NYPL Withdraws Salary Offer
after City Demands Givebacks
Salary talks between New York Public Library and the librarians’ union have broken down after administrators withdrew a proposal that would have raised salaries of current librarians by 15%. The increase, aimed at addressing inadequate salaries that have led to a shortage of personnel in the city’s library systems, was agreed to by NYPL and the union in August, Local 1930 President Ray Markey told American Libraries. But the city subsequently wanted the library to demand givebacks in the form of a two-and-a-half-hour increase in librarians’ 35-hour workweek. In addition, positions that are currently vacant would be eliminated.
Markey said the library staff, which is already overworked, “feels totally betrayed” by the demand for more productivity. He believed the city’s call for additional hours was the first step in obtaining a longer workweek for all city workers.
City officials, library management, and union leaders are scheduled to meet again September 29. The union plans a demonstration outside NYPL’s main facility at Fifth Avenue and 42nd Street on October 12 to coincide with the opening of the library’s exhibition “Utopia: The Search for the Ideal Society in the Western World.”
Posted September 25, 2000.
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