Equity, in the Library and City-wide

Daily Hours: 4
Total Hours: 42

Today was a mix of activities to start the week off. First thing in the morning Chris, Michael, and I reconvened to make a final decision on who to hire for the teen position. We took the first part of the meeting to go through our notes on their interview responses and rate every answer on a scale of 1-5. We then added up each candidate's totals and compared our rankings, which Michael informed us is how they do it for the "big time" interviews at MPL as well. We also briefly discussed what questions they had asked us during the interview, and Michael gave me the advice that it can be really advantageous to come with a few good questions for the search committee to show you're really interested and have done a bit of background research. It was interesting to see that we all had ranked the same applicants in the top three when it all came down to it, even though we were struggling to pick the top contenders when we were just informally discussing the candidates. After a few more minutes of discussion we finally settled on our choice for the other position, with Chris declaring that this was the last year she'd be involved in the process; she just knows too many of the kids too well, not to mention the politics when their mothers are involved...


After starting to get up to speed with the Seed Library material for my presentation next week and making some logistical calls about scheduling the accompanying workshops, I biked downtown to join Chris and Michael at the City Racial Equity and Social Justice (RESJ) group meeting. Formed last fall and made up of representatives from various municipal departments, RESJ works towards "eliminating racial and social inequities in municipal government by implementing strategies in three main areas: Equity in City policies and budgets; Equity in City operations; and Equity in the community." In addition to Michael and Chris, Sarah Lawton, the director of the Monroe St. Branch and the Pinney Branch was at the meeting as well; like Michael and I had discussed before, there are some "movers and shakers" at MPL who are really advocating for diversity, not just internally within the library, but City-wide as well. The meeting started of with chatter among the members about the recent WSJ article featuring the leader of the group and her partner after they got married last weekend, which started things off on a positive note. Since they are still a relatively new group, the meeting mainly covered their new structure (splitting into action teams etc.) and what they hope to get accomplished. Right now they are mainly focused on creating community connections and working on tools that can be used as a reference City-wide when departments are developing new policies or making hiring decisions. They plan on joining an alliance of other cities who also have established RESJ initiatives like Portland, Seattle, and the Twin Cities. There was also a presentation about the new economic plan that the City is developing, with the idea to incorporate the standpoint that there is "an economic argument for equity." One part of the economic presentation I found particularly interesting was the discussion of the tax-base competition that Madison faces from outlying suburban areas like Sun Prairie, which could threaten many public services, libraries included of course!