From enthusiastic library patron to parent stunned by LGBTQ library displays aimed at children to vice chairman of library committee, Cheryl Sandford’s library journey through the years
A homeschool mom in Burlington who three years ago questioned the prominent placement of a display featuring mature sexual themes – on a bookshelf leading into the children’s reading area – has since successfully shepherded a new “parental guidance” policy that Alamance County’s commissioners have adopted for the county’s library system.
Cheryl Sandford of Burlington said in a recent interview with The Alamance News that she hopes the policy will help to inform other parents about children’s and young adult books that potentially contain age-inappropriate content.
The new policy enables library patrons to request a review of library materials aimed at young readers that feature sexually-explicit content, profanity, substance abuse, graphic violence, suicide, or other mature themes. The request would then be forwarded to a library staff committee to evaluate whether the content warrants the placement of a parental guidance sticker on the spine of the book.
A book would only carry a PG sticker if it is challenged and a board of library staff agrees that the content of the book warrants a sticker reading, “Parental Guidance Suggested – See catalog for details,” based on the policy the commissioners adopted last week.
“Every time I’m asked to speak at a meeting, one of the first things I clarify is that the goal [of the new Parental guidance labeling process and sticker] is not to infringe on protected speech; it is not to keep books out of the hands of children. It is to inform parents who are ultimately responsible for what their children take out of the library.”
– Cheryl Sandford, vice chairman of library committee
Cheryl Sandford, who serves as the vice chairman for the county’s library committee, recounted in an interview with The Alamance News how she got involved after seeing an LGBTQ-themed display near the children’s reading area at May Memorial Library in June 2022.
“I was concerned about the display of highly-sexualized content,” Sandford recalls. “It was a permanent display that was up for months and months.” Library officials insisted at the time that the display was temporary, installed for the month of June to commemorate “Pride” month; Sanford and another homeschool mom told the newspaper at the time that the display had been up several months.
Sandford had insisted at the time that it wasn’t the content of the books that the display featured– exclusively Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, and Queer (LGBTQ) books for children and young adults – that bothered her so much as its placement in an area likely to capture the eyes of young readers not yet thinking about their sexuality.
The former English teacher and her husband have four sons, two in their teens and two in their 20s, all of whom she homeschooled in Burlington. Her family has long-relied on the public library as an educational resource and as the place where they developed a lifelong love of reading.
sanford’s library journey – THE EARLY YEARS: LIBRARY CHEERLEADER
“I was the biggest cheerleader for the library ever. We went there all the time; we used it as a resource. Things have changed a lot since my son was volunteering. I would love to have a library that shares those same values. Not one time did I ever have to worry about the material my children checked out; they picked out whatever they wanted.”
– Cheryl Sandford, vice chairman of library committee
In fact, her oldest, Chris Sandford, was featured on the front page of an area newspaper in August 2017 after winning an essay contest for the North Carolina Library Association, writing about how his life and education had been influenced by the public library. As a teen, he volunteered at May Memorial Library, shelving books every Thursday afternoon and creating promotional fliers.
“I was the biggest cheerleader for the library ever,” Sandford says. “We went there all the time; we used it as a resource. Things have changed a lot since my son was volunteering. I would love to have a library that shares those same values. Not one time did I ever have to worry about the material my children checked out; they picked out whatever they wanted.”
Gender identity and jiggly bodies
Fast-forward to 2025, when the children’s and young adult books that Sandford shared with the commissioners depict graphic nudity, suicide, and adolescents struggling with issues such as gender identity.
One of those books, Just Shy of Ordinary, centers on 13-year-old who identifies as neither female nor male (i.e., nonbinary), entering public school for the first time and learning about “family, friendship, LGBTQIA+ identity, and Jewish heritage,” according to a description from the author, A.J. Sass.
Another book that Sandford shared with the commissioners, The Big Bath House, is described as a celebration of Japanese culture in which “naked bodies of all shapes and sizes, join a little girl at a traditional bath house,” according to a description from the author, Kyo Maclear. “Once there, the rituals leading up to the baths begin: hair washing, back scrubbing, and, finally, the wood barrel drumroll. Until, at last, it’s time, and they ease their bodies — their creased bodies, newly sprouting bodies, saggy, jiggly bodies — into the bath.”
“It had full frontal nudity – multiple pages of the book, naked women,” Sandford says of The Big Bath House. “It was in the children’s area.”
[Story continues below photos of commissioners looking at the books Sandford showed them last week before the board adopted the library committee’s P.G. labeling system.]
Here’s a link to the commissioners’ discussion about the new policy at last week’s meeting: https://alamancenews.com/commissioners-approve-pg-stickers-for-library-books-with-mature-themes/
The two other books that she presented to the commissioners, Just Shy of Ordinary and Camp Quiltbag, were in the young adult section at May Memorial Library, according to Sandford.
sandford’s library journey: TO ALARM OVER AGE INAPPROPRIATE MATERIALS FOR CHILDREN, YOUNG ADULTS
“There are so many things that are off-the chart inappropriate in the young adult section – [pornography], trafficking, prostitution.”
– Chery Sandford, vice chairman of library committee
Camp Quiltbag tells the story of 12-year-old “Abigail (she/her/hers) [who] is so excited to spend her summer at Camp QUILTBAG, an inclusive retreat for queer and trans kids,” according to a description from author A.J. Sass. While at camp, Abigail makes a friend, Kai, and together they “make a pact to help each other find their footing, all while navigating crushes, their queer identities, and a competition pitting cabin against cabin,” Sass writes.
“There are so many things that are off-the chart inappropriate in the young adult section – [pornography], trafficking, prostitution,” Sandford says.
Sandford insists that, today, she’d never allow one of her elementary-school children to have unfettered access to the young adult section at the library, the way they once did. “That was not the case years ago,” she says. “My child was shelving books; I never worried once about what he was going to see.”
She took her concerns about the library display in 2022 to several county commissioners, who encouraged her to apply to serve on the library committee. “I had no clue what that was,” Sandford recalls with a chuckle. She was appointed when a slot opened up the following year; in time, she floated the idea of developing some sort of policy that could help to educate parents about children’s and young adult books containing mature content.
Prior to pitching the PG labeling policy, Sandford says she checked out two armloads of books containing potentially inappropriate content for children.
“I shared the idea, and the director talked about the challenges of implementation,” Sandford says. “I was told that stickers don’t have a lot of longevity, that they were phasing out the use of stickers. There were three other ladies on the board saying, ‘look you have genre labels for Christmas [books], for Hispanics, for young adult; you have labels for all kinds of things and they [have] stickers.’ So we moved on from that.”
“It had been a year-and-a-half, and we were still talking about the design of the sticker and what it would look like,” Sandford explains. “Somebody said, ‘what do we have to do to implement this?’” The committee called a special meeting in January to vote on the proposed labeling policy.
Resistance ramps up
Sandford says she was surprised to show up to a packed house for the library committee meeting in January.
“The room was full,” Sandford says, referring to a meeting room at May Memorial where the library committee typically meets once a quarter, rarely drawing more than one or two observers. “There were so many people the [county] attorney said this is against fire code. All kinds of people showed up, and it all had to do with a sticker that said, ‘parental guidance suggested.’ I think it was misunderstood that it was targeting a specific group of people.
“Opponents [said] it was discriminatory,” says the committee’s vice chairman. “I think there were people that were misinformed…It was very emotionally-charged, that January meeting. They were upset about things that were not even part of the policy and not part of the implementation.”
sandford’s library journey – to EQUIPPING PARENTS
“[THE P.G. LABELING SYSTEM] isn’t about limiting constitutional speech. It’s about giving information to parents so they know what they’re taking home. There were many letters sent to the committee in support that said, ‘I brought a book home; my children pick out what they want; and when I began reading it to my child, it had an adult theme I wasn’t ready to share with my child.’
– Cheryl Sandford, vice chairman of library committee
“I said [at the meeting in January], it isn’t about limiting constitutional speech,” Sandford recalls. “It’s about giving information to parents so they know what they’re taking home. There were many letters sent to the committee in support that said, ‘I brought a book home; my children pick out what they want; and when I began reading it to my child, it had an adult theme I wasn’t ready to share with my child.’
“You don’t know that sometimes,” Sandford explains. “You can’t tell that by the cover of the book, and these are children’s books. This is not an isolated incident, it happens over and over.”
Things were much calmer once people understood how the PG labeling process would work. “They were, ‘okay, it’s a sticker,’” Sandford says. “It was much more measured.”
Goal isn’t to censor; it’s to inform
Though concerns about censorship have surfaced during the committee’s discussion, Sandford says she has repeatedly stressed that no books would be removed from any library branch; nor would they be moved to a separate area. “The goal is not to censor speech; the goal is to inform parents,” she insists.
A patron who requests that the library staff committee consider affixing a PG sticker to a book will be notified, and that decision will become public record, based on an amendment that the commissioners’ chairman, John Paisley, Jr., made to the policy last week, Sandford points out.
Sandford acknowledges it hasn’t been easy to help shape how the library addresses potentially inappropriate content for young readers. “In one way, the library slow-walked the whole process; admittedly it means extra work for them, and they’re just not happy.”
In the nearly two years since she initially floated the idea, “people got all kinds of ideas about what we were doing,” says Sandford. “We had a unanimous decision and [all of the library committee members] voted in favor of the stickers.
“Every time I’m asked to speak at a meeting, one of the first things I clarify is that the goal is not to infringe on protected speech; it is not to keep books out of the hands of children,” Sandford says. “It is to inform parents who are ultimately responsible for what their children take out of the library.”
U.S. Supreme Court hears case about whether parents should be able to “opt out” their children from classroom discussions with LGBTQ themes. https://alamancenews.com/u-s-supreme-court-may-rule-in-favor-of-parents-claiming-lgbtq-themed-story-time-in-elementary-schools-violates-their-religious-beliefs/
