The controversy over filtering internet access on public library computers has resurfaced in San Jose, California. Patron behavior at the Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Library, which houses more than 1.5 million items shared between SJPL and San Jose State University, seems to be at the center of the debate.
“If it’s an important policy matter it has to have this review process, and it’s an important policy matter,” SJPL Director Jane Light told American Libraries, acknowledging that she last explored filtering library computers in 1997 with city council members, who ultimately rejected the proposal.
The issue was rekindled there almost a year ago by an undercover report aired November 29, 2006, on ABC affiliate KGO-TV in San Jose. The footage purported to document instances of patrons viewing pornography at King Library computer terminals. In response, then–Mayor-elect Chuck Reed pledged to tackle the issue once he took office in January.
Ten months later, Reed is backing a city council member who recommended legislative action. “I don’t think we need to tolerate kids having access to pornography in the library,” Reed said in the October 21 San Jose Mercury News. “I understand it’s a free-speech issue, but there are limits on every constitutional right.”
Reed’s statement followed an October 18 memo from City Council member and retired police officer Pete Constant to the council’s Rules Committee, proposing that filtering be reconsidered. Hard on the heels of a recent council debate over smoking in public parks, Constant urged fellow council members to protect children from “second-hand porn” on library computer screens. Citing the 2003 Supreme Court decision upholding the Children’s Internet Protection Act, he went on to argue: “As we seek to close a multi-million-dollar structural budget deficit, it is our fiscal responsibility to ensure that the City of San Jose is competitive when seeking outside funding to ensure that we are providing our residents with access to the latest software and hardware. The city is not currently taking full advantage of the funding available” by not complying. Only libraries complying with CIPA may apply for e-rate discounts.
An attachment to the memo notes that it was written for Constant by the Alliance Defense Fund, a religious-rights advocacy group working with San Jose’s newly formed Values Advocacy Council, whose president is former city council member and retired police officer Larry Pegram.
The October 25 Mercury News reported that SJSU police have recorded 37 complaints about allegedly lewd acts at the King library—26 at computer workstations and two that may have involved the viewing of online child pornography. Of the incidents, 17 led to citations or arrests. SJPL officials are reviewing patron feedback forms to see how many complaints there have been about sexually explicit images on King Library screens.
Posted October 27, 2007.