Search for library chief coming to a head

Thursday, Aug. 27, 1998 | 10:53 a.m.

Three finalists in an eight-month search for an executive director of the troubled Las Vegas-Clark County Library District are touring the district's facilities today.

Friday each of the candidates will spend about 90 minutes being interviewed by the district's Board of Trustees in a meeting open to the public at the main library, 833 N. Las Vegas Blvd.

Saturday morning, in a somewhat unusual move, the three will face library staff and the public at large in a question-and-answer session that will be video taped at the West Charleston Library, 6301 W. Charleston Blvd.

Officials said making the candidates available for questioning by staff will give employees input into the hiring process and also reveal how each of the three respond in a public setting and how they interact.

Saturday afternoon the board will reconvene and make its decision -- whether to chose one of the three candidates, to delay a decision or to begin the search again from scratch to fill a position that will pay between $95,000 and $130,000 per year.

Carl Rowe, who has been managing the district for almost six months, is confident one of the candidates will be selected Saturday but feels the selection will be a tough one for the board to make.

"We ended up with three candidates who are really good, too good to rank," said Rowe, who is actually employed by the firm of Fair, Anderson and Langerman, which has a management contract with the district due to expire Sept. 15.

The three finalists are Ramiro S. Salazar, director of libraries for the Dallas (Texas) Public Library District; William W. Sannwald, manager of Library Design and Development in San Diego, Calif.; and Daniel L. Walters, director of the Buffalo and Erie County (New York) Public Library.

The three districts where the candidates are now employed are comparable in size to the Las Vegas library district, but Las Vegas has a bigger budget at $29.5 million.

The Dallas district's annual budget is $16.8 million; the San Diego district's budget is $23 million; while the Buffalo district's budget is the closest at $28.1 million.

Other comparisons of the districts include:

Circulation figures:

* Las Vegas, 5.2 million. * Buffalo, 8.5 million. * Dallas, 4.1 million. * San Diego, 6.5 million.

Staff numbers:

* Las Vegas, 540. * Buffalo, 398. * Dallas, 557. * San Diego, 343.

Population served:

* Las Vegas, 914,845. * Buffalo, 968,584. * Dallas, 1.02 million. * San Diego, 1.2 million.

Rowe said the process used to find the candidates was one used to fill positions in the private sector.

"We don't go after people looking for work," he said. "We hijack someone, hire them away from their job."

He said the process began with peer referrals, finding the top people in the library industry and asking them who, in their opinion, are the best candidates in the field -- regardless of whether the candidates are actually looking for another job.

"We started with senior people here and got the names of important, prominent people in the industry and then we called those people and got other names," said Rowe.

The initial list included about 75 names.

"We drew up screening criteria and went back to our original references and got them to help on the screening process, finally coming out with 25 names," Rowe said.

Calls were made to 24 of the 25 candidates -- one person could not be located -- who were informed they were being considered for the executive director's position and were asked if they wanted to remain on the list for the next phase.

"We narrowed the list down to 12 viable candidates," Rowe said. "By then we knew we had the best available."

Two consultants with experience in library searches were hired to further narrow the field.

"We ended up with three very strong candidates," Rowe said.

Rowe said heading the Las Vegas-Clark County Library District is a plum job, with the pay being among the highest in the country.

Even with the high salary, and such perks as working in a state with no income tax, Rowe said it took a little selling to get candidates because stories about the turmoil in the district over the past several months -- perhaps years -- have circulated throughout the industry.

The conflict between the Board of Trustees and the library staff stemmed from weak leadership and a lack of communication between the two factions, according to Rowe.

"I don't think the same problem will happen again," he said. "These three candidates are seasoned, tough, professional executives."