An angry Westhampton Library staff yesterday voted 31-3 to unionize. Employees are demanding “equal voice and due process” and a voice in library policy. Employee Sabina Trager claims she was unfairly fired June 23.

Susan Hurley, board agent of the National Labor Relations Board, counted the paper ballots one-by-one starting shortly after 6:30 p.m. in front of an audience of about 20 staffers and other NLRB agents.

Staff “professionals,” who can be either full time or part time, voted 14-1 in favor of the union. The non-professionals voted 17 for the union and two against.

We were asked to leave the building when we showed up at about 6:15 Friday night. We were told to wait outside until the vote count at 6:30. The person asking this would not identify herself nor who was giving that suggestion or order. The name of the law firm handling the library and a contact there was given to us but a call was not returned this a.m.

We don’t think it was an order since we’re a resident, taxpayer, member of the library, and a reporter with every right to remain in the building, if not in the “children’s area” outside of the room were votes were cast, but some other place on the floor. Staffers asked us not to take any pictures and we accepted that although we feel we had the legal right to do so.

No Emails for Library Board

The library board is not fully open to public contact and discourse. The trustees are reachable by email only through library director Danielle Waskiewicz. Emails for the trustees of WHB, meanwhile, are public. Members of the public can attend board meetings of WHB and the library and address the boards and ask questions. But under New York State law, board members are not required to answer any questions or engage in dialogue with citizens at their meetings.

Mayor Maria Moore resigned from the library board earlier this week. She said she had remained on the board after her election in June 2014 to help new board member Marth-Ann Betjemann.

Staffers say the library board makes all the policy decisions. The staff might be in favor of having the library take the new role of hosting public discussions on topics like the eruv, plans for revamping Main street, the sewer proposal, the bid by CVS pharmacy for a store in WHB, whether strict rules against “shared” housing can be relaxed, etc.

There are lots of articulate WHB residents as shown by the opinions on the library, many of them negative, expressed in Kyle Campbell’s story Aug. 19 in 21east.com.

The American Library Assn. is urging libraries to take the new role of performing a “town hall” function since smart phones are far better research tools than any library and more convenient.

There is a pattern of press-avoidance in the library and WHB itself. The WHB board listened to 25 minutes of demands for more communication Aug. 6 and Mayor Moore said that “perhaps it would be more helpful to the community to hear it at a meeting" (discussion about the eruv Jewish boundary proposed for WHB).

So far she has said nothing further on this.

WHB, with a $9.92 million budget, should have something in it for press relations.