LISNews: Librarian News

A student comes up to the reference desk and asks if I can help him with a problem with his computer. We have two areas with computers on this floor - some are in the center of the floor, among the circulating collection, and others are in a separate lab, off to the side, next to the reference desk.

Me: "Okay, I'll come over and take a look."

The student starts walking and I follow behind him. He is walking toward the main computer area, but as we pass by the lab, he starts walking slower and slower, and finally looks at me to see where I am walking.

Me: (pleasantly) "I'm just following you."

The student starts walking again toward the main computer area. He then pauses and says, "Actually, my computer is in the lab back there."

Me: "Um, then we should be heading that way."

Eight half-time library staff were laid off in the first of what are expected to be further staff reductions. The library system now has 28 vacant or frozen positions, including part-time and full-time staff. The system has about 90 workers.

The terminations come as the 50-year-old library system faces budget cuts, like the rest of Collier County government, as a result of state legislative mandates imposed on local governments.

Collier County commissioners already voted to cut the fiscal 2008 budget by $44.2 million.

To help offset the revenue loss, the county implemented a hiring freeze, eliminated several positions and is offering a voluntary separation plan for eligible employees.

According to county staff, there now are 256 vacant or frozen positions on the county manager’s staff, or more than 12 percent of the total workforce.

from Naples Daily News

The School of Information Studies, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee has posted a formal response on WISPUBLIB to recent questions about "the professional status of the Master of Library and Information Science degree." Excerpt:

"We urge those making personnel and budgetary decisions to maintain the professional status that communities expect and deserve in their libraries by providing a living wage that recognizes the value of trained librarians."

Not specified by name in the UWM-SOIS post: Marathon County Public Library. In February 2008, the Wausau (Wisconsin) Daily Herald reported that Marathon County Public Library demoted three librarians because "librarians today do less complex work."

The Dispatch reports on A former Ohio State University librarian accused of sexual harassment after recommending a conservative book for freshmen has filed a lawsuit against the university and some of its faculty. Scott Savage, who said he resigned because of personal and professional attacks on his character, asks for his job back and for OSU to be forced to change its sexual-harassment policies.

OSU is "an aggressive proponent of the homosexual lifestyle by virtue of its practices and policies," Savage says in the lawsuit, filed in federal court because he says his civil rights were violated.