Librarian Dowlin's downfall and role of a passive commission

[Marc Salomon]

from:

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/examiner/article.cgi?year=1997&month=01&day=29&article=EDITORIAL12418.dtl

Wednesday, Jan. 29, 1997 7 Page A 12

© 1997 San Francisco Examiner
(even though I wrote one of these letters and didn't sign away my copyright
..go figure...does the ex just assume copyright or what?)



LETTERS TO THE EDITOR


Regarding your story "How the library chief's fairy tale went sour" (Jan. 23):
Much of what is wrong was visible at the Library Commission meeting Jan. 21
when Kenneth Dowlin resigned.

Steven Coulter, commission president, was so enchanted by Dowlin that he
failed to question any of his decisions or policies. The commission and
Coulter are ultimately responsible for the city librarian's actions. Whenever
any question arose in the last seven months, the commission's votes were
unanimous and rigorously supported Dowlin.

True to form, the commission spent nearly an hour that Tuesday eulogizing
Dowlin as a person of momentous stature. No mention was made of any real
troubles.

On Dec. 3, the commission president told the public, at Dowlin's annual
evaluation, that "no serious questions were asked of the city librarian" as
"he has a national reputation as a visionary." Just eight days later, the
supervisors' budget chairman called for The City to take control of the
system.

Before the new Main Library opened, promotional materials claimed that it was
prepared to serve 12,000 patrons a day. As problems began to surface, Dowlin
claimed to be overwhelmed by a "wildly popular" usage of 9,000 visitors a day.

The library has by design locked up two-thirds of the books in the new
building. This necessitated more staff to serve the public. What books were
checked out and returned couldn't be put back on the shelves because, again,
there were no people to do it.

Dowlin is not a victim of his success; he is a failure because of his
inability to manage what he claims to have created. In each of his management
failures, the commission failed to question his decisions.

I respectfully suggest that the Library Commission, which serves at the
pleasure of the mayor, be asked to resign.

Jim Kirwan San Francisco

= o = o =

Your article has Commission President Steve Coulter whining about being made
the scapegoat for the library's numerous 1996 management fiascoes. He again
shirks responsibility for the budget deficit by alleging that the former
commission, which I headed, expanded branch opening hours beyond the minimum
set by Proposition E.

Coulter fabricated a quote attributed to me: "Hire, hire, hire." Prop. E
mandated minimum opening hours of 1,028 weekly. Based on public testimony in
the summer of 1994, the public wanted more hours, and the commission approved
1,172, or 144 more than the minimum. Spread over 27 branches, the additional
hours work out to 5.4 per branch, equal to one extra afternoon or evening -
hardly excessive.

Coulter was fired from the Library Commission by then-Mayor Frank Jordan in
February 1994 for leading the charge to close seven neighborhood branch
libraries. He is no friend of the neighborhood branches.

Based on public input during the summer of 1994, a budget reserve to meet
future contingencies was proposed. The commission approved the reserve, and it
totaled $1.2 million when we left office in January 1996. Based on the staff's
financial projections, it was sufficient to carry the library through 1999.

Has the reserve been spent? If so, added to the supplemental allocations from
The City in 1996, the deficit could be even larger than reported. We will have
to wait for The City's audit for a full accounting.

Jim Herlihy Former president S.F. Public Library Commission

= o = o =

How could Ken Dowlin mismanage the library's budget after it was doubled by
voters? Easy. The voters asked for more books and longer hours. Dowlin used
the money to buy that, as well as more technology.

Books are relatively cheap, both to purchase and to archive. Computers are
expensive and have a lifetime measured in months, and databases require
regular subscription payments.

Building a digital library at this early date is neither simple nor cheap. The
citizens of San Francisco deserve and will probably pay for a library that is
first-class both in paper resources and the evolving web of high-quality
networked information resources. There are two technologies operative at this
time, and a first-class modern library serving a diverse set of communities
demands priority for both technologies - the well-understood and the emerging.

Dowlin's toxic tactic was to play off the old-school library against the new
instead of working to create a separate, dedicated funding stream for the
costly digital library.

That Dowlin and Library Commission President Steven Coulter tried to hide
their failures by taking it out of the pockets of the lowest-paid workers is
inexcusable, and Coulter should follow Dowlin's lead out the door.

It's time to ask the voters for another dedicated funding stream, this time to
plan and build the best public digital library in the world so that the
destructive divisiveness of the Dowlin era can be relegated to the past.

Marc Salomon San Francisco




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