Two Limestone County residents petitioned the Alabama Public Library Service Board of Trustees to withhold state funding from the Athens-Limestone Public Library last week over concerns about the current board members.

Elizabeth Stewart and Huntsville Bible College undergraduate professor Roy Mattson addressed the APLS Board Thursday, May 16, and requested that no state funding be distributed to what they described as an “illegitimate board.”

Stewart and Mattson previously addressed the Limestone County Commission in January about issues concerning the wave of library book challenges that swept through the state last year. The focus of the challenges largely focused on removing or relocating library books featuring depictions of LGBT characters which Mattson equated to providing children with a “loaded handgun.”

“What we’re doing here is leaving a loaded handgun around for kids to check out trash from the public library,” Mattson said in January. “We’re adults and we’re sitting around saying ‘Oh, we need to study this for six for months.’ Meanwhile our children are reading pornography and homosexual literature in the library.”

Limestone County Commission Chairman Collin Daly told The Courier on Friday, May 17, that he has met with Stewart and several other members of the far-right “parental rights” organization Moms For Liberty on several occasions and the commission passed a resolution in January to “support libraries and parental rights.”

Moms for Liberty has been labeled an “extremist” organization by the Souther Poverty Law Center for allegedly harassing community members, advancing anti-LGBTQ+ misinformation and fighting to scrub diverse and inclusive material from public spaces. 

Daly said the commission’s resolution included a request for the Athens-Limestone Library to adopt policies in line with recommendations made by Gov. Kay Ivey in October 2023 which included the following “minimum” actions to be taken:

– Make state aid for local libraries contingent on the adoption of sensible policies to facilitate greater parental supervision of their children. 

– Require all expenditures of public funds to the American Library Association be approved by the relevant governing authority in an open, public meeting.

– Reaffirm local libraries’ ability to respond to parental concerns about sexually explicit or other inappropriate materials.

“I know there’s a group out there, Moms for Liberty, that have spoken to us about it and we’ve had several meetings with them. The biggest thing was that they wanted something included in the bylaws about the books in the library and the governor’s recommendations,” Daly said.

He said to board approved those changes in their most recent meeting and commended the library staff and its director April Wise on their job performance.

“The library itself and April and them do a great job down there. We’re not worried about the healthiness of the library,” he said. “The board has don’t what has been asked of them. They’ve adopted the governor’s recommendations in the last meeting. There’s no books in the library that have an issue. The board has done has done what they needed to do to fix everything,” Daly said. 

The APLS approved similar statewide policy revisions last week along with the following amendment from board member and ALGOP Chair John Wahl:

– Approve written guidelines that ensure library sections designated for minors under the age of 18 remain free of material containing obscenity, sexually explicit or other material deemed inappropriate for children or youth. Age-appropriate materials regarding religion, history, biology, or human anatomy should not be construed to be against this rule.

– Approve written selection criteria for minors that prevents the purchase or otherwise acquiring of any material advertised for consumers under the age of 18 which contain obscenity, sexually explicit or other material deemed inappropriate for children or youth. Age-appropriate materials regarding religion, history, biology, or human anatomy should not be construed to be against this rule.

– Approve written guidelines that establish library cards for minors under the age of 18 must require parental approval before a minor’s card is permitted to checkout materials from the library’s adult sections.

Stewart and Mattson’s current concerns primarily focused on the current members of the Athens-Limestone Library Board which they said are in violation of the board’s most recently published policy. Before the policy was recently removed from the library’s website it showed that the board was to consist of three appointees from the city of Athens and two from the Limestone County Commission and members would be limited to two terms. 

Currently all five members have been appointed by the city and several have served far beyond the stated policy’s term limits.

“This is an illegitimate library board for all of these reasons,” Stewart said. “I’m asking that [the APLS] put a hold on state funding until a legitimate board can be placed. A lot of policy decisions are happening and they are being made by a board that is not legitimate.”

Athens city attorney Shane Black said the policy which has been removed was far outdated and provided an overview of the history of the board’s appointments. According to Black the County Commission were only involved in board appointments for a brief period from June to September 2001 when both bodies adopted resolutions to create the Public Library Authority of the City of Athens with all appointments to be made by the Athens City Council. 

In 2003, the city attempted to revert back to a jointly appointed library board but the commission opted not to act of those attempts. The city officially re-established the five-member municipal board in in 2009 and dissolved the Public Library Authority of the city of Athens in 2010. Black said each member serves four-year terms but the city has never imposed term-limits but rejected claims of the board’s autonomy. 

“The board’s members may serve as many or as few terms as the city council determines. The library board has no control over who is appointed to the board, and so it cannot set term limits for its members,” Black said in an email sent to The Courier.

Daly confirmed Black’s overview and acknowledged the board’s legitimacy. He said since January the commission has been working closely with the city to adopt policies which would provide the county with representation on the library board. 

“They did form a joint library board for a while and then the county went back and said hey y’all [the city] just handle all that and we’ll give money to it. It’s been kind of back and forth over the years but we’ve all got a good working relationship on it,” Daly said. 

Stewart said an Alabama House Representative had requested an opinion from Attorney General Steve Marshall to address her concerns but had received a response which said any requests would need to come from the city of Athens, Limestone County or the APLS. 

Wahl motioned to request an opinion through the APLS but chairman Ronald Snider said, due to the board’s advisory role, he didn’t feel it was it’s place to insert itself into local affairs. Instead, the board approved to advise both the city and county to request their own opinions from the AG’s office. 

“If there are questions from the public and everything has been done in accordance with the rules and the applicable laws then there’s no reason not to seek an attorney general’s opinion,” Wahl said when reached by phone Friday. “Hopefully that might help ease the minds of concerned citizens if there are people who have questions or do not understand some of the changes that have taken place.”

Daly said based on the county’s discussions with the city up to this point that he didn’t believe an AG’s opinion would be necessary. He said the process of revamping the library board has been mutually amicable but would take time.

“To do this we are going to have to restructure the board as a whole,” Daly said. “I know it’s been a lot of back and forth. The city and county have been working through this and talking about how to move forward. I think it’s all going to work out.”