Critics, Check Out Real Public Service

When a Fortune 500 corporation needs to cut, the boss gets a big fat bonus and the workers get layoffs. But the Spokane public libraries don’t “run like a business.” They are a public service agency - and a fine one. So, when a financial crisis hit, the library’s employees, from top to bottom, devised a sacrificial plan that saves money and minimizes harm to the community they serve.

For all who missed the story, here it is: City revenues have sagged; there wasn’t enough money to cover next year’s projected costs. For the library, the shortfall exceeded $170,000 - even after other cost-cutting moves, such as an early retirement program.

To close the gap with layoffs, as many as six employees might have lost their jobs. That, in turn, would have forced two branch libraries to reduce operating hours by one day per week, a heavy blow to library users. Plus, those six workers would have gotten pink slips for Christmas and would have taken their experience out the door. Library officials saw what nearer-sighted money managers sometimes don’t: The short-term savings would have caused long-term damage.

Dan Walters, the library’s former director and overseer of its splendid building program, knew that other libraries had saved money with less damage with employees taking days off without pay. So he and assistant Aubrey George, now the library’s interim director, took the idea to employees. But the sacrifice wasn’t proposed only for workers low on the totem pole; everyone, from the director on down, would take 12 unpaid days off in 1996. That’s a sizable cut in pay. Would the workers consider it?

They did. What’s more, the union and administrators worked together on a plan that structured the days off to minimize cuts in service. The libraries will be closed during their lowest-volume week - at the end of August. They’ll be closed Presidents Day, Columbus Day and Veterans Day. Remaining days off will be scattered through the year in ways that won’t require closures.

Last week, employees approved the plan and the library board, with well-deserved pride in the commitment its staff had displayed, went along.

Bottom line? Library hours next year will be shortened less than half as much as they would have been if layoffs had been the solution. And the libraries will keep their valued workers.

So if you feel the urge to bad-mouth government, don’t do it in the library. And the next time you check out a book, tell that librarian thanks.

, DataTimes The following fields overflowed: CREDIT = John Webster/For the editorial board