Boone County Public Library Board Meeting. re: The Firing of James Duvall, M. A.

18 Sep 2009

Letter to a Friend,

I am happy to answer your question. I have dozens of documents relating to this. I just can't get anyone to read them. I was able to meet with the Board at their meeting last night and give them a ten minute presentation. Cindy Brown was there and attempted to orchestrate it, but not with great success. I was interupted twice by the President, Alice Ryle, probably on her instructions, to say that talking about what happened prior to 1 September was a waste of their time. I was able to convince them that they should hear me out, and to read my entire statement. The new director, Greta, gave a statement as to why she had fired me on her third day, which is that I had refused to work with my supervisor, Bridget Striker. They will not pursue the question of why I don't want to work with her, only that I must or be fired.

I am still pursuing this, and my greatest concern is that other employees of the library will think I was involved in some wrong doing. Unless they manufacture this, by placing something incriminating among the books and papers I still have there, I can assure you there is nothing of the kind. I requested a Hearing from the Board for a resolution of a work related dispute between two employees, which according to the Employee Handbook (2-18) is a process to which I am entitled. Getting that Hearing was what my presentation was all about. Two of the members listened intently, two acted like it was a waste of their time, especially Pam Goetting, who made several smart aleck remarks. They did not say they will grant the Hearing, and if they do not our next stop will be the Fiscal Court, who meet next Tuesday evening.

I have attached a copy of the letter I sent to Ms. Ryle requesting the Hearing. She stated she was not granting that request, but that I was there at their invitation; I am uncertain for the reasons for this distinction. My email has been suspended and I would like to have access to a few more of my letters, and also files of correspondence I have there. I have paper copies of all essential documents and am going to try to get them scanned and made into pdf documents so I can begin sending the whole series to where they need to go. I will be glad to send you anything else you would like to see, and please assure anyone interested that I am trying to get my job back and hope justice will be done.

I can tell you that the whole thing was a collaboration between Sherri Slavey and Bridget Striker. They presented me with a letter purporting to be a "progress improvement plan" which was a cover for Bridget's attempt to take away my project. She had been telling people that Cindy Brown said she was not doing enough work. X. in our department told me she said this, as well as Y. I asked Cindy Brown about it at our meeting on 19 August, and Cindy said she had not said any such thing, but that the department was not publishing enough; she did not address the issue of how Bridget understood that. It seems to the the major cause of what has happened since.

The improvement plan and Bridget's subsequent agenda was designed to insure that I fail (I only have a paper copy), and included weekly meetings, close monitoring of my schedule to be sure I was productive, and video taped weekly meetings. At the big meeting we had about the project about the only positive thing that came out of the meeting was Jennifer Gregory's declaration that I had amassed so many documents and so much information that it was going to take a year to get it all online. What's unproductive about that, especially when she is accusing herself of not doing enough work. (Neither Cindy or I ever said that, so why did she jump to that conclusion so quickly; she knows what she is doing or not better than anyone else.) I do not, of course, have time to tell you everything here, and I may not be entirely clear about this, however I hope you will understand and will let people know that I may be back. I also hope to point out some major defects in the policies as I go along, as there are some things that need fixing — I hope that doesn't come as a surprise.

Thank you for your kind interest and regards.
With all best wishes,

James

Attached to this was LTR.REQ.Dispute Resolution.to Board. 8 Sep 2009.pdf