Then There Are Five

“And Then There Are Five”
or,
How a Library Board is Appointed


James Duvall, M. A.
Big Bone University

One would think the Director of a Public Library wold have nothing to do with appointing the Library Board of Trustees; after all, they are her boss. In reality, she has everything to do with it. The way the system works the Director hand-picks the people who set her salary, decide the budget, and the tax-rates for the district, and rubber stamp nearly all of her decisions.

It works like this: The Boards of Trustees consists of five members who serve two year rotating terms; one or two must be appointed every other year. The Director proposes two names of her choice to the Board, all the members of which she has picked in a similar manner if she has been Director any time at all, to replace any departing member. (This proposal of two names for each position to be filled has a hoary antiquity, and was inherited from the time before 1792 when Kentucky was still part of Virginia.) In the vast majority of cases the Board rubber-stamps this recommendation, which is then sent to the Director of the Kentucky Department of Library and Archives (KDLA), who again rubber-stamps it — at least a nominee has never been known to have been turned down — and sends it to the Governor. This individual signs the papers, and would only turn down a recommendation if the first proposed name were known to be a political foe, in which case the second name would be approved instead; usually those proposed are either political friends, or nonentities that the Governor would never even have heard of, and then his rubber-stamped recommendation is sent to the local Fiscal Court. Guess what happens there? Whereas yesterday there were only three or four members of the Board, they again rubber-stamp the Director's choice, and then there are five.

This means that the Director has effectively selected her won bosses, and in the majority of cases, certainly in our county, the Board allows the Director to do just about anything she wants, such as the “Five Mile Plan” in which the Director and “Her Board” (Yes, every Director speaks of the Trustees as “My Board”, and with very good reason.) has decided that there needs to be a huge Library building within five miles of the home of every Boone County citizen. In some places there are still great restrictions on what a Director can do, but not in Boone County.

The whole process is one big, mechanical rubber-stamp, and the public (read “voters”) has no say in the process. Boone Countians have no choice, and are not even told how this Board-Director plans to spend literally millions of dollars of their tax money every year. And no input when these people decide to invest in new buildings that cost over ten million dollars, not including the land. Such a scheme has often been referred to as a “self-perpetuating Board”, and in one sense it is; but it is actually a handpicked Board — a Director's dream — or taxpayer's nightmare — depending on your point of view.

I said above that in some places there are still great restrictions on what a Director can do, this is not because she (in a few cases it is a he) does not have the Board in her pocket, but because the County is poor, and there is not much money. That is not the case here. Whereas many Counties are content to have one medium sized facility, or in a few cases a branch or two, Boone County has six locations and the “Five Mile Plan”. A facility that will cost more than $10 million dollars is now reached the stage of having the initial blueprints drawn. $3.1 million dollars has been spent already to buy fifty acres of land on which to place this facility. I have seen the initial drawings, which are not available for public inspection. In fact I have yet to speak to anyone from Boone County, not associated with the Library, who is aware of the plan, or the new facility, which the Board has already approved, though major details concerning its design and style are still to be worked out.

Some measure of fiscal responsibility was forced on the Board due to the efforts of District Judge Candidate Rick Bruggemann, who got enough signatures to put a 5% limit on the Library property tax rate. Acting quickly, former Director Lucinda Brown decided to lower the rates, which had gradually reached remarkably high levels, to 5%; the Board, as might be expected, rubber-stamped this decision. The Library avoided a referendum on the issue (which would have limited the ability of the Board to raise the rates over a much longer term), and County Attorney Robert Neace issued the opinion (I think rightly), that since the vote would not actually change the rates (now the exact figure of the proposed limit), it need not be placed on the ballot. The rates can still go up in the near future, since the Board is empowered by State Law to raise them one and a half percent per year without a referendum (that is how they got so high in the first place), so in several years the rate may be as high as it was before, and most people will not even be aware of how it happened. I feel the public owes a great deal to Rick Bruggemann, and some people who think like him, and I hope they will make their pleasure known in November.

The $18 million facility on Burlington Pike, known semi-affectionately as the “Taj Mahal” (It is actually on Wildcat Boulevard, so I call it the “Taj on Wildcat”.), as most people know, features a copper dome. I must say here that I do not actually object to the dome; I am tired of libraries that look like rejected school houses from the 1960s. I happen to agree with Ms. Brown in her statement to the assembled Library staff before the new building was ever built: “I think a public building should look like a public building!” I do not object to the dome, or even the building (though I think it is inconvenient, and difficult to get around in; a lot of it is wasted space.) I think the time may come when many people in Boone County are proud of this building as many years ago when a child in Lexington I loved the old Public Library there: It was built of marble, and had pillars in front — it looked like a real Library, much more so than this one; but that was another era. What I object to about this building is the way it was done and foisted off on the public. The citizens of Boone County were not aware a new building was going to be built; the actual meetings were kept secret.

No one was asked to give an opinion about a dome, or anything else about the building; it came as a surprise to the community, and the Director was shocked that not everyone appreciated the gift she had given them with public money. The negative publicity was why she decided to retire before she was ready; she didn't want to take the heat for the new building in Hebron. It is my guess that a significant percent of the population in Boone County would like to be able to express an opinion about what the new building should look like, and how much it should cost; presumably it will not have a copper dome.

The copper dome on the Taj Mahal, in my opinion, has saved the County untold millions of dollars, and a heap of political boondoggling. This is due to the fact that it was the rallying cry for the opposition to the infamous “Parks Tax”. Thanks to PVA Cindy Arlinghaus Rich, and to County Clerk Candidate Kenny Brown, and the Boone County Tea Party, this proposal to tax and spend an amount that makes the dome look like a picnic basket in comparison went down to ignominious defeat. Again, I hope the voters will make their pleasure known in November, and it was the protest lead by these two responsible citizens, and by Commissioner Kathy Flaig, who made that a reality. It was the initiative lead by Mr. Bruggemann, in my opinion, that focused public attention on the whole issue of taxation, and showed that it was possible to override the Tax-&-Spend crew who have grabbed the reigns of power.

There has been an attempt to enact legislation in Frankfort to make Library Boards and Fire District Board accountable to the Fiscal Courts. Kenny Brown has testified before the Legislature to get this accomplished, but it will not happen unless there is a major infusion of minority power into the Legislature, and this is sorely need to equalize many other issues. In my opinion a far more logical solution to this problem is not to turn more authority over to the Fiscal Courts, but to make Board Members subject to the election process, and thus make them subject to the will of the people. It may be initially more expensive to hold elections, but it is likely to save a massive amount in the long run. The present system was set up to shield Boards and Directors from the public; that may be nice for them, but how do we make them accountable? As you know the Fiscal Court has issues aplenty, and does not particularly care to add the additional responsibility of setting rates for the Library, and the many Fire Districts in the County. School Board members run, and they devour much more of our money than the Library or the Fire Districts; but at least the Superintendent of Schools does not appoint his own bosses; and if his bosses do not answer to the people in some fashion at least, they can be gotten rid of at the next election.

Elections in Boone County cost more than $180,000 a year, how much more could it cost to add a few more Board members to that? If members were elected to the Board the taxpayers would be in a fair way to get control of the Libraries, that is, exactly what the present laws are designed to prevent. While I think Directors do not need to be necessarily subjected to every whim of the public, and it is nice if they stay on awhile, I think they should be courageous in presenting their plans to the public; we are not all as bad as they seem to think. Why not tell the public what you plan to do? If your plans are good the public will propose the funds necessary, after all the public initiated the idea of having a Library in the first place. As it is, disinterest Board membership means they have no motivation or responsibility for what they do. The Director has motivation to hide important decisions until they present the public with a fait accompli, then, as with the 5% tax rate, it is to late to do anything about it. I suggest that if there were between 6 and 12 Board Members, with the two senior members going off each year. On the petition of 100 taxpaying citizens of the County the entire Board could be replaced in a general election in any given year. The right of petition would give the Board reason to listen to the public. The numbers and the rotation would give the Director enough stability to do her job effectively without controlling the Board, as is currently the case. The current Board of Trustees of Boone County Public Library

Alice Ryle, President
Pam Goetting, Vice-president
Nancy Grayson, Secretary
Chris Grubbs
Jim Henning
Greta Southard, Director
Branches: Florence, Scheben (Union), Lents (Hebron), Walton, Burlington (Main), Chapin (Petersburg).

Additional Remarks on Libraries

“Libraries have always been a weapon in the war of culture (Kulturkampf); that is as true today as it ever was; however, today the war, in many cases, is waged by the lower culture against the higher, even though it may retain some of the trappings of prestige. This is unprecedented.”

Heinrich Adler, The Past in the Present,trans. by Mason Hamilton (Caria Books, 1985), vol. 2, p. 123.

“It does not help matters that we are out of sympathy with the architects's rich clients, who so often commissioned the mansions, the factories and office buildings, and sat on the boards and committees that ordered the museums, the libraries, and the clubhouses. We think of these wealthy people as selfish and pretentious, conceited and foolish, and
their patronage seems to damn doubly the eclectic architecture they commissioned, regarding it as suitable to their self-image and life style.”

Walter C. Kidney, The Architecture of Choice
(Brazillier Books, 1974), p. 67.

It is my opinion that politics is but history in the making, and that both the past and the present can be best understood by being studied together.

James Duvall, M. A. is the Director of Big Bone University, a Think Tank, History Research Institute, and Public Policy Center, located at Big Bone, Kentucky. James is the former Local History Research Specialist for the Boone County Public Library, and is currently engaged in a massive research and writing project, which he plans to publish as a multi-volume work to be entitled The History of Big Bone, and Southern Boone County, Kentucky, several volumes of which are nearly ready for publication. If you have any comments on the above article, or information, photographs, or artifacts relating to Big Bone, you may contact him at jkduvall@gmail.com.