Two Apply For Library Post

WAITSBURG - Two Waitsburg-area residents have thrown their hat in the ring for the city's library manager's position.

The applicants for the job vacated by the resignation of Su Alexander last month are Heather Hay-Baker and Rosie Warehime.

The Board of the Weller Public Library is expected to meet later this month to go over the applications and move the hiring process forward. Alexander left the position late last month, citing personal reasons.

Hay- Baker, who lives with her family between Waitsburg and Dayton, said she applied because she loves books and enjoys working with people, particularly kids. A mother of four, her children include high school students Maera, musician and essay winner, and Fletcher, youth representative on the Waitsburg City Council.

A long-time Portland-area resident, she moved to the Touchet Valley a decade ago and has helped out checking books at the school library from time to time. Her background is in sales, purchasing and some management through her job at two Portland-based electronics companies.

Warehime, who came from Montana with her husband Walt 41 years ago, worked for two decades as a clerk at Touchet Valley Grain Growers, and also at Green Giant and the National Bank of Commerce in Dayton, which is now Sterling Savings. She worked at the Cenex station on Preston Avenue for four years until it closed late last year.

She has two grandchildren in school in Waitsburg, Jaidyn Brown at Preston Hall, and Zach Brown in High School. Her husband taught and coached kids of all ages in the district until he retired in the mid 1990s.

"I'm a big supporter of kids," said Warehime, noting that her family is a "reading" family. "I love kids of all ages. I think it'd be fun. I'd like to do something for Waitsburg."

Alexander, who had been long time manager Jan Cronkhite's assistant since March 2009, took over as manager last fall.

Cronkhite said the job is demanding beyond the 10 hours for which the city employee gets paid. The hourly rate is $12.45.

Aside from helping patrrons select and check books, managing the library involves organizing reading programs, buying new books and processing their entry into the system, and discarding or selling old books.

Cronkhite and Alexander had started to introduce a library inventory control sytem.

Unfortunately, the barcode company they had selected went out of business after fewer than 3,000 of the 7,000 volumes at Weller had been entered in the new system.

Starting the inventory control technology project from scratch and completing it will be an ongoing challenge for the library and the candidate replacing Alexander.