The newly formed Platteville Library Board changed its policy last Thursday, including banning LGBTQ content aimed at minors, and other groups are taking notice.
Karin Wellhausen Tanks, a member of the Facebook group Faith, Family and Freedom Coalition, shared with the group an article from the far-right website 1819 News detailing the library's policy changes, exclaiming: . Obscene material available at local libraries in Alabama! ”
“Now that they have finished their work, other local boards can now follow suit and adopt the same or similar policies,” Tanks continued. “Let’s make this happen in Baldwin County!”
According to her author bio on Amazon.com, Tanks is a professor of education at the University of South Alabama. There, he teaches courses in youth literature, children's literature, elementary language arts, and early childhood education.
Stephanie Williams, a Baldwin County resident who runs a book challenge at the Foley Library, commented on the post and urged the conservative coalition (presumably in Baldwin County) to “adopt policies based on Hanna's writings that can be proposed to Baldwin. I told them to do it,” he added. The county library, its board if there is one, and the city council and mayor. ”
Williams refers to these policies as “Hannah's work,” likely a reference to Clean Up Alabama executive director and Prattville resident Hannah Reese. APR is not aware of Mr. Rees' involvement in formulating Prattville policy. Platteville Library Board Chairman Ray Boles told APR that the policy was developed by the Ordinance and Policy Committee, which included Rachel Daniels and Doug Dahl. Dar told APR that he was not involved in policy development, leaving it up to Daniels.
Laura Clark, who was hired by the board at the same meeting that changed the policy, acknowledged to APR that she was “involved” in drafting the policy, and Boles told APR that she was hired. pro bono We support policy planning. In a Facebook comment on an article about Clark's relationship with Clean Up Alabama and the Alabama Policy Institute, Angie Hayden, a Platteville resident and co-founder of Reed Freeley Alabama, said Clark ” “Did you write this policy along with Clean Up Alabama?”
“I'm sorry, but I can't tell you that,” Clark replied. “Attorney-client privilege”
Although Mr. Clark helped draft the policy, he was not an attorney representing the board at the time.
Williams suggested that she thought it would be helpful to “look at who's interested and then look at Hanna's work as the basis for a model for BC.”
She also warned that the page was being “vandalized by crowds, including left-wing blogs like APL, who seek to expose children to sexually explicit and inappropriate content.”
The Reed Freeley Alabama newspaper said in a statement that Williams said Mamas for Liberty, which is part of Baldwin County, “has been working with our partner Clean Up & Co. to impose strict policies aimed at censoring public libraries. “It's not surprising that we're trying to implement Alabama's blueprint.”
“Moms for Liberty, in particular, calls this blueprint 'Hannah's Plan,' after Hannah Mann Reese, executive director and founder of the anti-library radical Clean Up Alabama.” the group said in a statement. “From the beginning, Clean Up Alabama and Mamas for Liberty have used the Autauga-Platteville public domain to impose their fundamentalist religious and political views on all Alabamians and to persecute those with whom they disagree. It was clear that they were working in concert to destroy the library.”
The group also warned that the end result of Senate Bill 10 passing in the Alabama Senate would be to pile more library boards on top of each other to enact similar policies.
“I hope the House considers Stephanie Williams' comments and considers whether they want their town to be like Platteville,” Reed Freeley said. “Threats of lawsuits, negative media attention, taxpayer rights trampled?
“Unfortunately, the Autauga-Platteville Public Library Board, solidified by supporters of Clean Up Alabama, is now in disarray due to their policies. Is Autauga-Platteville a model? Instead, it will be seen as a warning of what can happen if local governments succumb to these extremist groups.”
