A Bully in Board Member's Clothing

So here's the deal:

I have in the past posted about my various digital battles on social media with the board member who has no use for the library (feels it is a waste of taxpayers money--he has used the term "entitlement", while I believe that the taxpayers get more than their money back). He was appointed by the mayor who also has no use for the library. Usually the posts are just quick and fun. To update my page (since so much of my life is about working that's often all I have).

This board member has a blog in which he details the evils of...well anyone who doesn't agree with him on how Park Ridge should be run. On this blog he regularly disses his fellow library board members, the director of the library and the staff of the library who he claims on his blog, in rather hyperbolic language, are using the library patrons as pawns in their political game to get more money from the city.

Little background: For several years now, the city has defunded the library even though the cost of doing business has continued to raise. It's primarily in an effort for the mayor and certain members of the council to look good in the eyes of the taxpayer (they can't find money for the library but have no problem finding money for other lil' projects of theirs). The library has been asked to tighten its belt, even when the bad economy brought even more people to the library. And it has tightened it's belt, doing away with certain amenities for the patrons, putting off certain projects (some important), cutting hours, even cutting staff. But last November, the director went to the council and basically said, we can't do it anymore. We're going to need more money. (Again, the cost of doing business has continued to rise). A five percent tax levy was requested. The council voted it down. So the library had to figure out how to cut even more to address the budget. We lost three more staff members (their last day was April 30, the last day of the fiscal budget for the previous year) and it was decided that after over a decade, the library would be closing on Sundays during the summer.

Some libraries are closed Sundays during the summer but the Park Ridge Library is very well used by the taxpayers all year round (which is why I don't think it was too much to ask to increase the levy: The taxpayers get that money back and then some).

So beginning Memorial Day weekend, the library will be closed which affects all the staff, including myself, for whom Sundays are a part of their weekly schedule. That decision was not an easy one for anyone on the board or the director to make. And no one on the staff (who have no say in it anyway) wanted to see it happen either. We all experience how important the library is to the patrons and how important it is for those who come to the library on Sundays. For some people that was the most convenient time to go to the library.

In January, in an effort to demonize the staff in the eyes of the taxpayers, this board member wrote on his blog that one of the reasons for the Sunday closings was to divert the money to raises for the staff. Now raises for the staff had actually been brought up in a board meeting along with actually cutting staff pay to make up the budget deficit. But I've heard nothing further on it so for me, it's one of those "believe it when it happens" sort of things. I can say that that wasn't the main imputes for the decision to close the library. What this board member doesn't mention on his blog is how rarely in the past decade the library staff has had raises, and that any proposed 1% raise would do little to make up for what someone like myself is losing financially by losing those Sunday hours.

Predictably, on that particular blog piece there were people expressing concern and outrage that the staff would be getting raises. I believe this was exactly the reaction the board member was going for. 

Now since I've in the past felt compelled to correct certain misinformation that he's put out there (such as when I wrote a letter to the paper asking why he called the Food For Fines program--a program that the community has known about and participated in for a couple of decades--"theft from the taxpayers") I decided to pop on his blog and clarify this raise issue for the outraged readers. I know I won't convince him of anything. But there may be some reasonable citizens who can be reached.

That's how it started. We've been digital pals ever since. Well, perhaps not pals. He apparently has a lot of time to maintain that blog, and he has such a problem with the library, that he's been slamming the board, director and staff pretty regularly. Continuing to insist that these entities are using the patrons as pawns. I know that most members of the board don't like the Sunday closings (though I wouldn't be surprised if he loves it, despite his claims, because it's allowed him to get his agenda out there). I know the director is not happy about it. She cares about the community. And as stated, I know the staff isn't happy. But what troubled me was his insistence in bringing the staff into his accusation. The staff has no say in any of this. I understand his goal: to further demonize the staff in the eyes of the patrons affected by this closing. But it isn't fair. And I felt it important to point this out. Continuously, because he was relentless in his response to comments made on this post, continuing to drag the staff into the fault of this decision.

And of course other posts have continued this harranguing of the staff. I've commented on many of his posts, at first using my initials cause it was easier to input after every comment, then when he decided I was trying to hide (the way some people hide behind the "anonymous" tag) I started using my full name. So apparently now, I'm fairly well known.

A week or so ago, a friend of mine attended a library board meeting and posted to my Facebook timeline something along the lines of her watching a board member scarf down the free chocolates. I think it was one sentence and mentioned no names (not that most of Facebook friends, many of whom are out of state and out of the US, would recognize a name used anyway). It was the sort of innocuous jokey post made on FB by any number of people every day.

Well, a few days ago my friend messaged me and asked me to take the post down. Apparently the board member and his friends were checking out my FB page. I checked for the post but couldn't find it leading me to suspect that since my friend deleted it off her timeline, it was deleted from mine.

If it hadn't involved her I wouldn't have bothered with it. I've been posting about that library situation for months. But she was skiddish because she's been the target of some social media bullying before.

A day or so later someone told me that indeed my name, my FB page and that post was mentioned in the comment section of one of the board member's posts on his blog. It was mentioned by someone using the tag "Anonymous" because they were too chicken to use their real name or identifying initials. It could have been the board member's close pal, the mayor. It could have been one of his alderman buddies. It could have been one of the people in the past who have harassed my friend. Whoever it was, mentioning it really had nothing to do with the post that the board member made. It was all a deliberate attempt to make me look bad.

Of course I put up a response (and as anyone who knows me knows it was a meaty one). The chief point being that since I post a lot of stuff on my timeline, someone would have had to (in my opinion obsessively) scan through a lot of stuff to catch this one line post. That in itself borders on creepy.

By the time I was able to post my response, however (I had to wait a day or two because of my idiotic schedule), Anonymous commented again stating that he/she went through my time line again and the post had been removed to which the board member piped in an accusation that I had white washed my timeline.

Which is what's led to this blog post. Had my friend not deleted this post, I may have per her request because it involved her. If it was just me, I would have left it on. After all, I wouldn't want the board member and his pals to think they scared me off.

After it was noted that the board member minions were trolling my FB page some people counseled me to make my status private. I especially won't now. Right now my FB page is for friendship and promotion. Perhaps I'll set up an author page but I haven't had the time yet.

But why should I give these trolls the benefit of trying to scare me into changing my status?

This board member and his pals are engaging in the sort of tactics 12-year old bullies use now to scare their targets at school. I've faced bullies all my life. Both outside and inside my home. When you have your own parents taking out their frustration out on you, a little bullying by a board member doesn't really register.

I have no doubt that part of the reason this comment was made on the board member's post was for intimidation purposes. "We're keeping an eye on you. You may get into trouble." That is, after all, what helps make people nervous about asking questions, or calling people on their BS.

But another reason I believe my FB page was brought up was so the board member could bring up certain things that he might not have had a chance (because they hadn't been raised) to bring up. For example, he commented on the "scarfing chocolates" observation with a long discussion about not having time to eat dinner when he takes the train downtown and heads to a 7 p.m. board meeting so he was feeling hungry (all because he had to hurry to the library board meeting and stand up for the taxpayer against the evil cabal: Look how he gives and gives to and protects the community--this last bit was implied). 

Again, no one on his blog would have known anything about this post had his pal not brought it up after surfing my timeline looking for trouble. And since names weren't given, my friend technically could have been talking about anyone. The board member rather outted himself on that one.

But this board member is a crafty one and he understands opportunities and he knows how valuable words are. You get the meme out there (oh...like we're closing on Sundays so that the staff can have raises; or the library personal are using the patrons as pawns) and it's out there causing all sorts of misunderstanding and trouble.

Or I've "whitewashed my FB page" because I'm scared of being found out about something.

That's why I'm putting this piece up on my blog and posting it to my FB page for my friends and his minions to see. I want them to understand that I'm not scared. If there is something I don't want people to see, I don't post it to social media. So what you see on my timeline that I post are things I have no problem with you seeing. And if I leave it on there after a friend shared it to my Timeline (provided I catch the post), then I'm fine with people seeing that. 

And that includes you, little minion who goes by "Anonymous" because, again, you're too "cluck cluck" to go by your real name. When you start having the guts to post with your real name, you can start talking to me about what I post on my social media pages.

And stay tuned, minion, cause I'm sure I'll be posting more stuff on the library. You'll want to keep your master informed.