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City picks new top librarian
Rosanne Macek a library veteran with high-tech background

by Daniel DeBolt

The city has selected Cupertino library director Rosanne Macek to head Mountain View's library after Karen Burnett retired in January.

Macek is leaving a county-run library which she headed for just over a year. It is reportedly the busiest library in the Santa Clara County library system and one of the busiest in the country. She will start April 30 and earn $152,000 a year.

"She is coming from a busy, active library and coming to a busy, active library," said city manager Kevin Duggan.

One reason for her wish to move, Duggan said, is that Mountain View's library is locally controlled by the city rather than the county. Duggan said Macek was excited about working closely with the city government and the community.

"She has a real kind of enthusiasm and dedication to the library field and believes in the value libraries provide to the community," Duggan said. "I think she is going to be a really good library director. She is very aware of the costs of providing these services."

Macek worked in the private sector until 2002 when she was named director of the county-run library in Morgan Hill, where she stayed until last year. During her tenure there she oversaw construction of a new library that opened in 2007. Before that she spent 15 years at Apple Corp. where she was a manager of corporate library services, research and product promotion.

She wrote a book about the use of Apple computers in libraries titled "Library MacIntosh," published in 1987. She also has held jobs at Hewlett Packard and Nortell Networks.

Duggan said he believed Macek would continue Burnett's legacy of bringing the Mountain View library into the 21st century with new technology. Burnett brought in an automated book checkout and return system and the city's high-tech, Google-funded bookmobile, among other things.

According to her LinkedIn profile, Macek has been working on her master's degree in public administration for the last three years at San Jose State University, the same place she got her bachelor's in English and a master's in library science.

According to her Facebook page, Macek is a Campbell resident and a fan of Barack Obama, writer Sylvia Plath, the rock band Muse, San Jose Sharks hockey player Joe Thornton and the TV show "True Blood," among other things.

E-mail Daniel DeBolt at ddebolt@mv-voice.com