Tuesday, January 24, 2012

Amherst Select Board mediates

Amherst Select Board 1/23/12

So in addition to abiding by the School Committee's wishes to have a joint meeting February 6 to fill the seat left vacant by Steve Rivkin's departure because, as eloquently stated by Chair Stephanie O'Keeffe, it would be beyond "weird" not to indulge their wishes, the board last night also delayed approving changes to Personnel Procedures Manual that the Personal Board has been working on for three years to allow Jones Library Trustees to discuss it at their next meeting.

The changes seem to take away authority from the Town Manager and give Library Trustees--elected volunteers--power to hire and fire all employees. Union rep Tina Swift told the Select Board "impact bargaining"(on a contract that was signed only last month) needs to happen with Service Employees International Union before they adopt the revised Personnel Procedures Manual.

Librarian Susan Hugus told the board a lot of employees "are very uncomfortable about this"; and even the Town Manager agreed with delaying a decision because the original intent of the change was "to provide clarity, not sow confusion."

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

The Select Board is also "elected volunteers." So are the School Board and the Town Moderator. Was that supposed to be a put-down?

Larry Kelley said...

The Town Manager is not an elected volunteer.

I was just comparing and contrasting.

Anonymous said...

Considering what the Trustees did to the past Director, and the intimidation they wreaked on staff through the process (interrogation that probably rivaled GITMO), I would be "concerned" too.