BELLOWS FALLS — What started last week as a request to discuss $151,734.73 in renovation overrun costs for Rockingham Free Public Library grew into an email thread that unearthed a new area of contention between trustees and the municipal manager.
As a result, Municipal Manager Willis “Chip” Stearns III has suspended any municipal assistance to the RFPL, its staff, or the Board of Trustees until there's a meeting between the trustees and the Selectboard to discuss the project.
In the emails, Jan Mitchell-Love, chair of the RFPL Board of Trustees, and Vice Chair Deb Wright both expressed concern over being left out of terminated library director Célina Houlné's unemployment filing process, as well as the chair and vice chair's stated desire that library oversight be handed back to the trustees.
Houlné was dismissed as library director this fall after months of contention, including allegations by trustees that her administrating budgeted cost-of-living increases for staff, including herself, amounted to an unauthorized pay raise.
Mitchell-Love, who did not respond to multiple requests for an interview, complained to Stearns that her board was not asked to complete paperwork from the Vermont Department of Labor (DOL) regarding the reasons for Houlné's termination from the library.
The town bears the employment identification number under which all staff at the library as well as the town is employed, and thus was Houlné's legal employer. Stearns said the town normally takes care of DOL separation request form, required for employees who are fired.
In a Nov. 5 email to Mitchell-Love, Stearns references a meeting held at the request of the chair's husband, Joel Love, in which Selectboard chair Thom MacPhee said he was invited to sit in. Love - who Mitchell-Love asserted in the emails was acting in the capacity of an interested taxpayer - wanted to resubmit the forms.
Stearns asked Mitchell-Love if her husband made that request on behalf of the RFPL Board of Trustees and, if not, asked if the board would be prepared to respond if the form if the state were to allow Houlné's case to be .
Responding to further questions from the chair and her husband as to why the town did not forward the DOL forms to the trustees, Stearns said his office has always “processed all requests for information from the DOL” and “will continue to respond to DOL request for all employees paid through the town [employer identification number].”
Stearns told the chair, “Any further information that RFPL trustees wish to provide to DOL regarding the former library director will require the majority of the RFPL board, authorized RFPL board members, or RFPL staff to communicate directly with DOL.”
Further, Stearns wrote, “Once a claim deadline has passed, the call is closed out, which means I can no longer forward you a request on this claim.”
Stearns concluded, “We can update the state, but at this point they most likely will not consider it.”
Love was reportedly concerned with the taxpayers footing the cost for Houlné's unemployment benefits.
Stearns told The Commons that, because the town pays unemployment insurance into a pool-funded program, “Amounts are charged to the pool and reflected in our assessments. Insurance is a numbers game/business.”
Ann Noonan, commissioner of the Department of Labor, told The Commons that only in cases of “gross misconduct such as stealing, violence, coming to work drunk or under the influence of an illegal substance” does the appeal and adjudication process result in denial of unemployment benefits.
She also said that “simple misconduct” resulting in termination does carry a time penalty before receiving benefits, but benefits are not denied under such circumstances.
Taking it back
The email chains also revealed Vice Chair Deb Wright's suggestion that the town turn the renovation project back over to the RFPL trustees immediately.
The town had assumed responsibility for the library building renovations last spring after the primary contractor, Baybutt Construction, went bankrupt and left the town scrambling to pay subcontractors. Engelberth Construction, Inc., was eventually brought in to complete the rest of the project.
“The library building is owned by the town,” MacPhee said. “The day-to-day operation is overseen by the (RFPL) Trustees.”
Town departments have been working to help get the library ready for reopening. The town Highway Department alone has put 381 man-hours into the project.
Wright emailed the town manager, “It would seem in the best interests of the standard working model of the Rockingham Free Public Library, in accordance with its bylaws, 22 V.S.A. 144, and the sorely needed healing process for the remaining staff, patrons and general public, that the RFPL-appointed interim directors, Emily Zervas and Samantha Maskell, should be reporting only to their employer, the RFPL board and its chair, and not to the Municipal Manager of the town of Rockingham.
“If there are still needs for the library building, these should be relayed through the library board's chair,” Wright wrote Stearns.
Asking if this decision had been approved by the full board (the Board of Trustees are under investigation by the Assistant Attorney General Bill Reynolds for possible violation of Open Meeting Laws), Stearns replied, “So say one, so say you all?”
He further replied, noting, “The standard working model may not be in the best interest at the present time. The smoothness of resolving the remaining renovation issues will be effectively removed. I have instructed highway to cease working at the library until the RFPL Trustees provide support of our combined efforts or confirm they do not wish for any more assistance.”
“The 'handover' discussed is about the presentation of renovation financial information used by me to track the project,” Stearns added. “I am not clear on exactly what the 'handover back to the trustees' would look like.”
Stearns responded further, “I am sorry for the confusion; assisting [Zervas and Maskell] in their work upon request should not be perceived as managing them. I am sorry again; the municipal manager does not work for the RFPL Trustees though I have been answering questions/attending meetings as requested by RFPL Trustees and staff.”
In response to the tension, MacPhee told The Commons that, unequivocally, “We would not be anywhere near where we [are] today if it were not for Chip and the town jumping in to help.”
Stearns said that the highway department was paid through highway funds but “may be moved to renovations” - in which case, the trustees may be responsible for reimbursing the town for those hours.
In the exchange, Mitchell-Love wrote that the trustees were left out of the loop, learning about the highway department hours only by watching Stearns give his report to the Selectboard in a meeting broadcast on FACT-TV.
Stearns also noted the names of 26 volunteers who had helped move the library materials from their temporary location in The Square.
“The process to return to the library and shake out the [renovation] issues was done by group effort. It was successful.”
And, Stearns vowed, “I will continue to assist RFPL staff when asked.”