Warren Mayor’s Charges
Prompt Investigation
The Suburban Library Cooperative of Macomb County, Michigan, is seeking legal counsel, following charges by Warren Mayor Mark Steenbergh that his city’s library inappropriately spent some of the $18,000 it received from the state-funded agency. The mayor had called for Warren Library Director Wlodek Zaryczny’s resignation July 9, but at a recent meeting the library commission opted not to take a vote on the director’s status. Instead it asked the city attorney to investigate what control, if any, the city has over the money.
SLC Director Tammy Turgeon said in the July 19 Macomb Daily that SLC’s nine-member board will likely meet later this summer to review the legal opinion and clarify “what this money can and can’t be spent on.”
Zaryczny told American Libraries that all the expenditures in question, including $375 for three political fundraisers, were approved as part of an overall strategy to rub shoulders with community leaders and raise the library’s profile. “And $175 of that money came out of my own pocket,” he added.
Commission chair Richard Palmer, who also defended the expenses, was not reappointed by Steenbergh when his term expired June 30 but was replaced by Bill O’Bryan. City finance officials are conducting an audit of the fund.
Posted July 23, 2001.
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