LIBRARY GOVERNANCE
Board Chairman: Library Governance Board Meant to Be Independent, Nonpolitical
Blaine Wall says the Board of Governance hasn’t met since April—and County Administrator Wes Moreno still isn’t talking to him.
The chairman of the West Florida Public Libraryies Board of Governance broke his public silence this week, telling me on Rick’s Blog Live that the board was never meant to be a rubber-stamp advisory panel, and that its canceled summer meetings are putting the library’s budget at risk just as state lawmakers consider property tax changes that could cost the library millions.
- Blaine Wall, a 23-year English professor at Pensacola State College, has chaired the board for three and a half years. He told me the governance structure wasn’t an accident of bureaucracy—it was a deliberate choice made when the library became a countywide system. Read Resolution Creating Board.
“There was a decision to move from an advisory board… to a governance board. And that was created by a city interlocal agreement, also a resolution that was passed by the county commissioners, and then bylaws were created that outlined what the role of the board should be.”
A Board Built for Oversight, Not Politics
Wall said the resolution creating the board makes its purpose explicit: oversight of library administration, not ceremonial advice. He pointed out that even the county’s own interim administrator at the time called it a unique, independent body, not something meant to fall under a department head’s control. Watch videos of the January 2013 BCC meeting.
Asked directly whether the board was designed to stay out of politics, Wall didn’t hesitate: “That’s correct. It was not supposed to be a political body.”
For most of his tenure, Wall said, that’s exactly how it functioned. The board reviewed policy, helped set budget priorities and long-range goals, and signed off on budgets before they went to the county commission. “Our meetings were not political,” he said. “It seemed that everyone was on the same page. There was a lot of transparency about what was going on.”
That changed, he said, after the library’s longtime director retired.
No Meeting Since April
The most pressing issue isn’t personnel—it’s the calendar. County Administrator Wes Moreno canceled the board’s summer meetings, even though the founding resolution requires the board to meet monthly. Wall has pushed back and called for a special meeting, which he said the bylaws allow him to do.
By the numbers: Wall says if the statewide property tax amendment passes, the library could lose $2 million to $4 million in funding—conversations the board hasn’t been able to have because it hasn’t met since April.
