The Enid News and Eagle, Enid, OK - Enid library officials concerned about bill

The Enid News and Eagle, Enid, OK - Enid library officials concerned about bill:

Enid library officials are concerned about a bill that passed the Oklahoma House Wednesday establishing a statewide board to check libraries for material with gay or explicitly sexual themes.

The bill would withhold state funding from libraries that do not segregate reading material with explicit or gay themes from reading areas for children.

It is opposed by Oklahoma Library Association.

“We’ve been watching that bill. Not only does it say the Department of Libraries cannot give funding but no other funding entity. That would prevent our local board or the city from funding this library, if it did not comply with the rules in the statute,” said Mary Shaklee, interim library director.

Shaklee said the bill would create an appointed group to determine what material young children can check out.

The group called State Library Material Content Advisory Board would develop an annual list of children and young adult materials that contain homosexual and sexually explicit subject matter.

“At this point, not knowing the particulars, I don’t know what specific materials are included. I don’t know if we even have material that fits their description,” she said.

The list will be distributed by Oklahoma Department of Libraries to every library in the state.

The advisory board would be made up of members appointed by the speaker of the House and the president pro tempore of the state Senate. Each would appoint two members of their legislative body, two people who are parents of a child under age 18 who reside in the state and two teachers in public or private schools in the state.

Shaklee said the biggest objection she has to the measure is the loss of local control of the library collection.

“They are asking us to accept a very small group of people who know nothing about our community to decide what material we can have and to whom it should be available,” she said. “Anytime someone seizes control of this sort, the logical question is what’s next?”

Shaklee said the library does have a process for people who find something objectionable.

“The local board oversees what we do here and the policies and approves those,” she said.

Six members of the board are appointed by the city and two by the county.

“Part of the issue is the whole idea you can take some part of the collection and put it somewhere and keep people away from it,” she said. If we move things to the adult collection, how do you keep children out of there? You can’t build a wall?”