Who Will Be the Next Library Director?

Salary information for the Library Director postion.

If you somehow missed Washoe County is looking for a new library director we thought we’d point it out. All while Washoe County stares down a huge budget deficit.

Yes, really.

Washoe County is currently recruiting a Library Director with a salary range of $146,681.60 to $205,358.40, with the first resume review set for Friday, January 9, 2026. That’s a healthy paycheck for any season — but especially curious timing when the county is tightening belts elsewhere.

And where, you might ask, is the Washoe County Library Board of Trustees in all of this? Sadly they are being lead by Assistant County Manager David Solaro and Washoe County Deputy District Attorney Herb Kaplan who seem to run the board and overrule the chair who has done a bang up job.

At the urging of Dave and Herb the board’s current chair, Ann Silver, canceled the final meeting of 2025 citing a “lack of enough business.” That explanation raises eyebrows, considering anyone who’s stepped inside a Washoe County library lately knows there is no shortage of business — from staffing challenges to aging facilities to service demands across the system.

Which makes us wonder what exactly was being served at that November meeting, because calling things “quiet” at the libraries feels a bit like calling the North Valleys traffic-free.

Now it’s January 2026, a new year, a looming deficit, and a top-tier salary position quietly moving forward. So yes — we’re diving deeper, asking for all of Dave and Herb’s communications with the trustees, because that’s what we do.

Stay tuned.