Troubled Sacramento Library Undertakes 302 Reforms
The interim director of the Sacramento (Calif.) Public Library has released a list of 302 reforms he plans to implement in the wake of recent charges of mismanagement and financial improprieties.
Phil Batchelor, who succeeded Anne Marie Gold after her December 1 retirement, called the roster of changes “ambitious but doable.” He told American Libraries that he expects 71% of the changes will be in effect by June, in time for the planned hiring of a new director.
Unanimously approved by the library board January 22, the reforms (PDF file) range from the sweeping (establishing a systemwide strategic plan, creating a comprehensive training strategy) to the relatively picayune (preparing bid documents for pest-control services, assessing space utilization of storage areas).
Batchelor said the highest-priority items are establishing internal controls over finance and accounting functions, putting policy and procedure manuals in place, and reducing the time between ordering materials and getting them on the shelf. The priorities are understandable, given SPL’s recent plague of management and morale problems: Following an investigation into overpayments made to a subcontracting firm co-owned by a library staffer and his wife, a grand jury issued a report last May charging the board and director with mismanagement and recommending that Gold be replaced; in August, the board rejected the panel’s findings.
Batchelor developed the reforms with input from the library’s 18-member management council and staff from all 27 branches, whom Batchelor said provided “a lot of positive energy and feedback.” The former administrator of Contra Costa County, Batchelor voiced optimism that the changes would be successfully implemented: “I’ve been in a lot of different organizations, but I’ve never seen an organization with the depths of talent and enthusiasm” as Sacramento Public Library, he said.
Posted on January 27, 2009. Discuss.