Gloria Weinrich: "Library Has Become Beating Boy of This Town'

Garden City Library board vice chair Gloria Weinrich is frustrated and she got a few things off her chest at the Aug. 12 library board meeting.

"For some reason the library has become the 'beating boy' of this town," she said. "We're losing money, we're not given the money to support our library ... There's just something going on that the library is not accepted for what we do and how much we do and how much the people in this library do."

Referring to the July 18 village board meeting, where a library board request to have $32,000 in unused State Retirement System funds transferred from last year's budget to this year's in order to restore Sunday hours was expected to be discussed, Weinrich said she attended the meeting only to get there and discover the request was scrapped from the agenda.

Library board chair Randy Colahan's request via a letter to the board was originally included in the online agenda but was missing from the hard copy agenda available for residents that evening.

Mayor John Watras told Patch that "in all probability" the request will be discussed at the Aug. 22 village board meeting.

Mayor Watras said there isn't supposed to be any animosity between both boards. "We are trying to work things out together," he said, adding that he met with Colahan not too long ago to discuss matters. "We are working on things," he said.

When reached this week, trustee Brian Daughney, village board liaison to the library, did not provide any further comment. Daughney was out of town and did not attend the Aug. 12 library board meeting.

Huntington Road resident Leo Stimmler said he'd like to see more advocacy for library services. "Do you not have a responsibility to be more of an advocate for your own services?" he asked Weinrich. "I have a sense that you're very reluctant to step up appropriately and advocate for your services in the village ... You seem to have an aversion to being political."

Stimmler said there's a rumor trustees are about to approve "hundreds of thousands of dollars" for the senior center on Golf Club Lane. "Look what that's for," he said. "That's for about 35 bridge players. You take half a dozen, maybe seven or eight bridge players, that go to village hall who insist that the village spend money on the senior center yet so many more people use this library. Could you be more of an advocate? Could you help corral some of these positive comments and individuals who write to the library?"

Weinrich said she does ask those who write letters of praise about the library's programs and staff to address the village board. "People who come to the library and really use the library are not the people that are going to 'rabble rouse' at village hall," Weinrich said. "And I think that is part of the problem."

Colahan added that the board does try to advocate as much as it can but has a "very silent support group."

"We're not here to judge whether the seniors should have their center but we are continually arguing for this," he said. "We have gotten a sense that the more we argue the less we get ... I think we do a lot of advocacy but we've got to be careful. We are nominated by the POAs and then the trustees vote for us. We are here for a specific purpose and it's not to defer to them. That's an important point.

"We have a right to defend this library and its budget the best we can and we do but we just have to be very careful not to alienate."

The village board meets at 8 p.m. in the village hall boardroom Thursday evening.