In the Gateway Overlook shopping mall close to 175 and 108. Chase is going to be across from Aldi and Ulta

Where in Ellicott City?

They just opened one in Ellicott City too.

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I was there couple days ago and it was still under construction. I am excited about the branch as well!

That’s exactly what that means.

Here’s how you know: the policies and operations of both HCPSS and HCLS are not governed by or under the purview of the Howard County Council or County Executive, but rather, they are each governed by their own oversight boards, each of which is under the purview of (and reports to) their respective state agencies (the MSDE and MSLA, respectively).

The HCLS Board of Trustees is the governing body of the HCLS. They set and enforce the policies governing the operation of the library. They investigated the situation and found that this was within policy and not without precedent.

Respectfully, why is that not good enough?

I am wondering the same. I also did not see any source explaining this. It would be highly unusual in my experience for a county library system to be considered a “state agency”. The State Library is a state agency. But a county library system that takes some guidance and funding from the state is not de facto a state agency, just as a local school system that takes guidance and funding from the state Department of Education is not a state agency. This link explaining the governing structure of Maryland county libraries makes no reference to them being state agencies of any kind. I’m quite familiar with this relationship in Pennsylvania, having said that, it is possible that Maryland could be different, just have not seen anything that says it is. I’m wondering whether this is just a creative legal argument.

The MSLA is a state agency, that doesn't mean that things under their purview are state agencies too.

For example, the county school system is under the purview of the MD state board of ed, that doesn't make the county schools a state agency.

Thank you for clarifying that! The exhibit is important context.

I'm not sure if it being a partnership event means it's the same as closing for their fundraiser though. I can remember other partnership events (mostly HCPSS related) and other exhibits, but I don't recall the library closing early for any of them or intentionally closing early for anything other than the annual fundraiser.

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A key piece of information here is this: AKA was not just some “outside organization” having an event in a meeting room at the library because they needed a place to do it. Rather, AKA launched an exhibit in the Equity Resource Center the week of the event. This was considered a partnership event as a result, and the event was held in the Equity Resource Center.

The library can (and does) close early for its own events, as you noted.

Is it? The only part I see addressing the early closure is this:

>In response to the inquiry regarding where HCLS staff went after the Central Branch closed at 2:00 p.m. on October 7, 2022, the committee believes this is a legitimate area for further review of HCLS policies, and recommends that the Board do so.* The committee was informed by staff that HCLS followed its standard practice for early branch closures in this instance, giving staff the option of working at another branch for the remaining hours of the day or expending accumulated leave for the remaining portion of the day. However, the committee recommends a review by the Board of whether the same policy should apply both to Library events such as Evening in the Stacks and sanctioned events by outside organizations. The committee has identified no costs incurred by HCLS for this event, other than ongoing fixed costs of operating the Central Branch building such as utility costs, etc., but recommends that the Board further review whether employee leave was granted that would not otherwise have been granted, had the outside organization event not been held.
*In light of this recommendation, the Board intends to examine current HCLS policies with regard to early closure of HCLS facilities for events, and determine whether any modification to these policies is needed.

It looks like they're saying that the policy around employee leave for early closures for outside events will be examined.

They're not addressing if the early closure itself is an issue. Which is a bit frustrating because that's the part of this I think actually affects the community. I don't care if there's an event in the library after hours, but closing 4 hours early means the people the Central branch serves were denied access to regular library services for the sake of this event.

Is closing early for outisde events something HCLS does? (I only know of them doing it for Evening in the Stacks, but that's the library's own fund raiser, not an outside event).
HCLS's report doesn't really answer that question. It says:

>In response to the inquiry regarding other partnership events or gatherings held at HCLS facilities after normal operating hours, and/or which caused early branch closures, HCLS staff has provided the committee with the list of such events that is attached hereto as Exhibit B

But Exhibit B, is actually just "a list of organizations that have had access to branches before regular opening times or after regular closing times," which doesn't tell us if the library closed early to accommodate these organizations.

Please let me know if there's something I'm missing, because I'd really like to understand this.

They are under the purview of the Maryland State Library Agency. https://casetext.com/statute/code-of-maryland/article-education/division-iv-other-education-provisions/title-23-libraries/subtitle-1-state-library-agencies/section-23-106-powers-and-duties-of-state-library-agency

That sounds really boring. I bought a house in West Friendship and it's awesome. Highly recommend it. No books or lame geriatric documentaries required.

I bought a house in West friendship, it's fricking great.

> The HCLS IS a state agency. This is not ambiguous.

Can you point to any source other than these report which explains this? I have tried and I can't find any kind of explanation for how the 24 individual county library systems are "state agencies". I understand they are chartered and run differently than county executive agencies, but that doesn't make them a state agency.

So what does?

ok, thanks, I see it. It's a super brief mention for it being kind of the only thing they substantiated in the report. I think that's where the "they investigated themselves" is showing through. Anyone else doing an investigation would probably want to, like, draw attention to what they found.

I can do it, what type of work you need done?

Actually the library said the early closure is the only concern of merit from the audit report and they plan on reviewing their policies on that topic.

>> BUT what is missing from the HCLS's report is any mention of the 4-hour early closing. (I read kinda fast, maybe I missed it.) My guess is this is actually a policy loophole, there's probably no policy that actually prohibits this. But it's so strange, I can't imagine the library agreeing to do that for other events.

That is covered in the HCLS report.

The HCLS IS a state agency. This is not ambiguous.

The county has the right to conduct financial audits due to provision of funds to the library. (The statutory wording is “examination or audit of the accounts.”) That’s it. The Board of Trustees would be responsible for determining if misuse of facilities occurred.

Staking out an event intended to celebrate a Black civic organization’s exhibit at the library, because some racist asshole assumed the Black CEO was a member having a private party, is not what a financial audit looks like.

> It seems like a lot of the problems in this situation could have been solved by the "investigators" who "staked out" the event attempting to actually enter the event rather than drawing conclusions from the parking lot. If they were turned away, it's not a public event and there is something worth investigating. If they were allowed in, the event is perfectly fine by library policy.

God yes, it seems like whoever was on this "stake out" was having some covert agent fantasy instead of just figure out what was going on.

BUT what is missing from the HCLS's report is any mention of the 4-hour early closing. (I read kinda fast, maybe I missed it.) My guess is this is actually a policy loophole, there's probably no policy that actually prohibits this. But it's so strange, I can't imagine the library agreeing to do that for other events.

It's obvious from the report that HCLS thinks they are a state agency and not subject to county audits, but that's really not clear. The county pays over 80% of the library budget. I would be surprised if the county charter and other laws allowed them to substantially fund an organization but not be allowed to audit it. It's actually a complex legal issue.

@phil_g The Library Board of Trustees is the governing body to whom the HCLS CEO and staff report. This report is from them, not the CEO. They weren’t investigating themselves; they were investigating the employee(s) for whom they are responsible for overseeing.

Regarding the HCLS’ reluctance to cooperate: the CEO cooperated fully with the Auditor’s initial questions, though by statute she wasn’t obligated or required to. Then he took it further with the weird stake-out and subsequent interrogations instead of handing this over to the Board of Trustees. Given that the HCLS is a state agency and not subject to the county auditor, if I’d been facing such aggressive tactics from someone with no jurisdiction over me, I’d tell them to pound sand, too.