Libraries poised
for change
With the termination of the Baker
By Debra Barayuga
& Taylor contract looming ...
Star-BulletinMoiliili resident Donna Tran won't let the lack of quality foreign language materials stop her from visiting her neighborhood library. "I love to read, but I get discouraged," she said yesterday while poring over a local English-language newspaper. "If I can read in Chinese, my perception is much better."
Hawaii's state libraries must address deficiencies in foreign language material at all libraries, she said.
"I'd rather have less copies and less quantity, but higher quality," Tran said.
She hopes to see changes in upcoming months once the state severs ties with book buyer Baker & Taylor, she said.
With the state poised to terminate the 51/2-year, $11.2 million contract with the North Carolina firm, state Librarian Bart Kane and his administrative team are expected to introduce a plan July 10 to library employees and union representatives to resume the functions Baker & Taylor was hired to do: select, acquire, catalog, process and distribute library materials to Hawaii's 49 state libraries.
"We expect to be able to successfully terminate the Baker & Taylor contract, receive claims and damages and agree with fellow employees on a system to allow them to select materials and get them into the public libraries as soon as selection is made without reducing hours and days of public libraries," Kane said.
Kane and his team have been working on the plan for three months, since he sent Baker & Taylor a letter in mid-February expressing dissatisfaction with the company's performance. He was instructed by the Board of Education to begin preparing for possible changes.
A letter informing Baker & Taylor of specific areas in which the company defaulted on its contract and legal rights to cure these defaults was to be completed at the end of business yesterday and sent to Baker & Taylor.
The letter comes two weeks after the Board of Education referred a blue-ribbon panel's report and recommendation to end the contract to Kane and the state attorney general for action.
Act 252, signed by Gov. Ben Cayetano last month, instructs the Board of Education and the state librarian to involve public-service librarians in the selection of materials. The law will be the cornerstone of a new system, Kane said.
The plan includes nine options and costs to implement them, which will require review by the union representing library employees.
The choices include re-creating the former selection operation in the library system and reassigning employees to carry out the functions using manual or automated systems, Kane said.
Another option is sending the services out to bid again, and it's up to library employees and the union to participate in discussions if they don't believe that's the way to go, Kane said.
The recent state Supreme Court decision in Konno vs. Hawaii County upheld the notion that government services traditionally performed by civil service workers shall not be privatized -- including functions of the library system, Kane said.
Any effort to take functions away from library workers requires a negotiated agreement with the union, he said.
The Hawaii Government Employees Association, which represents library employees, is waiting to see Kane's proposals, said Randy Perreira, HGEA field services officer.
The union has yet to receive a response to its class-action lawsuit filed last month asking the contract be declared invalid because Baker & Taylor was performing a function that has long been done by civil servants, Perreira said.
Faith Arakawa, president of the Hawaii Librarians Association, said there are many talented and experienced employees in the library system, including technicians and assistants, willing to provide expertise. "If employees are involved in coming up with a workable system to replace the outsourcing when the contract ends -- and we hope it's very soon -- I'm sure we can come up with a workable plan," she said.
Involving library employees, in the long run, "will help our public service," Arakawa said.
Before the contract, staff at the Centralized Processing Center were in charge of library acquisitions.
Branch librarians and specialists at the Hawaii State Library would select materials for the libraries, and staff at the processing center would order, process, catalog and distribute the materials to the libraries.
Although the system cannot return to the way it was because its employees have been assigned to other jobs, perhaps a modified version can be created, Arakawa said.
Chronology
July 1995: Gov. Ben Cayetano announces $3.5 million cut to the libraries' $20 million budget. It's reduced to $2.68 million after state Librarian Bart Kane proposes to abolish vacant permanent positions and re-engineer the library system, hiring outside contractors to take over several functions.
