The Howard County Library Workers United demanded fair wages for its members at the Howard County Board of Library Trustees meeting Wednesday as the union works toward its first contract.

“The board has made it abundantly clear that they value our community, its members, and I want to iterate that we are also members of the community, members of Howard County,” said Charles Smalls, a member of the union’s bargaining team and instructor and research specialist at the Savage Branch. “And the board has an opportunity, a very special opportunity, to respect its employees, to make a change … by engaging with us and understanding our most recent wage request…”

Smalls testified in front of the board Wednesday as union members filled the room in green shirts with AFSCME on the front and the union’s slogan, “We make Maryland happen.” He said it is sickening that library workers can’t afford to live in the communities they serve, and that it’s “ludicrous” that in an area as wealthy as central Maryland, there is little left for those facilitating learning.

While more complicated issues can take longer to solve, Smalls told The Howard County Times, wages are the easiest aspect to address to improve workers’ quality of life.

A raise for library workers in fiscal 2025 to match inflation and the wages of other government workers is a primary focus of negotiations, said Eliana Holgate, a member of the bargaining team and a children’s instructor and research specialist at the Elkridge Branch.

The library workers were offered a 2% cost of living adjustment, the same increase that was planned prior to library workers’ unionization in February, according to a union news release. That rate has been the same for library workers for 20 years, Holgate said.

The union says the adjustment is far lower than the rate given to workers in county government, the sheriff’s office and the school system. According to the release, Howard County government employees will receive raises of 5-7%, employees of the sheriff’s office will receive 9% and Howard County Public Schools workers will receive 3.5% raises this fiscal year.

Trustees Chair Elizabeth Banach thanked the library staff for attending the meeting and said the Howard County Library System has “consistently prioritized staff.”

The cost of living adjustment and merit increases add up to about 5% each year, which was above the rate of inflation every year since 2000, except for 2022, Banach said. Howard County employees are receiving a 5% cost of living adjustment increase and school system workers represented by AFSCME are receiving a 3.5% increase, she said.

With the state facing a $2.7 billion deficit and cuts to federal programs, Banach discussed the challenges that could occur as conversations to adjust the budget are held.

“As always, we will prioritize our staff while also balancing our responsibility to taxpayers to operate in a fiscally prudent manner,” Banach said.

At the meeting, the board approved its proposed fiscal 2026 budget request that will be presented to Howard County Executive Calvin Ball. The request included a 4% cost of living for library employees.

In February, library workers voted overwhelmingly to unionize with the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees Maryland Council 3 union. Since contract negotiations between the union and the administration began in May, they’ve held 11 bargaining sessions, according to a news release.

“We’re not at an impasse, but we are working to demonstrate to library management and our board that we are serious and we are not going away, and they need to negotiate with us in good faith,” Holgate said.

The contract will be the first for the new union. Megan Royden, a member of the bargaining team and an instructor and research specialist at the Miller Branch, said it feels wonderful to be able to negotiate. Royden said she hoped the meeting, the first to be held in person since April 2020, would help increase communication between the board and the union.

“It feels very empowering, getting to finally sit down and discuss face to face some of the issues we’ve been facing, and being able to actually get some change on them,” Royden said.

The initial collective bargaining agreement takes time, especially since the agreement will lay a foundation for future years, Christie Lassen, director of communications and external affairs for the library system said in a statement.

“Our team is working diligently, and we look forward to continued negotiations with the unit’s representatives to develop a solid collective bargaining agreement for the benefit of our team,” Lassen said. “Our goal is to create the best agreement for our team and, ultimately, our community.”

Workers at the Enoch Pratt Free Library, Anne Arundel County Public Library, Baltimore Museum of Art, and the Walters Art Museum have unionized through AFSCME’s Cultural Workers United program in recent years, along with the library workers in Howard County.

Communication has been an ongoing issue for years, Holgate said, leading many to want to form the union. She’s looking forward to workers being able to have their voices heard in the decision-making process for the library system.

“Of course, we want to be paid appropriately for the work that we’re doing and the community that we’re working in, but we really have everyone who is doing this job is doing it because we want to, and we care about the community, and it’s important to us that our voices be heard,” Holgate said.

Holgate said the union hopes that after seeing the strong support at the meeting, the library administration will advise its representatives to work with the union in a “greater degree” at the bargaining table.

“And they have not been inclined to many changes to their current operations, their current procedures,” Holgate said. “And we can understand resistance to change certainly. However, we’re hoping that this will help push them to be a little bit more flexible and willing to come toward our position.

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