Chief executive Alex Parmley said the "transformation" would involve the role of library services broadened among other council functions to improve service to the community overall.
"It is envisaged under the proposed changes that management arrangements will change for the library, as they will for nearly every part of council," Mr Parmley said yesterday.
"Some roles in our cultural facilities have been combined as a result of the new organisation design.
"This was outlined in the initial document shared in May and confirmed in July."
However, Mr Parmley has still not publicly released a clear organisational overview for the transformation, despite repeated requests from the ODT.
Instead, he said the council was in the recruitment phase of the process and the focus was on supporting staff at this time.
"We will have a public-facing version of the organisational design to share with the community and media, along with an explanation of the finalised changes.
"However this, will be part of the ongoing community engagement and information about projects, pilots and changes that we'll be releasing as the programme progresses."
That response gave no indication of any timeframe.
For the past 18 months the planned reorganisation was presented to the elected council and management staff as a "transformation".
Mr Parmley said that in relation to the library this would mean council staff from across the organisation now working at those sites to deploy their local knowledge.
This would help improve location specific service by council across the district .
"It is likely there will be more staff in the library at many points going forward."
He said the council libraries in Oamaru and Palmerston, and a yet--to-be determined new Waitaki Valley location, would become community hubs.
All council staff were in May asked for feedback on the transformation.
They learned on July 18 that at least 9% of the current 211 full time equivalent positions were to be redefined or disestablished across all existing roles and departments.
Staff have been told they will need to reapply for their jobs.
Mr Parmley told the ODT on July 17 the council hoped to avoid any redundancies.
He held that line yesterday jobs were not being cut.
"Transformation is not about cutting but delivering things differently to improve effectiveness and efficiency," he said.
"We propose to continue to develop the library as a hub. In time, there may be more staff in the library than currently."
Mr Parmley said "a core group" of librarians would remain.
