So this happened at around 4, I'm off at 5. Guy was yelling and being belligerent, and had been when I arrived at the front desk for my last hour. He was upstairs so I couldn't see what was going on or catch everything he was saying. When he started to get loud and shouted something like “what about active shooters” I went to the back and got my mace. (I wasn't gonna rule out the possibility of him trying to assault staff on his way out. Staff have been physically assaulted MULTIPLE times. Earlier this year there was also a hostage situation at another branch involving a guy with knives.) While in the back, I told a couple coworkers to not go out front. Dude was still yelling when I got back. A coworker at the desk with me said I didn't have to stay but I chose to since it was a desk shift, and I didn't think it'd escalate the way it did. Patrons were leaving. I felt bad for the patrons for having their time at the library disturbed, but at the same time I was glad that patrons were getting up and leaving because of this guy because maybe–MAYBE–it will show management what kind of environment they're allowing our library location to be. The guy refused to leave, said he'd only leave with police. Later I learned he had called the cops on himself.
Cops came in through the front, I'm all “JESUS CHRIST! JESUS CHRIST!” when I see the rifles. Cops gather at stairs and one or two at the elevator. One of them asks “Is there an active shooter?” NO YOU DUMB MOTHERFUCKER, IF THERE WAS WE WOULDN'T JUST BE SITTING HERE BEHIND THE DESK. So the guy comes down and is making remarks/playing passive-aggressive-friendly with the cops as they pat him down. One hikes his shirt up, boom there's a knife. He said something about having a water bottle. He was walked out–like cops are wont to do if it's a white guy–and I heard some loud talking out front. The whole thing took about 20 min or so after I got to the desk. PICs (People In Charge–shift lead, basically) came to check in on us. I said I was freaked out by the rifles and the guy's knife, PIC said “the guy said it's a water bottle” and I'm like “Oh, bull.” I know what a knife looks like, and I know what a water bottle looks like, and that wasn't a water bottle.
I'm okay, but freaked out and angry. Angry because I know that, like every other time shit like this happens, management is going to feed us meaningless platitudes and then do nothing to make the place safer. When a guy was tossing a brick around and another guy stabbed someone, we brought up the issue with people bringing weapons into the library and management responded with “well they feel like they need weapons on the street.” The library is not the street. I'm freaked out because there were RIFLES. Seeing a bunch of cops walking in with rifles is just naturally going to be a jarring experience.
Libraries regularly have to deal with workplace violence and mental health crises because the way our system is set up, there's very few–if any–resources for people experiencing addiction and mental health issues. It's insane and upsetting that this is pushed on us and I wish that there was pushback from the library, and more pressure being put on our government to get the proper shit put in place for these people. I got into library work because I love books, not because I want to get traumatized every time I go in to work. And I'm sick of management's excuses for shitty patron behavior and straight-up violence. If it wasn't enough that a coworker got jumped, and wasn't enough that people toss shit around and flip over displays, and it's not enough that a guy gets stabbed, I'd really hate to think about what will actually be enough for management to act.