On the day the contract covering 55,000 county employees is set to expire, LA County library management announced the layoffs for dozens of library aides and pages, which will directly impact service at the county’s 84 libraries.
The announcement comes as county workers are negotiating into the night at the LA Convention Center. Workers adopted a set of proposals called the Building a Better LA Plan that includes suggestions to improve services like decentralizing county book purchasing so that residents have access to more relevant book selections at their local branch.
Earlier this summer, SEIU members presented the LA County Supervisors with a plan to use President Obama’s Economic Stimulus funds that are meant to “preserve and create jobs” to maintain library positions. Library workers collected 5,500 signatures and the Board adopted Supervisor Gloria Molina’s motion that directed the CEO, DPSS and the Library Department to use Federal Stimulus dollars from the TANF Contingency Fund to avert employee layoffs.
“With federal funding available, the library department still decided to slash county library services. It doesn’t make any sense — particularly when the county CEO has taken great pride in the fact that the county will weather the economic downturn without a single layoff,” said John Tanner, executive director of SEIU 721.