The judge agreed that city government could spend money targeted for books and longer library hours on school district spending and tool lending programs nullifies San Francisco voters' rights to have their will carried out, according to Chaffee. "This is just the tip of the iceberg. This opens the door to library funding for every nefarious project the supervisors can dream up," said Chaffee. The Fund sunsets in 2009 and it will have to be renewed or a substitute found. "Now that City Hall has fought for the right to avoid an accounting and to avoid the priority set forth in the law," says the long-time library activist, "they will be hard pressed to sell the same bill of goods again."

     "Losing a lawsuit is a lot like getting arrested in a protest," adds Chaffee, "It is regrettable but sometimes history remembers an issue because of the protest that would have been forgotten otherwise." Chaffee says that he is content that the lawsuit has clarified some important issues. "City Hall fought for their victory and now they are going to have to live with it. It is well known that when the public is told 'books books books' they reach for their checkbook. If the public refuses to do that again, our libraries have been irreparably harmed."

     When City Librarian Susan Hildreth was confronted on the witness stand with the fact that in the face of the priority in the law for books and materials, the books and materials budget has been continually dropping as a percentage and in buying power from the first year of Prop. E, Ms. Hildreth defended herself with the claim that when the law began to be implemented the book budget was "abnormally high." Chaffee wonders if this means that she is bringing it down intentionally and that the "priority" the bond issue specified for the book budget was not consistent with her priorities. "Is this the respect," Chaffee asks, "that the trust of the voters deserves?"

     When asked under oath about whether the $316 million in Prop E funds to date had been accounted for, City Controller Ed Harrington admitted that, "...on the expenditure side you can't tell." Chaffee believes that voters passed the Library Preservation Fund on the premise that it would be in addition to the general fund support for libraries and that there would be a priority for books and materials and library hours. The voters, he says, trusted that their wishes would be carried out. To receive an answer that, when it comes to determining where the money went, "you can't tell," betrays that trust, says Chaffee.

     In addition, says Chaffee, the hours have been frozen and have not budged one minute in light of all the budget increases, the bloating of administration and a million dollar public relations dept. The time may be ripe, says Chaffee, for San Francisco voters to call for an audit of the library.

Note: Three days after the disturbing outcome of the lawsuit, Susan Hildreth announced her resignation as Chief Librarian (more here)

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Media Contact: James Chaffee

415-705-0908

savebooks@pacbell.net

     The resignation comes as the Public Library, under Hildreth's direction, has become embroiled in several controversies, including the creation of a Citizen's Advisory Council to oversee the affairs of the public library, the near-unanimous opposition at a public meeting of Hildreth's Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) plan and the lawsuit by James Chaffee of Save Our Libraries that charged misuse of the 1994 Library Preservation Fund legislation.

     There have also been persistent charges that the Branch Library Bond Program, overseen by Hildreth and her staff, was over budget and out of control. Ms. Hildreth's flawed proposal for (RFID) in library books and materials may have been the straw that broke the camel's back. The initiative brought vocal opposition from the American Civil Liberties Union, the Electronic Frontier Foundation, Save Our Libraries, the Library Users Association and alarmed local citizens with privacy concerns.

     "There were just too many instances where Ms. Hildreth was asleep at the wheel and Mayor Newsom seems to recognize that a new direction needs to be set for the library" said long-time library activist and Save Our Libraries founder, James Chaffee. "Mayor Newsom ran on a platform of bringing change to City Hall and this seems the latest of the mayor's attempts to fulfill that pledge. Nowhere is it more needed than at the public library where the lack of leadership and a clear direction have been pronounced." 

     Chaffee's recent lawsuit was largely seen as a disastrous turn of events for Ms. Hildreth. The Library Preservation Fund mandates hearings in each branch this summer for the resetting of a new schedule of library hours for 2005. The interpretation of the law that was advanced by Ms. Hildreth and the City Attorney's office is seen as untenable in front of neighborhoods concerned about their branch hours. There has not been an increase of even a single hour over the last nine years in the face of a library budget that has nearly doubled.

     The carefully crafted loopholes that the library administration advanced were put in place by the City Controller Ed Herrington back in 1998 before the city embarked on District Elections. What had been a mere cost cutting measure at the expense of neighborhood libraries is now seen as a major embarrassment by City Hall when each supervisor is expected to defend the branches in his or her neighborhood.

     Citizen activists are calling for a clean sweep at the Library Commission as well. It is considered by many that it would be impossible to set a new direction for the library without replacing the Library Commissioners who had appointed Ms. Hildreth and supported her every move, no matter how misguided. All sitting Commissioners were appointed or re-appointed by Willie Brown, one of them hails from the Frank Jordan administration and two were initially appointed by Art Agnos.

     Those long-time commissioners have been heavily committed to the privatization that was Librarian Ken Dowlin's legacy. Dowlin was fired as a result of the scandal involving landfill dumping of books to cover up the botched design of the New Main library, among other failings. The commissioners recently approved a "Wall of Heroes" commemoration for the builders of the New Main to be placed at the Larkin Street entrance while turning a deaf ear to the protests of the professional librarians who asserted that it was embarrassing to them.

     City Librarian Hildreth had lobbied heavily against the Citizen's Advisory Committee and attempted to defeat it by casting it as a referendum of no confidence in her administration. When it passed despite her opposition, she was stuck with the implications of her own escalated rhetoric. But it is undoubtedly true that if the Supervisors had confidence in Ms. Hildreth, there never would have been approval of a Citizen's Advisory Committee.

     The Library Branch Bond Program passed by the voters in 2000 was suffering from cost overruns after only two projects had been approved. A 5% reduction was placed on each branch project without ground being broken on a single project. There have also been consistent charges that branch collections are being reduced much to the dissatisfaction of concerned parents and prominent neighbors of branches in a planning process. Particularly, the Excelsior Branch and the Richmond Branch, that have progressed through the planning stages, there were strong vocal protests then it was revealed that collection sizes would be reduced.

     In addition, with the city being four years into the Bond Program, the library claimed during the Prop. A campaign that the branches that were seismic "Fours" were an immediate hazard, yet none of those projects have begun The original claim during the Prop. A campaign was that no more than three or four branches would be closed at one time, yet plans now call for twelve branches to be closed at one time. Although the library claimed during the Prop. A campaign that every effort would be made to find temporary sites, no neighborhood will receive a temporary site.

     The Branch Bond Program had also relied heavily on an infusion of cash from the State of California Prop. 14 Bonds. Applications by the library under Hildreth's administration were evaluated as deficient and finished well below the funding level. The Branch Bond Program that passed in 2000 as Prop. A was at least partially based on an estimate by Ms. Hildreth that the City of San Francisco could expect $10 million from the California State funding for local projects. With 80 percent of that funding now committed, San Francisco has not received a dime. Speculation regarding whether the fault lies in Ms. Hildreth's unrealistic estimates or Ms. Hildreth's ill-prepared funding applications is seen as largely academic in City Hall circles and the Mayor's office. With recent revelations in the School District Bonds and the Recreation & Park Bonds, the Mayor and City Hall can ill afford another overspent and poorly executed bond program.

     Ms. Hildreth's appointment from the position of Assistant City Librarian under former City Librarian Regina Minudri was widely seen as a betrayal of the promise that the City would conduct a national search for Dowlin's replacement. Ms. Minudri's appointment and her agreement to come out of retirement to accept it was regarded as merely a caretaker role and that what was needed was a librarian of national stature.

     "One cannot build a solid institution on the foundation of a lie," said James Chaffee. "The citizens of San Francisco were promised a nationwide search in the aftermath of the resignation of Kenneth Dowlin over the scandals of the New Main Library. That didn't happen and instead an assistant was promoted who was always in over her head." "Maybe this time," adds Chaffee, "they'll get someone who believes in books, believes in branch libraries and is truely qualified for the job."

Judge Denies City's Attempt to Toss Suite

The City attempted to have the suit, which, in part, claims lack of accounting for up to $316 million in 1994 Library Preservation Fund monies, dismissed on summary judgement, but the judge ruled that there was definitely cause to go to trial

James Chaffee, the long-time library activist who filed the suit, says, "We are looking forward to redeeming in court this fraud that has been perpetrated on the citizens of San Francisco. This misuse of public money is just the tip of the proverbial iceberg of the abuse of the most important of our democratic institutions. And that iceberg is the use of the Public Library for private interests."

The lawsuit stems from Proposition E in 1994, called the Library Preservation Fund, that put in place guaranteed funding for the library on the condition that it only be used for the library and that a priority be placed on hours and books. That law has been consistently violated as political and private interests play politics with that money.

The Library Preservation Fund had a number of provisions that were carefully crafted to assure that the intention of the guaranteed funds was carried out, including the following:

• The Library Preservation Fund be accounted for separately. (The Library Administration now contends that it is "impractical" for the Fund to be accounted for separately.)
• The Library Preservation Fund be appropriated for the operation of the library and on a priority for books and neighborhood branch hours. (There has been no priority for books or hours while the money has been spent on a Tool Lending Center, support for the Unified School District, support for the private, corporate-dominated Friends & Foundation and now it will be used to bail out the current Capital Bonds.)
• The Library Preservation Fund be in addition to General Fund monies. (The Library Administration contends that it can ignore the above priorities because it spends Preservation Fund monies first and that is therefore free to divert General Fund monies and ignore the priorities.)

"If the present direction continues, they will turn San Francisco Public into the Wal-Mart of Libraries," charged James Chaffee.

This has been, according to Chaffee, the most extreme of all "bait-and-switch" frauds in the City and County of San Francisco. "Whenever the "commercial privateers" want money, the library is the "House of the Book," dedicated to preserving history and distributing the information and knowledge that the citizens need." This pattern was described in a May 3, 2004 editorial in the San Francisco Chronicle describes as "squandered promises", generating "cynicism and mistrust" among voters.

Chaffee has seen a pattern over twenty years that shows that as soon as the library administration has the public's (bond) money, then the library is dedicated to the flashy gadget of the moment and caters to the vanity of philanthropists and fund-raising privateers.

"That stops now," says James Chaffee, "I don't want future generations to look back and say that no one raised a finger while our public libraries were being destroyed."

The SFPL has been plagued over recent years with scandals and lawsuits involving the wanton destruction (featured in the New Yorker) in landfills of tens of thousands of books, $28 million design short-falls in the New Main, which has been roundly criticized as inadequate to users' needs and described in the January, 2004 Metropolis Magazine as "... one of the most unwelcoming and dysfunctional buildings ever constructed." The SFPL is now mired in controversy surrounding the 2000 bond measure to replace aging branch libraries, with one of the few projects started now 200% over budget.

Information about the suit and the SFPL can be found at www.SaveOurLibraries.com.