A flap over edgy library books has prompted the county’s library system to borrow a page from the distributors of motion pictures and other popular media to ease the minds of concerned parents.
This new labeling policy, which received a nod from Alamance County’s commissioners this week, won’t apply to every volume that appears on the county’s library shelves. But for items that furrow the brows of a patron, a staff-level committee will ascertain if it warrants a measure of “parental guidance” – in which case, a sticker suggesting said guidance will show up on the spine of the book.
These PG stickers are merely the most visible step in this new labeling system, which an advisory committee for the county’s libraries formally presented to the board of commissioners on Monday. Also part of this policy will be detailed explanations of why particular books received the label as well as a administrative review process that includes the prospect of an appeal to the library system’s advisory committee.
Cheryl Sandford, a Burlington resident who serves as the vice chairman of this committee, informed the commissioners that she and her colleagues have spent a fair amount of time formulating the details of this new policy.
Sandford began her remarks by acquainting the county’s governing board with the library system’s selection policy, which openly acknowledges that the “selection of adult materials will not be limited by the possibility that items may come into the possession of minors.”
“Parents are ultimately responsible for what children take home from the library,” Sandford went on to sum up this protocol, “and that is exactly as it should be. We know our children best…Unfortunately, parents are busy…and these stickers are designed to help busy parents make informed decisions about the books their children check out just like ratings for movies, music, and video games.”
Legal aide
Although the brainchild of this advisory committee, whose members are appointed by the county’s governing board, the policy’s nitty gritty particulars are largely the work of Alamance County’s attorney Rik Stevens.
During Monday’s presentation to the commissioners, Stevens said that he drafted the text of the policy based on the committee’s recommendations. He went on to note that he divided the policy into two parts – one regarding the aforementioned stickers and another to ensure patrons have access to additional details on why a specific book had been flagged. Stevens added that this information will be available to anyone interested at each branch of the county’s library system.
Stevens stressed that, under the new policy, an item will be graced by a “parental guidance” sticker only if a patron questions its suitability for young readers using a form that the county’s legal department has created. A board of high-ranking library staff will then review the patron’s challenge based on criteria like graphic violence, sexually explicit content, depictions of substance abuse, references to suicide, and profanity. The committee will then rule whether the item warrants one of the aforementioned stickers – a decision that Stevens observed can be appealed to the advisory committee.
“The content label accomplishes the mission of letting parents know ‘hey, other people that reviewed this had issues with it,’” Stevens went on to explain. “What it doesn’t do is put all the labeled books in one part of the library, and it doesn’t say that kids can’t check things out because of age.”
Stevens also distinguished this policy from the voluntary rating systems that movie studios and music labels have adopted to indicate the age appropriateness of their latest releases.
“The board is not suggesting that these materials be removed from the public library. We are not moving them to a restricted area. We are not imposing an age limit to stickered books. . . We are not censoring any Constitutionally-protected speech. The goal of the library board is to help parents choose the books that are most appropriate for their children.”
– Library committee vice chairman Cheryl Sandford
“This is different,” he conceded. “This is government putting labels on content…and there have been challenges – in some cases, successful challenges – as to the First Amendment ability of government to censor speech by either removing materials from libraries or labeling them in such a way that they become almost contraband.”
In the end, the policy that Stevens roughed out was hailed by Sandford as a careful compromise between the freedom of information and the concerns of area parents.
“The board is not suggesting that these materials be removed from the public library,” the committee’s vice chairman declared in her remarks to the commissioners. “We are not moving them to a restricted area. We are not imposing an age limit to stickered books. . . We are not censoring any Constitutionally-protected speech. The goal of the library board is to help parents choose the books that are most appropriate for their children.”
Equally pleased with this measured response was Kelly Stutts, a self-described “advocate for the prevention of child sexual abuse” who resides in the southern part of the county.
“It just makes sense to label our books. We label movies and we label TV shows. . . It’s an adult responsibility to protect our children and when we have an anything goes attitude that children are responsible for what’s appropriate for them, we aren’t doing their jobs as adults.”
– Kelly Stutts
“It just makes sense to label our books,” Stutts told the commissioners. “We label movies and we label TV shows…It’s an adult responsibility to protect our children and when we have an anything goes attitude that children are responsible for what’s appropriate for them, we aren’t doing their jobs as adults.”
Notes from the board
The county attorney’s efforts nevertheless left a few things to be desired for some of the county commissioners.
Particularly wary of the policy that Stevens had drafted was commissioner Ed Priola, who raised a number of objections to the county attorney’s suggestions.
“I intend to vote for the sticker proposal. It’s a good start. But it should be stronger…Children should not have access to age-inappropriate materials without parental consent. . . It’s unreasonable to suggest that a 10 year-old needs unfettered access to everything that has ever been printed.”
– County commissioner Ed Priola
“I intend to vote for the sticker proposal,” the commissioner went on to concede. “It’s a good start. But it should be stronger…Children should not have access to age-inappropriate materials without parental consent…It’s unreasonable to suggest that a 10 year-old needs unfettered access to everything that has ever been printed.”
Priola also took issue with some references in Steven’s proposed policy to the “Library Bill of Rights” and other initiatives of the American Library Association. From there, the commissioner descended into a lengthy denunciation of the ALA for its “promotion” of “Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion,” which he said has been a stalking horse for ideologically-driven campaigns to “dismantle white supremacy” and “redistribute power.” He also blasted the group’s former president for her allegedly self-proclaimed “Marxist” agenda.
In the end, Priola proposed that the commissioners should strike Stevens’ references to the ALA from the county’s proposed policy. His recommendation was immediately embraced by Steve Carter, the vice chairman of Alamance County’s commissioners, although it drew some pushback from commissioner Pam Thompson, who warned her fellow board members not to foist their own political proclivities on the county’s library system.
“We’ve got to make sure that our libraries are public libraries,” she added, “and on every shelf, there’s stuff that will tick somebody off.”
In the meantime, Stevens acknowledged that his allusions to the ALA weren’t really crucial to the actual text of the policy.
“My [point] was to make reference to what the industry and the law consider best practices,” he elaborated. “My intent wasn’t to align us with an extreme ideology in any way. So, I don’t think it hurts to have that come out…I don’t think it’s going to sink the ship.”
Stevens nevertheless objected to another suggestion from Priola that stickered books should be kept out of the reach of young children. The county attorney insisted that this move “is not a defensible position for the county to take,” although he conceded that the commissioners can discuss the possibility at a later date.
The commissioners proceeded to approve Priola’s proposed excisions along with some additional revisions from John Paisley, Jr., the chairman of Alamance County’s commissioners. Paisley suggested some new verbiage to ensure that the staff’s labeling decisions are ultimately shared with the library committee and also appear in its minutes to provide a modicum of public transparency.
With these additions, the commissioners voted 5-to-0 to approve the new labeling policy.
Opus DEI
Priola later rehashed his objections to Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion when Susana Goldman, the library system’s director, rolled out a new strategic plan that was entirely shorn of these once-trendy concepts.
Priola pressed the system’s director to explain why the new plan is mum on DEI phraseology when it continues to pervade the library system’s website and other “policy statements.” Goldman replied that the website and other publications simply haven’t caught up with the shifting attitudes of the public – as spelled out in her department’s updated strategic plan.
“What I can say,” she told the commissioner, “is what’s in our plan is what our community has determined are the priorities right now. And what’s on the website reflects the policy five years ago.”
Goldman went on to contend that the board’s approval of the strategic plan will hasten revisions to the website and other materials. These assurances persuaded Priola to join his colleagues in a 5-to-0 vote in favor of the new strategic plan.
