I don’t know nothing ‘bout statin’ no facts!”

I complained a few years back about this fiscally inept run local library (surprised you, right?). I complained that this library was being operated with no concern for fiscal responsibility. The figures in the two graphics confirm my concern.

I don’t know how many of you have increased your wages by at least $20,000 over a three year period. But to have that done for you then still complain about not getting enough money to run a business, non-profit or not, that you are fortunate enough to get paid to run, smacks of a greedy hubris that is only equaled by Wall Street.

The staff, and I presume those are the part-timers, didn’t get a raise over the last 3 years according to Miss Sally. Since figures aren’t in for 2009 and won’t be in for 2010 for quite a while, we have to go by her presumptions that the only person to get a raise between 2006 and 2008 (that’s actually three years, not two) must have been Miss Kathy. And that would have been one whopping raise when the library needed, supposedly, more funding to operate.

And now they will want our school district to kick in more money. For what? Or should I ask, for whom? If the Highlands School Board votes to give the local library ANY SCHOOL TAX MONEY rather than provide for ANY needed services for the students first, the board and superintendent needs to be removed. And as I said before, all it takes to remove a board is a petition to be filed by ten residents to a county judge (sorry, not our own beloved Carole!) for the matter to be examined. If the judge finds the board acted improperly, guess what? They can ALL be removed, new ones elected or temporarily appointed and those who were on the board can NEVER run for school board again.

Just a thought. Enjoy the reading and try not to get mad enough to attend board meetings. Because that will allow the board to continue to give away your money without your consent.

Oh yeah. By the way, they have air conditioning or so says Miss Sally; supposedly cool. I might disagree, though.

garion