Huntington Beach will move forward with a proposal to screen library books for material that's considered age inappropriate, obscene or pornographic after lengthy discussion of the motion at Tuesday night's meeting.
The meeting continued for six hours and extended into early Wednesday morning after public comments about the plan. In the end, the council directed the city manager to work with the city attorney to come up with book screening options.
The city attorney is expected to return with options in September regarding the agenda item introduced by Mayor Pro Tem Gracy Van Der Mark. By a 4-3 vote, the council opted to move forward with studying the proposal.
"It has been a longstanding problem in public education that children are being exposed to obscene, and age-inappropriate material by adults, many of whom are educators we have entrusted with our children," Van Der Mark wrote, in part, in a memo to her fellow council members. "Not too long ago, I learned that our City public libraries also provide similar obscene materials to our youth in the form of obscene and at times pornographic children's books (and other materials). Our City libraries should not be engaged in infecting our children with obscenity or pornography."
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The memo cited the Department of Justice's position that obscenity is not protected under 1st Amendment rights to free speech. Examples of what Van Der Mark's memo referred to as obscene and/or pornographic books available to children were included in a Powerpoint presentation included in the meeting agenda item.
Under the proposal, the city attorney would evaluate the library materials -- both hard copy and digital items -- screened under the First Amendment. The proposed policy would create new screening protocols for books and other materials acquired by the library.
Some speakers addressed the proposal during the public comment period at Tuesday's city council meeting, which ended at about 1:30 a.m.
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"God bless you, Gracey, for your courgeous position and proposal to protect our children from being sexualized," one woman said.
Another woman called the proposal unnecessary censorship.
"I urge you to vote no on this wholly unnecessary censorship initiative," she said. "Do the right thing here. Let freedom read."
A nonprofit that funds the Huntington Beach Library said such decisions shouldn't be up to the city.
"For over 50 years the FOTL has worked to support and promote the Huntington Beach Public Library system," Friends of the Huntington Beach Public Library's statement reads. "The FOTL rejects any attempts to ban books from our public libraries. We firmly believe that individuals have the right to decide what books they choose to read for themselves and their families and that no individual has a right to decide what you are allowed to read. We fully and unequivocally support our professional librarians to manage the collection of materials available in our public libraries, just as they have for more than 100 years."
