Library staff keen to join the Teamsters Local 589 are now part of the collective bargaining process currently underway between union negotiators and city management. Bargaining is ongoing with the city’s current union contract coming to an end on Dec. 31.

Union negotiator Robert Braun said Port Townsend Library staff are “being fully represented by Teamsters Local 589, just as the other general government employees of the city are represented.”

Braun said city library employees asked to join the union about a year ago, and the Public Employment Relations Commission agreed.

Braun said the city and the Teamsters have made “significant progress on many issues in the contract.

Braun said he could not divulge details of those negotiations.

“The union and city have committed to private discussions, so I am not free to discuss too much detail,” Braun said.

“The collective bargaining process can take time especially for the issues of a new unit,” Braun said. “As you may notice in the news, it sometimes takes two years for a new unit to have results. In this case, the city library staff should be part of the new agreement to be effective January 2025 because Teamsters 589 has handled the matter very efficiently.”

Anthony Boruch-Comstock was hired as a library assistant in February 2023 and became a proponent of union membership, when, after a few months into his tenure, he said he experienced wage inequities, scheduling issues and treatment that he felt union representation might remedy.

“Library assistants are effectively doing the work of much higher compensated jobs at an artificially low title and wage,” Boruch-Comstock wrote. “In October of 2023, I and five of my library assistant colleagues signed our cards to join the Teamsters Union Local 589. Local 589 represents every other City of Port Townsend department … and the difference between our wages, work environments, and benefits is stark.”

Boruch-Comstock also said that Port Townsend library assistant pay is out of sync with the responsibilities of the position and with pay at other libraries across the state.

Boruch-Comstock said his decision to push for unionization came, in part, after an early morning, pre-shift meeting, organized by City Manager John Mauro and library director Melody Sky Weaver. In that meeting, Boruch-Comstock wrote, 20-year employee, Kathi Johnson, was given “a printed out ‘Congratulations’ certificate, that said ‘Thank you for your service,’” followed by an introduction to two new (at the time) employees — the communications director and facilities manager – both with salaries at about $100,000 a year.

According to the City of Port Townsend 2024 Salary Schedule, the communications and marketing director salary starts at $109,388. The parks and facilities manager starts at $94,494.

“In 2003, Kathi Johnson was hired at the Port Townsend Public Library for $12 an hour,” wrote Boruch-Comstock. “On that day, after 20 years of service to her community as a City of Port Townsend employee, she was being paid $19 an hour. I was hired 6 months prior and was being paid $18 an hour.”