Gilbert School Throws Out $400,000 Worth Of Books?!Posted: 2013-10-23 October 22, 2013 via Email
At the beginning of the school year I was given permission to visit the highland h.s. library by high school secretary, Sharon Orr. Principal Salce was not on campus. I had only been in the library for 5 minutes when a young highland staffer "RAN" into the library and told me I had to leave. When I replied that I would leave shortly, the young staffer told me that, "Mr. Salce said that you must leave immediately."
When I again spoke to ms. Orr she told me it would be fine if I returned to the library with that young staffer accompanying me. At first, I had no idea why mr Salce didn't want me in the library. Then I began to take stock of the state of the library book collection.
When I left the library we had the largest high school book collection in Arizona, over 44,000 books! Of these, 37,000 were donated to the library by the parents, teachers and citizens of Gilbert and surrounding communities thru the intensive effort of several well advertised book drives over a period of seven years.
Since I have been counting books for many years I did a quick count. I was dismayed to find in the years since I left the library ,the other librarian, mr Dick Trizicky, had THROWN OUT over 15,000 books from the collection. There were only 29,000 left out of 44,000. He had thrown out so many books that he had to also throw out a set of Oak, free-standing bookshelves that cost the district $10,000. otherwise the missing books would have been noticed. The missing bookcase contained 108 shelves.
I also noticed hidden in the north-east corner behind other bookshelves with some books on them, another set of shelves completely empty (48 more shelves). There were at least another 200 empty shelves and many of the shelves with books were only half full. 35% OF THE ORIGINAL LIBRARY COLLECTION WAS MISSING.
With the average cost of a library book at $27, mr Trizicky ,without district permission, had thrown out $405,000 worth of books. Mr Salce must have known about the missing books because I had called his attention to the missing bookshelves before I left Highland in retirement. I will never forget his final words to me. Mr Salce looked me in the eye and said definitively, " library books are no where near the top of my priority list."
If he didn't know about the missing 15,000 books why was he in such a panicy rush to get me out of the library that day? In addition, I noticed a large plaque honoring the thousands of Gilbert citizens who had donated the original 37,000 volumes in the collection was gone without a trace. That plaque should remain on the wall as long as the Highland library exists. Where is it now?
Also where are the Inspirational life-bust sculptures of George Washington, and Benjamin Franklin, father of American Libraries, that were mounted on the top of the northside shelves. What did you do with them mr Trizicky? Why did you remove them? Where are THEY now?
When I brought this to the attention of mr Allison he did nothing. At a recent meeting at Mesquite library, held to assure the community that our money in the $5,000,000 overide would be oh so carefully spent and not a penny wasted, I told this story, mr Dangerfield, assistant superintendent, said he would "look into it."
With all due respect to Mr Dangerfield, in my 29 years in the Gilbert school district, the Administration's phrase "I'll look into it," is code for, "We're gonna need some time to cover up this mess with a self-serving excuse believable enough so that we can get the community to swallow it!"
Let me guess, "all the books were torn and dirty" LIE! "all the books were duplicates" LIE! "all the books were old and outdated" LIE ! "all the books were yellowed with age" LIE ! The truth is that mr Trizicky and mr Salce are both computer men, not book men and they thought that no one would notice they threw out $405,000 dollars of donated books. And why should they care anyway? This November 5th the district will have another $5,000,000 to spend, so who cares ?
For my part, before I vote to give the district another fat check to waste, some heads will have to roll on this one. But will the administration act to terminate for gross misconduct? NOT A CHANCE !
(by Glenn Frakes-Gilbert, AZ)
Previous Comments
From: onlyoneharry@hotmail.com Posted on: 2013-10-26 bshicks: It may be that your pop up blcoker is on. If you turn it off, it should work
From: bshicks3@msn.com Posted on: 2013-10-26 Can you explain on this page how to share this on facebook....the icon doesn't work....I don't have the email you sent that may have helped me accomplish this. :-) Thanks! |
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