Carroll County Branch Separates
Children’s Nonfiction Again
The Carroll County (Md.) Public Library trustees voted October 25 to end an experiment of interfiling children’s and adult nonfiction after nearly a dozen people, including County Commissioner Robin Bartlett Frazier, criticized the system.
One parent said that when she brought her 10-year-old daughter to the North Carroll branch in June, they found books containing sex, nudity, violence, and crime when they were looking for a book on hamsters. “We were incredulous that this was being done; it was just so inappropriate,” she said in the October 26 Baltimore Sun.
Branch manager Lisa Hughes said she merged the 31,581 adult and children’s nonfiction books in June to make more room for fiction in the children’s section and to help patrons by consolidating subjects.
After hearing patrons’ complaints, the board decided not to wait until January, when it had planned to review the system. “Everybody has been working very hard because of your concerns,” board member Peggy Jones told patrons. “We have listened.”
Posted October 30, 2000.
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