Black librarians say Indianapolis ‘inhospitable location’ for national conference

The Black Caucus of the American Library Affiliation has introduced that its twelfth Nationwide Convention of African American Librarians will not be held in Indianapolis after the town’s public library board refused to completely rent a Black lady as CEO. 

Nichelle Hayes served eight months as interim CEO of the Indianapolis Public Library. Regardless of protests, petitions and native officers issuing a letter urging the board to nominate Hayes as CEO, the library’s board provided the job to Gabriel Morley, a white man from Louisiana. He declined the job.

“The actions of the Indianapolis Public Library Board are a mirrored image of what occurs inside our career, the place hardworking, gifted and certified persons are used to scrub up messes, repair issues, and to only be seen sufficient {that a} range purpose is ticked with none substantive change,” the convention planning committee stated in an announcement.

“When entities consider you aren’t ‘the individual’ they create imaginary limitations designed to cease progress each the skilled, and the career. Our members deserve higher.”

In a letter despatched final week, the board stated Hayes was not a “runner up” within the seek for a everlasting CEO as a result of she was not certified for the job. The letter added that there had been no promise that the interim CEO place was meant to be a “de facto” everlasting place.  

“Whereas many have assumed that having the capability to behave as Interim CEO is a de facto illustration of getting the required abilities and expertise to behave as a everlasting CEO, this isn’t the case,” the letter stated.

“The Trustees had been keen to simply accept an Interim CEO with far much less managerial, management, and monetary oversight ability and expertise than that anticipated of a everlasting CEO at an establishment as massive because the Library.”

The convention — Tradition Keepers XII: Unity in Variety: Stronger Collectively within the African Diaspora — had been scheduled for July in Indianapolis. With the board’s choice, the group stated Indianapolis is an “inhospitable location” and the convention will now be held in New Orleans in 2024.