BRIDGET BITTMAN SPENDING - p4: Heres $545.70 that Bridget Bittman (OPPL spokesman and crisis manager) spent on some kind of little frames as a gift to staff and Board Members for their 2012 Christmas party. There are several judgment errors here. First, was this the best thing to give the staff as a gift? I dont think so. If you are going to be blowing taxpayer money on gifts for staff (who are already very well-paid) you should have the gift be something they really want…and there is no way that these staff members spent an entire year pining away for some kind of little frame (that we dont even have a picture of). They bought 150 of these things when they actually only have about 80 staff members…so who got the other ones? Were always suspicious when Bridget Bittman is buying things because she runs a side business doing flower arranging…and sometimes we wonder if she over-orders things for the OPPL that she can use in her flower arranging business. Were these frames repurposed for flower displays in some way, since she ordered double the amount of frames that would have been needed for a staff of 80? Also, the unit cost on these things was around $3.50 or so each. How nice could these things have been? If they were going to spend $550 on gifts for staff and there are 80 staffers, why not give each person a $5 gift card to Starbucks if they wanted to give a little token of appreciation? That would have been just $400 total…and the staffers would have actually enjoyed a nice treat, instead of this frame that they probably never looked at again (and male staffers no doubt threw in the back of their cars and forgot about). The invoice also says these frames were for Board Members too, which makes us uncomfortable. Arent Board Members supposed to be uncompensated for their time on the Board? Yet, here they are getting these frames as gifts (cheap, junky gifts…but gifts nonetheless). When it comes to this nonstop gift-giving to staff we keep circling back to the fact that if the Library would only go out to local businesses and ask them for gift certificates and other tokens for staff presents, they would have a treasure trove of things to give their employees. What business wouldnt donate a few gift certificates to the Library for staff recognition? Thats a great marketing tool for these businesses. Bittman claims she has over 20 years of marketing experience…yet, shes always wasting money on these ridiculous things that a good marketing expert would be able to get for free as donations from businesses. The Wilmington Public Library does this kind of thing all the time and even gets the cakes for employee celebrations donated for free from local businesses. Why doesnt OPPL do this? Another question: why doesnt the OPPL staff do a White Elephant or Yankee Trader gift exchange every year? Thats where employees bring a wrapped gift to the holiday party and then they trade with other employees and its a fun event; some people get great stuff and others get joke gifts. It costs the employer nothing.
Posted on: Mon, 24 Nov 2014 19:00:00 +0000