To the Editor:
I would like to address inaccuracies stated by the Guilderland Public Library Board of Trustees president in the May 23 Enterprise article entitled “GPL striving to ‘improve our workplace culture,’ says interim director.”

She stated that “all employees are covered by a union where they’d bring their grievances." In fact, library staff in the Administration and Information Technology departments are considered Management Confidential, and are not part of a union.

She also stated that a work-from-home policy exists for employees, as opposed to administrators. To date, no work-from-home policy exists for any GPL employee: https://guilderlandlibrary.org/get-to-know-us/things/policies.

In addition, the internal safety plan committee was discontinued in 2023; no safety plan currently exists — whether that is strictly an administrative function, or warrants board input.

Finally, the reorganization plan was not shared with trustees, despite their request to do so, nor with the staff. Clearly, part of the intent was to incentivize long-term employees to retire, and bring in new staff at a significantly higher rate.

A concerted effort between board and administration to address salary equity between new and existing staff is needed, as well as a safety plan and work-from-home policy for all staff.

Best wishes to the new director to enact positive changes.

Luanne Nicholson

Latham

Editor’s note: Luanne Nicholson formerly worked as the public information officer for the Guilderland Public Library.