The Columbia County Library Board did not discuss the four books up for reconsideration during the meeting on Tuesday, Nov 14 and instead moved them to the December meeting.
County Manager Scott Johnson spoke to the board members about the reconsiderations and gave some guidance on how it needs to be handled. He said that since the board is a citizen advisory board, they can make recommendations about reconsiderations, but can’t make the final decision – that would fall to the head librarian.
“The Supreme Court has repeatedly held that content-based regulations violate the First Amendment,” Johnson said. “You have to overcome what’s called the strict scrutiny analysis, which is almost impossible to overcome. So, in layman’s terms what that really means is you can’t treat books differently based on the topics within the books. You can treat books differently with exceptions like obscenity and inciting violence and things like that.”
Johnson said if the board finds the book to be obscene in some way – and there is a legal definition of obscenity – then it could be treated differently. But, moving a book to a different section or removing it from the library just based on the content is a violation of the First Amendment.
“If we said any books that are dealing with sexuality period should be in the adult section, we can do that,” Johnson said. “But we can’t single out books that we ok, this book deals with homosexuality or we say this book deals with anything in the LGBTQ+, the Supreme Court has said you can’t, that is content based auditing, and you can’t therefore move that book somewhere else in the library.”
Johnson added that there is an unofficial Georgia General Attorney opinion that states librarians have discretion to decide what is adult material versus children material. The opinion takes into consideration the education levels of the librarians, their training and more.
“But as a board you do not have that authority,” Johnson said. “You don’t have it in the bylaws, the county is not giving you that authority. So, it would be inappropriate for this board to say we’re going to move a book from this section to this section, you simply don’t have the authority to do that. You can make a recommendation to the librarian, I think that would appropriate to be able to do something like that. But as a board, you don’t have the ability to say we voted to move this book from here to here, you don’t have that authority currently.”
Board chair Russell Wilder mentioned the reconsiderations from October, the board didn’t want to keep the books out of the library, it just felt some of the content, including underage drinking and drug use, was not appropriate for some of the ages that fall into the young adult section.
“It’s not like we said there’s gay people in the book, we want it out of here,” Wilder said. “We feel like for our 12-year-old’s in this community, statutory rape don’t need to be discussed yet, alcohol or drug use does not need to be discussed.”
Johnson said when it’s a situation like Wilder mentioned, the board can make recommendations for the librarian to move the book, but would be inappropriate to say it’s going to be moved from section A to section B.
“You are a recommending body, you don’t have the autonomy to make, you do in certain cases, your bylaws give you the autonomy to do certain things…anything within those bylaws gives you the autonomy to do certain things…anything outside those parameters are something we would questions,” Johnson said.
Also discussed, and approved, were updated versions of the constitution, bylaws and collection procurement policy.
The books up for reconsideration that will be discussed in December are “What If It’s Us” by Becky Albertalli, “The Real Riley Mayes” by Rachel Elliott, “Mama and Mommy and Me in the Middle” by Nina LaCour and “Simon vs the HOMO Sapiens Agenda” by Becky Albertalli will be up for reconsideration. In January, the board will discuss “You Know Me Well” by Nina LaCour.
As for the five books discussed at the October meeting, Library Manager Mary Lin Maner said she was not sure if the action decided by the board would happen and was waiting on speak from her supervisor.
The next Columbia County Library Board meeting will be Thursday, Dec. 14 at 11:30 a.m. at the Evans Library in classrooms B and C,
Stephanie Hill is the managing editor and covers Columbia County government for The Augusta Press. Reach her at stephanie@theaugustapress.com.
