7/30/09
After an eight-month wait, the city of Española plans to hire Teddie Riehl as the new Española Valley Public Library director, after two of the other four options withdrew their names in part because of the length of the hiring process.
Riehl would start work no later than Aug. 1 if she accepts the position and no problems crop up, city officials said.
The finalists for the position were Riehl and Robert Forman. The other two candidates from the initial short list, Patricia Scharinger and Paul Waak, removed their own names from consideration earlier this month. Five other candidates were either eliminated or withdrew their names earlier in the process.
Riehl has been a technical associate at the Thomas Branigan Memorial Library in Las Cruces for the past 13 years. She is the only candidate of the original four finalists who has never been a library director and who does not have a master’s degree, though the job only requires an associate’s degree. She also does not have an associate’s but it will be a stipulation of her contract that she get one, according to city documents.
Robert Forman is a former client relations manager for Trillion Partners, Inc., a telecommunications company in Santa Fe, and Austin, Texas. He also worked as Continuing Education coordinator for the State Library for the past two years while working at Trillion. His last position as a library director ended in 2003.
Waak removed himself from consideration because while waiting for a decision from the city, he was given two obligations related to library work in Texas that he felt he could not fulfill while being library director.
Waak said he took these opportunities because he wasn’t sure how long Española would wait to make their decision.
“I hate to say it, but they took their time,” he said.
Scharinger, who had the most experience as a library director of the four candidates, said she dropped out because she felt Española was an unsafe environment. She also agreed with Waak that the hiring process had taken longer than she thought it would.
Española Human Resources Director Jeannie Brito said she feels the hiring process had taken too long. Brito said the delay can be attributed to the time it took to establish a short list of candidates for interviews. Resumes were given to Library Board President Clarissa Duran in April, with the assumption that she would narrow the list. Brito received the resumes, with no comments, and no short list after about a month, she said.
“I agree it did take a really long time,” she said. “In the end, I reviewed the resumes, and I made the short list.”
Duran refused to comment for this story.
The position became vacant in December 2008 when Ann Moore resigned after less than two years as the director. Since then library technician Maggie Romero has been handling the director’s duties, Cata said. The position pays an annual salary between $42,000 and $47,000.