Category Archives: Advocacy

Advocacy

Corporate champions urge all Senators to support FY18 library funding

District Dispatch

Posted by: Adam Eisgrau to ALA’s District Dispatch

If you’re part of or connected to the library world in any way, you know that the President’s “skinny budget” released in mid-March proposed eliminating the Institute for Museum and Library Services (IMLS), the small and respected federal agency that administers bulk of federal library funding. It also “zeroed out” virtually all such appropriations anywhere in the federal government, including programs authorized by the Library Services and Technology Act (LSTA) and the Innovative Approaches to Literacy (IAL) program.

Happily, however, Congress just added $1 million to the IMLS FY 2017 budget in the omnibus spending act signed into law last week. Moreover, it specifically directs that $600,000 of that $1 million be used for LSTA-authorized purposes. It did so after one-third of the entire House of Representatives signed separate “Dear Appropriator” letters in support of slightly increased FY 2018 funding for LSTA ($186.6 million) and level funding for IAL ($27 million).  Two similar bipartisan letters are now circulating in the Senate, where both programs also historically have enjoyed the support of approximately one-third of all Senators. ALA’s Fight for Libraries! grassroots campaign for FY 2018 LSTA and IAL funding is aiming to increase that base of support to 51 Senators – a majority of all members of that chamber.

Continue reading Corporate champions urge all Senators to support FY18 library funding →

Advocacy, Communication

Update regarding “Former Librarian Faces Jail Time for Laugh at Sessions’s Confirmation”

This is an email from Julie Todaro, ALA President. (Jamie, mentioned below, is Jamie LaRue, director of the ALA’s Office for Intellectual Freedom)

Colleagues – I wanted to provide an update to leadership on ALA’s work on this. Below is a brief overview and links as well as content on Jamie’s lead and great work from him on this situation.

  • Desiree Fairooz did not reach out to ALA for support. Jamie saw the first NYT story and began to research the issue.
  • ALA media found out about the same time when they received a few communications from members who had worked with her. Her colleagues identified her as a librarian, and asked ALA if/how they might help. Her story is here.
  • Jamie reached out to Ms. Fairooz and alerted American Libraries as to what he/ALA OIF and FTRF was doing.
  • AL told ALA media/us they would be gathering information for a story.
  • I had asked ALA/OIF and media to find out hearing rules and Jamie confirmed – as one might imagine – Congressional hearings can set rules of behavior and – apparently set additional rules at their discretion.
  • It’s not clear – based on the variety of reports – what all of the charges are/what they mean and which behaviors are the real issues (links are to stories with charges) and one opinion is while the laughter probably wasn’t a crime, her conduct as she was led from the room was determined to be.
  • Jamie is the ALA lead on this and will work with FTRF board.
Advocacy, Programs, Services

Intellectual Freedom News 5/12/17

This is our issue! This is what we, as library people, do for our communities – and the need to protect the intellectual freedom of our communities is very strong right now.

We are passing on this newsletter; and the information on subscribing is at the end.

“Intellectual Freedom Highlights

  • Banned books and (nearly) murdered authors | OZY: “When the Nazis first started burning books, Sigmund Freud saw it as a positive thing — even though, as a Jewish author, his books were systematically thrown atop the pyre. The famed psychoanalyst knew, after all, that things could have been a lot worse. His reasoning? ‘Look, we’re becoming more civilized: We’re burning books, not people,’ says James LaRue, director of the American Library Association’s Office for Intellectual Freedom. But Freud would soon be disillusioned, when, shortly thereafter, ‘the Nazis started burning people too,’ LaRue adds.”
  • Censorship or Hate Crime? | Intellectual Freedom Blog; “Book burning, tearing pages, destroying books in disrespectful and obscene ways are all methods of censorship. If the books are representative of a specific group of people like the Qur’an is of Muslims, is the censorship also a hate crime?”
  • Apply for a Freedom to Read Foundation Grant for Banned Books Week events! Deadline today, May 12! 

Continue reading Intellectual Freedom News 5/12/17 →

Advocacy

Governor Vetoes Budget Bills

Passing on our latest news on library-related budget issues. (This is a good time to promote our Postcard Party in the Park this week!! Join us Thursday, and share your voice in postcard form!)

Governor Vetoes GOP Budget Bills:

As promised, Governor Dayton vetoed a slate of GOP budget bills last Friday, including the E-12 bill. The Governor’s veto letter on the E-12 bill notes the insufficiency of 1.5% annual increases on the general education formula. He’s calling for 2% annual increases. That may not sound like much, but the difference is nearly $100 million. The repeal of his signature voluntary pre-K program (VPK) program is another reason for his veto of the GOP E-12 bill. You can read the rest of his veto message to the legislature here:

http://mn.gov/gov-stat/pdf/2017_05_12_Letter_Ch_43_Veto.pdf

Once again all of the state’s budget business has piled up into the last week of the legislative session. Skeptics assume we’re heading toward a complete breakdown and a June special session. Others remain optimistic that with a $1.5 billion surplus they’ll be able to modestly satisfy GOP appetites for tax cuts and DFL spending requests.

Sam

Samuel P. Walseth

Capitol Hill Associates

525 Park Street, Suite 255

St. Paul, MN 55103

Advocacy, Communication, Services

Librarians in the 21st Century: It Is Becoming Impossible to Remain Neutral

Interior view of Stockholm Public Library
This article is from lithub.com. I highly suggest you click here to read the entire thing, after looking at the excerpt we posted below.

I will add that the author is one of my former students in library school, and she was absolutely great there! I was fortunate to have her in classes, and valued both her contributions to class and the time I was able to spend with her. So I’m not neutral at all on the value she brings to the library profession!

Stacie Williams on
How to Confront Microaggressions in the Library

“Library neutrality sounds innocuous, but it’s not, if you’re a librarian. Although neutrality has long been regarded and taught as an important ethic of the profession, a growing number of librarians have begun questioning whether it is preferable—or even possible—for libraries to be neutral. In this essay, Stacie Williams makes the case that it is neither.

–Stephanie Anderson

I love working the reference desk. Like most people, it was my first introduction to librarians as a little kid: the smiling person behind a desk, asking me if I needed help finding anything. In my last semester of graduate school, I took a job working the access services desk at a medical library, where I could meet new people and help them the way that I had been helped in libraries throughout my life. Even as I gained more experience in archives, I continued to look for opportunities to assist at a reference or access point of service.

Working in such a visible position, over the years, I have been constantly reminded that my interactions with patrons are a reflection of my body: my black, female-presenting body. In ways small and large, I have been reminded that nothing about libraries is neutral. Not the desks or furniture that are sometimes built by incarcerated individuals who can’t protest their labor. Not the buildings, some of which lack physical access for individuals who can’t climb stairs or walk over uneven stones and bricks. Not the collections development theories, not the leadership opportunities, not the vacation and break schedules, or the computer use policies. Not our co-workers, our funding models, and certainly not the patrons we serve. Neutrality as we use it in libraries leaves people standing at the margins, demanding to be acknowledged as capable and professional, as human, as having histories and lived experiences reflective of the bodies we inhabit. Our bodies, like the bodies of knowledge we provide access to, are not and never were neutral. Continue reading Librarians in the 21st Century: It Is Becoming Impossible to Remain Neutral →