NORTHAMPTON — After meeting in closed session Wednesday, the Forbes Library board of trustees issued a statement detailing its reasons for taking legal action in probate court against the city and citing concerns about altering the will that established the institution.
The trustees said their talks with Mayor David Narkewicz broke down in January after City Solicitor Alan Seewald sent the board an opinion concerning library governance.
“That opinion (and Solicitor Seewald’s more recent arguments to several state agencies regarding the Trustees’ status) reflects an attempt to unilaterally alter the terms of the historic relationship between the City and the Library, as established under the will of Charles E. Forbes,” the trustees stated. “As trustees, one of our responsibilities is to ensure Judge Forbes’ wishes are respected. We are therefore determined to prevent the unilateral imposition of these changes on the library.”
On Jan. 28, Narkewicz sent a copy of an opinion from Seewald to Russell Carrier, the library’s board chairman, requesting a meeting to discuss next steps on “resolving ongoing maintenance and budgetary issues.”
In his opinion, Seewald wrote that “Judge Forbes made clear his intent that the Library, once constructed, be a municipal institution,” and as for management and control of the library, “the Library functions as a department of the City.”
Seewald further wrote that “as elected public officials that expend public funds for a public purpose, the Trustees are a public body and the employees of the Library are public employees.”
He was scheduled to meet with trustees April 28, but trustees in February canceled the meeting with Seewald indefinitely, according to correspondence between the library and mayor’s office.
On May 20, the trustees filed a complaint against the city in Hampshire Probate and Family Court claiming the mayor views the trustees as a governmental body and library as a city department.
They seek the court to “definitively interpret” the provisions of Judge Forbes’ will and trust.
In their statement Wednesday, trustees said they seek to preserve the “public/private relationship” they say has existed between the city and Forbes since 1881, when the city agreed to accept the conditions of Forbes’ bequest. Forbes was a Northampton lawyer and state Supreme Judicial Court judge.
Trustees stated that the dispute is not about negotiations with the city over annual appropriations and capital improvements, nor is it about transparency regarding the state’s Open Meeting Law, because it voted in 2009 to follow the provisions of the law.
“It’s about the issue of governance,” Chairman Russell Carrier said.
Narkewicz declined to comment Wednesday on the trustees’ statement, saying he had not had an opportunity to read it. He said he stood by his earlier comments on the issues when he said he had “no interest in usurping the authority of the trustees in the day-to-day operations of the library.”
“One of the long-standing challenges that pre-dates my administration, is how an institution initiated by a 19th century will and now funded almost entirely by city taxpayers interfaces with the requirements of 21st century open government.” Narkewicz wrote in an email last week. “Despite the unnecessary and potentially costly actions taken by the Trustees, I stand ready to continue our discussions toward what I know is our shared interest in the future vitality of Forbes Library.”
At the time, the mayor said he was “disheartened” that trustees would file a lawsuit against the city, and trustees on Wednesday said they were “disheartened” that the dispute has reached the point of litigation.
“Judge Forbes charged the Trustees with managing, preserving, and overseeing Forbes Library,” the trustees wrote Wednesday. “We take that task very seriously, as we do our role in preserving the fundamental notion that a free public library must be independent of governmental control and political influence.”
The statement continued, “Were the Trustees and the Library to become enveloped within City Government (as the City Solicitor is arguing is or should be the case) then there could be no guarantee that in the years to come, the City would continue to fulfill the obligation to support the library it formally accepted under Judge Forbes’ will.”
Dan Crowley can be reached at dcrowley@gazettenet.com.