The Macon County Commissioners will not pull the county out of the Fontana Regional Library (FRL) System at this time but will look into provisions to restrict what minors can check out as well as the governing structure itself.
“The FRL agreement entered into in 2013 requires that the three participating counties, Jackson, Macon and Swain, revisit the structure of the FRL every 10 years,” according to a statement read by board Chair Paul Higdon at the conclusion of the April 11 meeting.
He said the three county managers met on April 6. “It was unanimously agreed that the regional agreement is beneficial to all three counties and their citizens, but improvement is needed in the areas of parental empowerment and governance of the FRL system.”
The counties will look into “provisions which will give parents greater ability to set restrictions over what materials their minor children may check out while still remaining in compliance with the law, and the structure and authority of the respective local county library boards and the regional board.”
They hope to present the revised local agreement to the three county boards by mid-to late-August.
The statement was read at around 11:50 p.m., nearly six hours after the meeting started and following a 35-minute closed session. Earlier in the night, Higdon said the board would go into closed session to, among other reasons, provide a unified statement on the FRL matter.
“My first reaction is this is great news about the regional library system remaining,” FRL Director Tracy Fitzmaurice said the day after the meeting. “It made me happy on many levels for the people of our regional library system. This has been nerve-wracking for many people. It’s a great joy that we can move forward working with the commissioners. I’m so glad we will be able to sit at a table and work on that and move forward together. We all got our wish.”
Public participation
The fourth-floor courtroom was so packed at the onset of the meeting that Higdon asked those standing to step outside to meet the fire code of 135 people. It was estimated that 170 people showed up for the meeting. At the end of the night, around 30-40 people remained through the closed session to hear the board’s statement.
The meeting continued the recent trend of public comment being dominated by library speakers. Most who spoke were in favor of remaining with the FRL, wearing shirts and pins supporting the library, with some wearing pro-LGBTQIA materials.
For the first time since this current Board of Commissioners was elected in November 2022, the commissioners decided to enforce its public comment rules of five minutes per speaker and 45 minutes maximum allotted to public comment. After 10 speakers, the 45 minutes were up. At that point, at 7:50 p.m., Commissioner Josh Young asked to move the rest of the public comment to after new business.
“I don’t care if I’m here until midnight,” Young said. Otherwise, the remainder of public comment would have been resumed at the May 11 meeting. Commissioners agreed to continue the public comment period once regular business was completed.
The public comment resumed at 9:54 p.m., allowing 16 speakers to talk for another 75 minutes. The public comment period lasted a combined two hours.
There were 40 names on the list called out, all listed to speak about the library. Another five names, listed to speak for other reasons, decided to speak at another time or left before their names were called.
Sixteen speakers spoke in favor of Macon County remaining with the FRL, nine spoke about wanting to leave the FRL, one spoke neutrally and got applause from both sides of the crowd. Fourteen people had left by the time their name was called. Out of those 14 “no shows,” 13 were called during the 9:54-11:09 p.m. public comment period.
Some of the comments from both sides of the issue led to jeers and shouts from the audience. No one was asked to leave for their disruptions.
Local board encourages staying in FRLS
Between the public comment periods, Macon County Public Library Board of Trustees Chair Bill Dyar gave a presentation of the impacts of potentially leaving the Fontana Regional Library System.
“I never thought that I would spend so much time and effort in studying laws and statutes and regulations pertaining to pornography and obscenity as they apply to public libraries,” Dyar said.
Dyar said he’s come to a personal conclusion that neither option, staying with or leaving FRL, will resolve all the issues, and hopes the county can choose what is best. The commissioners received a one-page letter followed by a five-page report about what withdrawal from the FRL means, which Dyar read.
The letter stated that the effect of withdrawal is “financially staggering and unduly burdensome with absolutely no corresponding benefit” to citizens and library patrons.
Another issue would be the need for additional oversight. The letter stated the current county library board has never received any oversight directives from the commissioners but is receptive to feedback.
“In summary, the Macon County Public Library Board of Trustees expressed its strongest endorsement for our county libraries to remain in the Fontana Regional Library System,” Dyar said.
After the public comments, Commissioner John Shearl spoke about the library issue for the first time publicly.
“My deal with this library issue is that these books should be in age-appropriate places; these children should have library cards with their ages color-coded,” Shearl said, saying he’s been hammered with emails about this issue. “To have access by a 9, 10, 11-year-old child for these books is not what we should be doing as adults. If you want to remain with FRL, put these books where they should be….and make sure that child is not in that section of the library.”
Shearl also criticized the FRL for calling the police at the FRL’s March regional meeting in Highlands, saying they should not bar public comment.
Shearl and Commissioner Danny Antoine said there had been no conversations with other board members about leaving FRLS.
Going forward, Fitzmaurice said she is thankful that people have listened and given input. She added that all input will be considered going forward.
“Next year is the 80th anniversary of the Fontana Regional Library System,” Fitzmaurice said. “I hope it’ll be a great celebration.”
‘Gender Queer’ moved
One of the books in question at many of the meetings is “Gender Queer.” Macon County librarian Abby Hardison confirmed that book, and no others, was relocated to a different section of the library.
“The memoir ‘Gender Queer’ was transferred from the Young Adult to Adult Nonfiction Graphic Novel section several months ago,” Hardison said. “Library policy is that books are shelved in the sections that the publishers and authors intend them for, based on reading level and interest. The FRL director and I researched this title and learned that the author and publisher intended the story to be for adults and older teens, also the story centers primarily around the author’s early adulthood. We felt that moving it was appropriate and justified based on our research. No other books have been relocated here at MCPL in this manner since I’ve been here.”
Hardison started as the Macon County librarian in mid-January, following the retirement of long-time librarian Karen Wallace.
“Gender Queer” has been pointed out, specifically by Antoine in at February library board meeting (Antoine is a library board liaison), as an example of a book that he feels is pornographic due to its sexual imagery.
County Library Board meeting
The week before the commissioners gave their support to the FRLS, the Macon County Public Library Board of Trustees met in Nantahala.
Fitzmaurice said the meeting was well attended and lasted about 45 minutes.
During the meeting, Hardison read a letter from the attorney they hired “regarding the recent public requests to segregate and/or label materials as ‘LGBT’ and/or ‘sexually-explicit’ or restrict minor access to materials based on their content.”
The letter states that in holding with First Amendment rulings, regulations and procedures governing how library materials are acquired, removed, or presented for public access must be content-neutral, i.e., showing no bias regarding the content.
Examples of content-neutral practices are separating fiction from nonfiction books or separating books by age appropriateness, for example, teen books from children’s books. However, the letter advised, separating “general readership” books from “LGBTQ+” books is content-based. “Content-based separation is unconstitutional censorship. This is true whether it is accomplished by labels, segregating materials from the general collections, requiring patrons to request titles from a reserved area or more blatantly by removing books from the collection because of their content or refusing to acquire them for the library’s collection because of their content,” read the letter. The attorney advised such censorial activity could lead to lawsuits.
The library board’s new correspondence policy means that written comment, sent to macontrustees@fontanalib.com, is distributed at the meeting to the board members.
According to a records request, the MCPL board received 21 emails for its April 4 meeting by the March 31 deadline. Of those, 19 emails (from 18 different people) were in favor of staying with the FRLS and two wanted Macon County to leave FRLS.