Public libraries have been a hot topic in recent years, making headlines over battles of book censorship and budget cuts. They were even the main topic of the May 5 episode of “Last Week Tonight,” when host John Oliver asserted that “libraries are in trouble as they have become another front in the ongoing culture war.” In 2023 alone, 4,240 unique book titles were targeted for censorship in schools and libraries, according to the American Library Association.
Washington is no stranger to this issue, having faced its own dispute over the books on one library’s shelves.
Columbia County’s only library, the Columbia County Rural Library District, was in jeopardy in 2023, when a group of locals from across the region attempted to dissolve the library by putting a measure on the local general election ballot.
Ellen Brigham, director of library services for the district, says staff started noticing people expressing disapproval with the library’s book selection in late 2022. Comments called out books with LGBTQ+ themes being placed in the young adult section.
Brigham said people started submitting requests for the library to reconsider including some books in its catalog. After efforts toward removing these materials proved unsuccessful, the people upset with the library’s selections decided to take further action by attempting to close down the Columbia County Library.
“And what ended up happening was a little bit strange,” Brigham said. “It turned out that in the then-current Washington law, somehow there was a loophole that made it so that city residents wouldn’t be able to vote on county library district matters even though they paid taxes.”
That loophole comes from a provision in a Washington statute, RCW 27.12.320, which required only 10% of voters from the rural areas to vote yes to achieve the dissolution of a library.
In an effort to block the loophole from being utilized, Neighbors United for Progress, a local political action committee, filed a lawsuit against the action. Columbia County Superior Court Commissioner Julie Karl temporarily blocked the ballot measure, stating that she believed there was a case for fraud, citing disinformation used in the petition. The ballot measure was permanently struck down by a Columbia County court on Sept. 20, 2023.
The Columbia County Library was saved from closing over book battles after a swift vote by the Washington Legislature rewrote the original law. Senate Bill (SB) 5824 amended RCW 27.12.320 to require 25% of voters from a library district to vote to dissolve a library. SB 5824 passed 44-5 the second time through the Senate in March 2024. On March 26, Gov. Inslee signed the bill into law; it will go into effect on June 6.
The attempt to dissolve Columbia County’s library marks a rising trend of similar policies. Legislators in 28 states proposed a total of 105 bills this year that could harm libraries or limit the books and services they provide, according to the American Library Association.
Tom Fay, the executive director and chief librarian of The Seattle Public Library (SPL), expressed how alarming it was that a small group of individuals was looking to vote on the dissolution of a library, a decision that he says would have impacted a vast community.
“The reason we stand so firmly on intellectual freedom is that, even though you may not believe it is something that you want to read or your children should read, that doesn’t mean another person doesn’t think it’s critically important for either their own personal growth or that of their children,” Fay said.
In an effort to protect itself from similar threats to what the Columbia County Library faced, Fay says SPL joined Brooklyn Public Library’s Books Unbanned, an initiative designed to tackle book censorship efforts across the country by providing teens with virtual resources.
“One of the ways that libraries can really work to … at least minimize the impact of censorship and book banning is [coming] together. We have to say ‘OK, let’s just make all the information available, no matter where you are at,’” Fay said. “So that program has seen people from every state, every territory within the United States, participating and checking out materials.”
Fay considers libraries to be one of the last no-barrier, free physical spaces where people can “just be.”
“That third space, it’s huge. A lot of times folks will say that for our unhoused folks, and sure, that is a big piece of it. But so many people, kids come in who may not have another option between school and home,” Fay said. “And life on the street is not necessarily a good one either. Things can happen out there, gang activity, all those things, [so it’s] much better to be in the library and have that third space that you can be in and get help.”
Casey Logan, a second-year statistics major at the University of Washington, has used the library as a third space for as long as she can remember. Logan shared how her mom found reading important and got her and her brother library cards early on in their childhood. Logan likes libraries because they access to a variety of books and novels.
“It’s a really important way just to provide materials to anybody,” Logan said. “The library is not restricted at all. Anybody can go, anybody can read the books and anybody can check out the books or even their other materials like their computers or their research resources. It’s a space for everybody and I feel like there’s not really a lot of those [that] literally anybody can access, but the library is, and I think that’s really cool [that] there’s no barriers for entry.”
When Bibiane Choi, a regular user of SPL resources, moved to Seattle from New York seven years ago, she brought along her love of libraries. Growing up, she was encouraged by her Korean immigrant parents to read as much as possible. Choi now has a family of her own and uses SPL to foster that passion of reading in her own kids.
“My daughter and I still go regularly to the library,” Choi said. “She’s an emerging reader so that’s really exciting … to find her the books that make her excited about reading and help build her confidence.”
While SPL’s libraries are vital resources and beloved by many like Logan and Choi, they are facing their own challenges.
On April 11, the SPL announced it will be closing 22 of its 27 locations at least one day per week through June 4, citing staffing shortages, budget constraints and Mayor Bruce Harrell’s hiring freeze.
Real Change reached out to an SPL librarian, but they could not provide comment by the time of publication.
Fay explained that in an effort to budget and maintain access, the library was forced to adjust the hours of multiple locations.
“Any time you have these types of situations, it’s going to impact access,” Fay said. “We know that it’s the last thing the library wants to do. But we also know that, as we look at preparing ourselves to create a budget, which we have to do over the next few months, we need to make sure that we’re being good stewards, and sometimes that means pausing [and] slowing things down to make sure that we’re going to be in the best position.”
Holland Burris is a UW student working in the UW NewsLab.
Read more of the May 15–21, 2024 issue.