COMPARISON OF SALARIES OF COUNTY LIBRARY "CHAIN-OF-COMMAND"
REGARDING PERFORMANCE EVALUATION MANAGEMENT POLICY

It is important to understand the difficulty of criticizing the official policy of the County Library department's "chain-of-command" regarding my many grievance actions of "annual" Performance Evaluations and appeals of Appraisal of Promotability examinations. My "chain-of-command" consists of four "top" Library administrators, two "regional" administrators, and one "Librarian IV" who supervises a "B-sized" community library.

Together, they make a total of $578,212 annually at their "maximum" salary levels (or more than one-half million dollars), whereas, I make only approximately $43,000 annually.

They think their bureaucratic positions and "high" salary levels make them "right" regarding the administration of annual performance evaluations and appraisal of promotability examinations. I know my knowledge, skills, abilities, and personal characteristics make me "right" regarding the issues! My professional perspective has grown out of my 31 years of professional employment with the County Library Department serving the public ("customers") in two community libraries which have experienced vast social and technological changes.

In 1996 during my appeal of an Appraisal of Promotability Examination, the Library department attached one of my previous Performance Evaluations to the official moving papers. The Performance Evaluation form had been administered (signed) nine months late and had been properly grieved because of the violations of Civil Service Commission Rules and Regulations made by my building supervisor and the two regional administrators. The mistakes and irregularities of the performance evaluation process conducted by the Library department seemed self-evident to me but were not investigated by the Civil Service Commission at that time.

Nevertheless, top Library administrators and County of Los Angeles Department of Human Resources (DHR) analysts attempted to discourage my appeal efforts by attacking my professional character and reputation instead of changing their outdated employee evaluation policy.

My main amended appraisal appeal point was that County Library administrators had not implemented the CSC's "Rules-and-Regulations" properly. In my case, they had not done "timely and complete" annual evaluations based upon "fixed" rating standards as required by the Civil Service Code regarding the proper conduct of performance evaluations. In addition, I argued that the specific 1996 appraisal of promotability examination procedures were based upon faulty assumptions and, therefore, unfair and discriminatory because they were excessively subjective!

I have specific examples ("evidence") of the lack of understanding of my "chain-of-command" regarding their responsibility to implement the CSC Rules and Regulations concerned with annual performance evaluations and appraisals of promotability. Also, they failed to follow the DHR requirements in the OLd Performance Evaluation Rater's Handbook and also the requirements in the NEW training materials from March 1998. Therefore, I maintain that they are deliberately violating existing official policy, or the essential "Rules and Regulations," which are supposed to protect County employees from the abuse of administrative authority.

They do it every day when Library administrators and supervisors in the "chain-of-command" sign false evaluation forms, which were not administered in the way sanctioned by the CSC Rules and Regulations. Those violations do great harm to their subordinates since they jeopardize the careers of hundreds of professional and para-professional library employees.

TABLE 1. COMPARISON OF SALARIES OF LIBRARY "CHAIN-OF-COMMAND"

POSITION
SALARIES
RANGE
County Librarian $95,354 - $143,031 $47,687
Chief, Public Services $66,419 - $99,629 $33,210
Head, Human Resources $61,785 - $92,677 $30,892
Assistant, Human Resources $50,501 - $62,748 $12,247
Regional Administrator $61,785 - $92,677 $30,892
Assistant Regional Aministrator $53,464 - $80,196 $26,732
Community Library Manager IV * $40,546 - $50,254 $9,708
Librarian I** $34,536 - $42,772 $8,236

    * Community Library Managers ("CLMs") are building supervisors designated as
      "Librarian IIs, IIIs, IVs & Vs" depending on the size of the libraries.

    ** The "Librarian I" position is the "lowest" salary level Classification. They do reference
      and children's work but never do "line" supervision, except under emergency conditions.

TABLE 2. COMPARISON OF TOP SALARIES
OF ADMINISTRATORS AND MY "CLASS IV" SUPERVISOR

ADMINISTRATORS --- MINIMUM --- ---RANGE --- --- MAXIMUM ---
County Librarian $95,354 $47,687 $143,031
Chief, Public Services $66,419 $33,210 $99,629
Head, Human Resources $61,785 $30,892 $92,677
Asst, Head Human Resources $50,501 $12,247 $62,748
Regional Administrator $61,785 $30,892 $92,677
Regional Area Manager $53,464 $26,732 $80,196
Supervisor (Librarian IV) $40,546 $9,708 $50,254
TOTAL - - $621,212

May 1998 (Updated/May 1, 2000)

TABLE 2. The data compares the annual salaries of County Library administrators in the "chain-of-command" regarding the implementation of "annual" Performance Evaluations.

Library administrators and building supervisors control the professional destinies of hundreds of librarians in the "lower-income" salary levels , as in my case, which is shown in Table 2. The "bureaucratic" habits of administrators dominate the "annual" Performance Evaluation Management Policy and Appraisal of Promotability rating procedures of the County Library department. The dysfunctional habits jeopardize the need of subordinate librarians in the "lower income" salary levels , which is maximum "objectivity" and "fairness" .

The problem is that those subordinate librarians at the "lower-income" salary levels do not get sufficient respect , (recognition and appeciation) for their "Outstanding" (or excellent) professional work performance, which is providing information services to the public. That is because their supervisors are not accountable for implementing the official County Performance Evaluation rating procedures and developing and using written uniform objective "Work Standards" and "Rating Standards!"


Table 3. VISUAL COMPARISON OF TOP SALARIES
OF "CHAIN-OF-COMMAND" LIBRARY ADMINISTRATORS
(Based on Data in Table 2)

County Librarian Salary Classification Level at maximum salary $143,031
Chief, Public Services Salary Classification Level at maximum salary $ 99,629
Head, Human Resources Salary Classification Level at maximum salary $ 92,677
Asst., Human Resources Salary Classification Level at maximum salary $ 62,748
Regional Adminstrator Salary Classification Level at maximum salary $ 92,677
Regional Area Mngr. Salary Classification Level at maximum salary $ 80,196
Bldg. Supervisor Salary Classification Level at maximum salary $ 50,254
TOTAL "CHAIN-OF-COMMAND" SUPERVISORS AND ADMINISTRATORS $621,212


TABLE 4. VISUAL COMPARISON OF CAREER LADDER FOR LIBRARY
ADMINISTRATORS AND SUPERVISORS REGARDING TOP SALARIES
(Based on Data in Table 2)

                             
Co. Libn.
                        
Public. Serv.
 $143,000
                   
Pers. Head
 $99,600     
              
Pers. Asst.
 $92,700          
         
Reg. Adm.
 $62,700               
    
Area Mgr.
 $92,7000                    
Bldg. Sup.
 $80,200                         
$50,300                              

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