Hennesey, really? I mean really?

Wednesday evening six children and their mom came to visit the library. I had never seen this family. I kept hearing the Mom yell, "Hennesey." I finally looked in the children's area. A little girl who appeared to be about 3 years of age was the one answering to Hennessey. Why y'alll? No, they are not black. The only work of english spoken was Hennesey. I said to my staff, "Well at least we aren't the only ones who do that to our children."

New Construction doesn't always work out too good

After being open a little over 30 days, we have had sewage back-ups in all restrooms and the custodial closet on 4 different occasions in 3 weeks. Each time, the pipes have been snaked. Obviously this isn't solving the problem. Each and every sewage back-up has been blamed on the staff. They keep saying the back-up originated in the staff restroom. Funny, the staff restroom or any other restroom didn't back-up prior to the branch opening to the public. The staff worked in the branch and used all restrooms from 1 month prior to the branch opening. My claims of there being a bigger issue were not acknowledged until the fourth time there was a sewage back-up. We even had two in one week. They set up a date for the plumbing contractor to use a camera in the plumbing system and no one showed up. I think the plumbing contractor is trying to get out of his liability for the issues that keep occurring.

First Week in a Brand New Library

I noticed a regular patron at another branch sitting at one of our express terminals. It's a YT man, so I really wanted to know how and why he had come to the south eastern neck of the city. I called the branch that he normally frequents to tell them that he was at my branch. What do I discover? Homey had received a 7 day suspension from them the week before. The suspension was still in place. I approached the patron and asked his name to be sure I had the correct individual. He told me his name and I informed him that he was inviolation of his suspension. The man had the nerve to ask me how I knew what happened at the other branch. It had only been two weeks since I stopped working at that branch, so I'm still on their email distribution list. I received a copy of the incident report regarding the patron. I didn't think anything of it at the time, because the staff at that location constantly submits incident reports. In essence, I didn't read it at the time of receipt. I explain once again that he must exit the library because he is in violation of the suspension guidelines. He tells me that the suspension is just for that branch. I told him that a suspension is for all branches in our library system. The man called me the devil and told me that I needed to repent for my sins. I told him that he still had to leave the library. This back and forth went on for about 2-3 minutes. I finally walked away from the patron and he began packing up his belongings. He said something to a pair of teen girls who were staring at him and they told him that he's suspended, so he needs to leave them alone and leave the library. This is how the last day of my first week in our brand new library ended.