A bill that would restructure the Enoch Pratt Free Library board of trustees was introduced February 15 by Maryland Sen. Ralph D. Hughes (D-Baltimore City). Senate Bill 840 calls for a three-term limit of five years each, representation among the six councilmanic districts, and residence in the city of Baltimore. “Basically, people on the board serve life terms,” Hughes said in the February 25 Baltimore Sun.
Hughes admitted that he drafted the bill at the request of the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now (ACORN), a community activist group that brought a lawsuit against the city in August 2001 contesting the legality of the library’s closing of five branches. A hearing on the lawsuit is scheduled for March 15.
The group’s attorney, David Goldstein, said the suit contends the Pratt board did not have the authority to close the branches because it was not representative of the city it served. “We shouldn’t have county people running city libraries,” ACORN member Willie E. Ray told the Sun.
Pratt attorney Marta D. Harting said that the trustees changed their bylaws last fall to require city residency and that after the lawsuit was filed, all trustees living outside the city voluntarily resigned.
Posted March 4, 2002.