The grassroots organization Nampa (Idaho) Citizens for Parental Rights has submitted to the city council a petition with almost 400 signatures asking that the city library drop its American Library Association membership and instead join the socially conservative group Family Friendly Libraries. Group leader Allen March condemned ALA’s open-access guidelines as a “diseased philosophy.”
At one point during the October 1 city-council meeting, Mayor Maxine Horn stopped Marsh from using explicit sexual references in describing library materials. “You don’t want to hear this although you allow it in your library,” Marsh retorted, according to the October 2 Nampa Idaho Press-Tribune. Council member Lynda Clark questioned the integrity of Marsh’s claims, saying that ALA “is not some liberal, left-wing, radical group.” Nonetheless, Horn directed trustees to consider the issue so it “doesn’t come back every five or six months.”
Founded in 1995 by self-styled family-values activist Karen Jo Gounaud, Family Friendly Libraries advocates shielding children from library materials dealing with subjects such as sexuality, divorce, and death.
Posted October 8, 2001.