Wednesday, August 1, 2018

Village Board Holds Special Meeting to Discuss Librarian Position


The Exeter Village Board held a special meeting on Tuesday, July 24th for the sole purpose of processing the resignation letter of Exeter librarian, Jessica Votipka.
Chairman Alan Michl opened the meeting stating, “First, we need to discuss what is going to happen in two weeks (when the current librarian leaves her post) and second about getting applications out.”
Michl also welcomed the two library board members, Board Chair Rachel Vossler and Secretary Lynette Trauger.
Board member Justin Harre started the conversation indicating, “Jessica needs to put into place in the next two weeks kind of the standards of what she does.  A way to transfer all of this knowledge.”
“It isn’t like the new person couldn’t change things but this is a starting point,” added board member Kathy Erdkamp.
Erdkamp also confirmed that the new hire did not have to be someone within the Exeter community.
Trauger clarified that the library board members are the only ones that have to live within the village limits.
The board discussed the difficulty of hiring someone because of the Saturday hours the position requires.
Trauger noted, “We had her (Votipka) keeping a log of how many were coming in on Saturdays so that we could evaluate that.”
The village board was amiable to eliminating some Saturdays as long as evening hours were offered during the week.
Michl encouraged the board to discuss hours and decide any changes before starting interviews.
Trauger noted that they had a meeting on Monday and could discuss the issues.  She asked about pay rates and benefits. 
Michl advised that the wage would be dependent on the applicant’s qualifications.
The board discussed some of the certification and accreditation requirements.  The board encouraged the library board to make some phone calls to towns of similar size to verify their pay rates and their certification requirements.
Michl explained that the process by ordinance requires that the library board review the applications, interview candidates and choose an applicant and present them to the village board who approves hiring.
Michl explained the reason for the special meeting, “I felt we needed to meet and get this going as fast as we could.”
The board noted that Jessica’s resignation included the offer of help with transition training and the board planned to take her up on this offer and compensate her for her time.


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