Mpls.-Hennepin Plan Proceeds

Compromise on wage issue means union signs off on consolidation

By Norman Oder -- Library Journal, 6/15/2007

The potentially stalled consolidation of the cash-strapped Minneapolis Public Library (MPL) into the better-supported suburban Hennepin County Library (HCL), Minnetonka, MN, has finally gotten over the hump, as the MPL union reached agreement on terms and the state legislature passed a law enabling the merger.

The consolidation could occur as early as January 2008 but must be completed in that year; the expanded HCL will include 15 Minneapolis and 26 suburban facilities. “This merger moves us from a 20th- to a 21st-century structure for financing and governing our libraries,” said Hennepin County commissioner Peter McLaughlin, who introduced the concept of the merger, in a library news release.

On May 16, AFSCME, the union that represents the single largest number of MPL staffers, approved a deal for the alliance. Under the terms, the Star Tribune reported, up to 55 city library staffers who face lower wages would get a lump sum payment; also, pensions and seniority would be protected, as would guarantees against layoffs.

Additional legal, property, and labor issues will be addressed in the next six months, leading up to approvals by several authorities. Under the deal, the city of Minneapolis will contribute $6.8 million in additional funding for the first three years of any increased service hours at the libraries and to reopen three temporarily closed branches, but the city will stop supplying operating funds over the course of ten years.