Even though he’s the boss, Jose Aponte, 57, is very clear about one thing when it comes to his staff. “Power is like manure; the more you spread it around, the more successful you’ll be,” he says.
As director of the San Diego County Library System, Aponte oversees a new literacy program, 33 libraries and two mobile libraries within a widely diverse region. Within the three years he has been at the helm, the system’s circulation has increased 75 percent at 20-25 percent per year. A good library, according to Aponte, expects 5-6 percent increases per year.
But Aponte is reluctant to take all of the credit. “I don’t do all the heavy lifting,” he says. “This is the work of the incredible staff we have here.” To Aponte, libraries are more than repositories for books. They must serve the needs of their communities.
Among the achievements of the San Diego County Library are the Arabic language computer class series that won the American Library Association/Information. Today, Inc. Library of the Future Award, and its ESL program, which was one of seven in the nation that received the National Association of Counties “Acts of Caring” Award.
These are only two of the many education and community programs that reach out to almost every group imaginable, from children, to teens, to seniors to immigrants working towards their citizenship. No one is excluded regardless of their race, ethnicity or cultural heritage.
If the community has a high drop-out rate and you’re not providing after-school programs and breaking the cycle of poor academic performance, you’re not serving the community,” says Joe Cordero, director of human resources for the community services division of San Diego County.
Cordero recruited Aponte to his current position based on his history of mentoring young people and seeking resources to help kids with potential. “It’s easy to be a manager and manage your budget and build more buildings,” Cordero says. “But to meet the needs of your constituents and develop staff takes leadership and that’s what he’s done in this position.”
Changing Lives
Aponte got his first library job from his mother, who was a librarian at the Albany Public Library. He was seven years old.
“I remember coming to her when I was done with my homework and she told me to go tell a young lady a story,” he recalls. When he protested that the girl was older than him, his mother replied, “Yeah Joe, but she can’t read.”
It was a stunning realization for a boy who grew up surrounded by books. She then offered to pay Aponte five cents for every story he read.
“I sat there and told five stories,” he says. “I made 25 cents!”
Upon graduating from Bard College, Aponte went on to the University of Arizona at Tucson where he received his Master of Library Science degree. His first job at the Tucson Public Library, housed in the El Pueblo Neighborhood Center, led him to the other love of his life: his wife of 28 years, Cynthia Aponte.
While the world sees her husband as a librarian and an elder of the Latino community; she sees a man who doesn’t get as much sleep as she thinks he should. “I worry about him,” she says.
She admits that she keeps his ego in check, and yet she’s very proud of all that he has accomplished in his 32-year career.
“He’s been criticized for not conforming,” she says. “But he doesn’t know the meaning of the word. He’s a visionary and he has ideas that will go out way into the future.” Married for 28 years, the Aponte’s have raised two sons, Tony, 25 and Pablo, 24. This past summer Tony received his Master of Library and information Science at UCLA, creating the third generation of Aponte librarians.
While Aponte might not accept all the credit for the growth of the library, he’s very proud of his work on the Advisory Board of the Laura Bush Foundation for America’s Libraries. As an advisor, he reviews grant applications from needy libraries across the nation.
“Every application reflects poverty in America, from the coal miners of West Virginia where 40 percent of the population is unemployed, to Mississippi where they are lucky if their literacy rate is one out of every two adults,” he says.
The foundation has donated millions of dollars in grants since it was founded in 2001.“At the heart of it, I’m a librarian. I’ve driven the book mobile, and yet I’m sitting three tables away from Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, or meeting Mrs. Bush,” he says. “My life has changed.”