In another coup for San Antonio's powerful private citizens, Tobin Endowment co-trustee J. Bruce "Almighty" Bugg got the
library name change he had asked his friend (and our Mayor Phil Hardberger)for last spring. What delayed the unprecedented changing of the 38-year-old Oakwell Library to the Tobin Library at Oakwell? Bruce Almighty was essentially talking to the wrong end of the machine. Only the San Antonio Public Library Board of Trustees - citizens, bookworms, decent folk or resume padders appointed by our City Hall slicks - have those naming or renaming powers. And after a fantastic
putsch led by the city's glitterati - resisted by the actual patrons of the Oakwell Library and a few Library Board Members (one of whom resigned citing back room arm twisting) - and after scandalous public hearings that hurled mud on the deceased philanthropist Robert L.B. Tobin and upset the Library Board's bookloving harmony and exposed the ways we placate City players (even those we suspect of
mismanaging their playgrounds) ... well after all that a vote on the name change was postponed. We just learned that on the last day of February, the Library Board met at the Maverick Branch Library, without giving notice to the media about the agenda. Bruce, thy will be done.
