Workers at the Cleveland Public Library staged a one-day strike April 20, shutting down 19 of the system’s 28 branches and curtailing services at the Main Library and nine branches, which were staffed entirely by managers.
The walkout was called “a shot across the bow” by Ryan Moore, steward of the Service Employees International Union Local 1199, which represents 407 of the system’s 735 workers. The library is demanding staff concessions in health care, leave, transfers, and outsourcing. The union seeks annual salary increases of about 4% over the next three years; management has offered just 2% a year.
No further talks have been scheduled between library officials and the union. Moore said in the April 21 Cleveland Plain Dealer that “All the options remain open,” including another strike. “We’re going to continue to maintain a public profile on this issue.” Head of Human Resources Sharon Tufts said the library is “ready and eager to go back to the table.”
The city council passed a resolution in support of the workers April 19, stating that the library “is wasting thousands of tax dollars in such contract negotiations attempting to take away long-standing benefits and rights.”
When picketers outside the Main Library’s Louis Stokes Wing spotted the annex’s namesake, Stokes also offered his support. “That union was one of my strongest supporters in Congress,” said the former U.S. representative. “Plus, they work in a library named after me! Anybody associated with it has my respect.”
Posted April 23, 2004.