Following accusations by conservative political writer Stanley Kurtz that the University of Illinois at Chicago blocked his access to documents that might portray presumptive Democratic presidential nominee Barack Obama in an unpatriotic light, the university issued a statement August 22 that the material will be “available for public inspection” August 26.

Charging that UIC’s Richard J. Daley Library prevented him from examining materials that might connect Obama’s political agenda with those of radical activist William Ayers, Kurtz had demanded that UIC “take immediate public steps to insure the safety of the Chicago Annenberg Challenge records, to release the identity of the collection’s donor, and above all to swiftly make the collection available to me, and to the public at large.”

The UIC statement says that “authority to grant public access to the archives was recently called into question” but that “university officials promptly initiated a thorough inquiry into the legal circumstances of the gift and its custody of the documents. Pending resolution of this challenge, access to the archives in their secure location was temporarily suspended.” It goes on to say that the university has “determined that the terms of the gift have been fulfilled and that it has the legal authority to allow public access to its archive of Chicago Annenberg Challenge documents in accordance with the customary procedures of the Special Collections Department of the UIC library.”

Established largely through the efforts of Ayers, the Chicago Annenberg Challenge was a nonprofit public-private partnership founded in 1995 to improve school performance. Now a professor of education at UIC, Ayers is also an unapologetic former member of the Weather Underground, a leftist organization that organized a riot in Chicago in 1969 and bombed buildings in the 1970s. Obama served as the CAC board’s first chair; he remained on the board until the project ended in 2001 but has denied any ties with Ayers’s radical past.

Kurtz claimed in the August 18 National Review Online that he was “assured by a reference librarian that, although I have no UIC affiliation, I would be permitted to examine the records.” But after making an appointment and arranging a trip to Chicago, he “received an e-mail from the special-collections librarian informing me that she had ‘checked our collection file’ and determined that ‘access to the collection is closed.’” Once in Chicago, Kurtz said, he was greeted with a message from Ann C. Weller, professor and head of special collections, indicating that no one currently has access to the collection because “it has come to our attention that there is restricted material in the collection. Once the collection has been processed it will be open to any patron interested in viewing it.”

The Chicago Tribune reported August 21 that Chicago Mayor Richard M. Daley was asked at an August 20 press conference if he supported access to the CAC collection in the library, which bears the name of his late father, mayor of Chicago from 1955 to 1976. Daley urged instead that people should stop trying to align Obama with radical activities that took place during “a terrible time [for] our country.”

Although UIC is a publicly supported institution, the Daley Library is not a public library per se. UIC rules governing the use of special collection materials require “permission from the copyright owner before making any public disclosure of the contents.” The acquisition of materials does not automatically give the library the legal right to open the materials to the public or to reveal the identity of the donor or other confidential information that might be embedded in the documents.

The campaign of presumptive Republican presidential candidate John McCain issued a statement urging Obama to call for the release of the documents. The Associated Press reported August 21 that the Obama campaign said the senator has no control over the UIC documents, but “we are pleased the university is pursuing an agreement that would make these records publicly available.”

Posted on August 22, 2008. Discuss.

When Sheldon Jackson College in Sitka, Alaska, shut down its operations last year, among the many logistical questions was what to do with the 48,000 items held by its Stratton Library. The oldest institution of higher education in the state, the 130-year-old school abruptly dismissed its 100 faculty and staff on June 29, 2007, following years of financial troubles.

Ginny Norris Blackson had been library director for less than a year when the closing was announced. Agreeing to serve as a paid consultant to deal with protection of the collection, Blackson’s immediate concern was the fragile collection of 923 plate-glass negatives by turn-of-the-20th-century photographer E. W. Merrill, which she arranged to be loaned to the National Park Service.

Blackson then turned her attention to the print materials, particularly the collection of some 1,000 rare and first edition books about Alaska from the personal library of customs official C. L. Andrews. Although she told American Libraries that summertime temperatures in the region can drop into the 40s, she wasn’t able to negotiate the restoration of heat to the building until October. By this time, the college had voided her consultant agreement, but she was allowed to continue on a volunteer basis.

Blackson and a group of around 20 librarians, museum workers, and other concerned individuals began moving the most valuable materials to a second-floor conference room that was far away from water pipes that could freeze and break. Libraries and archives across the state donated 300 Hollinger boxes, acid-free backing paper, and other archival supplies, and a dehumidifier was installed in the room in late October.

About 5,000 items are currently being stored in the conference room, including all the historical collections and the college’s archives, as well as paintings formerly housed in other campus buildings. However, Blackson said, there’s no room to add additional materials, noting, “We can’t fit anything else in and still allow air to circulate.”

About once a month the group met to sort through the library’s materials, a task complicated by a lack of access to the catalog following removal of the campus servers. Blackson said the most valuable tool was a typewritten catalog of the historical collections that had been prepared for James Michener when he was researching his 1988 novel Alaska at the library. However, the monthly sessions ended when the college hired a new firm to manage the campus in July.

Blackson said she was able to return to the library for the first time in several months on August 19, and “the only thing I can say is, it’s just awful.” The ceiling is leaking where the historical collections had been previously located, she said, adding that the humidity in the building is “unbelievable” and “the whole place smells musty.”

The college’s board of trustees has appointed a nine-member library advisory group comprised of librarians and community members, which has recommended that the Andrews collection be given to the Sitka’s Kettleson Memorial Library. However, Blackson said the trustees, who hope to reopen the school, are reluctant to relinquish any of the holdings, feeling that “the Stratton Library is the last jewel in our crown.”

At the August 12 trustees meeting, the local consortium, the Sitka Library Network, proposed that it be allowed to develop a plan for long-term dispersal of the collection. The first step would be to apply for grants to inventory the holdings; local libraries could then request items that are not in their collections. If the college were to reopen, the materials would be returned. The trustees approved the proposal in principle, but stopped short of putting it into effect by removing the word “implement,” Blackson said.

Blackson, who is now working as librarian at Sitka High School, fears that time is of the essence: “I don’t feel that anything that is unique or of historical significance should remain in the building much longer.” She observed that the college is at least $7 million in debt, with no revenue stream other than rental on a few of the buildings, and it cost more than $27,000 to heat the building in FY2006; since then, she noted, fuel costs have doubled.

Posted on August 22, 2008. Discuss.

Officials now say two shuttered Hartford (Conn.) Public Library branches will not be reopened August 25 as planned, due to a continuing squabble between the city council and Mayor Eddie A. Perez.

After the council voted unanimously August 11 to restore $200,000 to the library’s budget, the library board announced that the Mark Twain and Blue Hills branches, closed July 3 to address an $870,000 budget shortfall for FY2009, would reopen on the first day of school. However, the Hartford Courant reported August 21, Perez sent council President Calixto Torres a letter August 20 stating that the body did not follow proper procedure when it allocated the funds without indicating where they would come from. Perez claimed that because the action violated the city’s charter, he needed to take no action on it.

“They can say whatever they want to say, but we’re not opening,” said board President Geraldine Sullivan. “We cannot operate in a deficit.”

“We were planning a celebration for Monday,” said Susan Hood of the Laurel Corner Neighborhood Association. “What a slap at the citizens of this city. This is political posturing on [Perez’s] part and the result is punishing neighborhoods and punishing children.”

Majority Leader Jo Winch said that the council could resolve the matter by identifying where the money could come from, which could happen when Torres returned from vacation August 24. “I hope they’re still going to open on Monday,” she told the Courant. “I’m going to call a couple of the board members to ensure that the council is still keeping their word and that we just need to find the funds and let the administration know where those funds would come from.”

Posted on August 22, 2008. Discuss.

It’s been a difficult summer for the officials of Hartford (Conn.) Public Library, where trustees eased an $870,000 budget shortfall for FY2009 by closing the Mark Twain and Blue Hills Avenue branches July 3 and laying off of 40 staff members. Six weeks later, the library board announced that the branches would reopen August 25 to coincide with the first day of school. In between the two actions, neighborhood activists sought—and subsequently withdrew—a court injunction ordering the branches’ reopening, and Hartford Mayor Eddie Perez signaled his displeasure by threatening to take over management of the nine-branch system altogether.

“Hartford residents have spoken loud and clear about how important libraries are to them,” HPL board President Geraldine Sullivan said in a statement August 12, the day after the city council voted unanimously to restore $200,000 to the library’s budget. “We are fortunate to have families who understand the important role libraries play in the enrichment and education of their children.”

Because the closings and layoffs had been projected to save $530,000 in FY2009, trustees had to decide how best to stretch the restored $200,000. The result was the shortening of service hours systemwide “and a focus on the after-school youth services,” according to the statement. Six branches, including the Mark Twain and Blue Hills facilities, are now open weekday afternoons only; the other three retained full-service hours Monday–Friday, and the Main Library became the only city library open on Saturdays. Sullivan concluded by saying, “The board looks forward to working with the city council and Mayor Perez to explore long-term solutions for stable library funding.”

That dialogue promises to be tense, since less than a month earlier Mayor Perez and city council President Calixto Torres had threatened to seize control of managing the library because the board refused to dip into HPL’s $14-million endowment. Torres fretted in the July 17 Hartford Courant, “We have no control, but the community thinks it’s the council, somehow, that is closing these libraries down.” Mayor Perez, in turn, blasted the board for declining to hold an emergency public hearing so residents could “air their views on the closing of two popular branches.” After the board declined, Perez said he was disappointed that trustees would not “take the city up on its suggestions and offers of staff assistance and guidance.”

The trustees’ decision-making was also challenged by constituents of the two shuttered libraries. Attorney Jeffrey Dressler went to court the day the branches closed with a petition charging that the closings would cause “irreparable damage to the children of the neighborhoods and the community at large.” He withdrew the court action July 21 after the HPL attorney refused to speak with community activists while the suit was pending.

Commenting on the August 11 city council/library board compromise mayoral spokesperson Sarah Barr said in the August 13 Courant, “We haven’t had a chance to review what the council passed, but absent of additional tax increases and layoffs, the city is not in a position to provide additional money.”

The fiscal turmoil came only a month after an unrelated community outcry triggered by a May 18 Courant article alleging that main-library patrons were engaging in substance abuse and sexual activity inside the building. A task force organized to review HPL’s patron behavior and internet use policies is slated to reveal its findings in September.

Posted on August 15, 2008. Discuss.

The board of the Boston Public Library offered the job of president to Hennepin County (Minn.) Library Director Amy E. Ryan August 14 after interviewing four finalists selected from a pool of more than 160. Trustees cited her extensive knowledge of big-city library systems, management style, understanding of technology, and commitment to community libraries. Ryan will succeed outgoing President Bernard Margolis, who was ousted by the board November 13, 2007, in the wake of repeated clashes with Mayor Thomas M. Menino.

“Strong leadership of our historic library system is crucial in creating a continuum of learning in our city,” Menino said in an August 15 BPL press release. “I trust Amy Ryan will bring the skills necessary to make our libraries work for everyone.”

Ryan, who has served as Hennepin director since 2005 and worked at various positions in the Minneapolis Public Library for 28 years before that, was chosen unanimously over others in the shortlist of candidates—California State Librarian Susan Hildreth, former Greenwich (Conn.) Public Library Director Mario Gonzalez, and attorney and former Massachusetts Senate President Thomas F. Birmingham.

The BPL position is “too compelling an opportunity not to explore,” Ryan said in the August 15 Boston Globe. She added that both her parents were from Boston and a daughter attends college in the area.

Ryan was integral to the January 2 merger of the Hennepin and Minneapolis library systems. “I hate to lose her, but she needs to do what she needs to do,” Hennepin County Commissioner Mark Stenglein told the Minneapolis Star-Tribune. “I think it’s a compliment to the Hennepin County system that they’re interested.”

Posted on August 15, 2008. Discuss.

A British man arrested over the theft of a First Folio edition of Shakespeare insists he is innocent. Raymond Scott, 51, walked into Folger Shakespeare Library in Washington, D.C., June 16 seeking authentication for a 17th-century book that experts now say was stolen from Durham University Library in England in December 1998. But Scott claims the item he lent to the Folger was a different copy of the First Folio that he came across in Havana, Cuba, through a friend of his 21-year-old fiancée Heidy Garcia Rios, the London Daily Mail reported July 18.

Scott’s story is that Odeiny Perez, a former bodyguard for Castro, asked him to take the book to the United States to have it authenticated—something Perez cannot do as a Cuban national. Perez told him it had been in his family since 1877. When Scott took it to the Folger, Librarian Richard J. Kuhta said he’d like to have an independent expert, Stephen Massey, fly in from New York to examine it, so Scott left the folio in D.C. and returned home to Washington, a town in northeast England.

On July 8, Massey informed Scott that he suspected the book was the Durham University First Folio—one of many rare books stolen in a multimillion-dollar theft—because it had “exactly the same dimensions.” Two days later, FBI agents working with the Durham police arrested Scott, raided his home, confiscated hundreds of books, questioned him, then released him on bail. He faces arraignment in November, after police have had time to look at all the evidence. Scott lives only 12 miles from the university but claims never to have visited there, according to the July 17 Washington Post.

In a July 17 Slate article, Portland (Oreg.) State University Shakespeare expert Paul Collins wrote that the Durham folio had a number of identifying characteristics that should allow a precise identification—a patched hole in the colophon, a broken clasp, and a specific annotation on Troilus and Cressida. But the Washington Post reported July 12 that Scott’s folio was flimsy, with no binding and a few of the opening pages removed.

Meanwhile, Scott has proclaimed his innocence in the British newspapers and recommended in the July 19 Darlington Northern Echo that Durham University sell off all its rare books to raise “billions of pounds” that could benefit the school and the rest of County Durham. The police would not comment on the case while it was still under investigation.

Posted on August 14, 2008. Discuss.

Canada is playing host to the 74th World Library and Information Congress of the International Federation of Library Associations and Institutions (IFLA), which convened August 10 in Québec. The annual IFLA conference is the largest and most diverse international gathering of library and information science professionals in the world. The five-day conference offers more than 3,280 delegates from 150 nations an opportunity to meet colleagues from around the globe, to hone their skills at 224 sessions, and to enjoy the cultural offerings of the host city. IFLA also serves as a backdrop for the announcement of the annual $1-million Access to Learning Award by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. The major conference programs are conducted in seven languages, with live simultaneous interpretation.

Kicking off an elaborate opening session, Canadian Governor General Michaëlle Jean welcomed the delegates to the 400th anniversary celebration of the founding of Quebec City. Delivered in French, her speech was a heartfelt paean to libraries as an antidote to the “forces of destruction and opponents of liberty” that threaten civilization. “Libraries, big or small, virtual or traditional, have a unique role,” she said, “through the diversity of their services and collections.” Her speech echoed the conference theme, “Libraries Without Borders: Navigating Towards Global Understanding.”

Preceded by a performance by First Nations dancers, the governor general’s speech and words of welcome from organizing committee chair Claude Bonnelly and representatives of Quebec government were interspersed with dancing, poetry, and a pair of Inuit throat singers, leading to a keynote speech by author Dany Laferrière. IFLA President Claudia Lux of Germany delivered her presidential address, calling the conference “a great opportunity for more professional exchange.” Said Lux, “Our network within IFLA and the network of library associations in the individual countries are the guarantee for the further development of information services through libraries, to improve the lives of people throughout the world.”

Amid great pomp and circumstance, Ismael Serageldin received an honorary doctorate from Laval University for his leadership as director of the Bibliotheca Alexandrina in Egypt. Robed faculty members from Laval University filed onto the stage to present the honor. Known to many as “the most intelligent man in Egypt,” Serageldin serves in an advisory capacity to a number of academic, research, and scientific organizations internationally and has been the recipient of 21 other honorary degrees.

The 2008 winner of the Access to Learning Award is the Vasconcelos Program in Mexico’s Veracruz state. The $1-million award honors the organization’s innovative efforts to connect the public to information and knowledge through free access to computers, the internet, and training. William H. Gates Sr. was in Quebec to present the award, and he talked about his son Bill Gates’s philanthropic objectives and dedication to libraries, while praising the strong support the Vasconcelos Program receives from the government of Veracruz.

OCLC CEO Jay Jordan announced the Jay Jordan IFLA/OCLC Fellows for 2009—six library and information professionals from Armenia, Kenya, Pakistan, Serbia, Uganda, and Zambia. OCLC recently renamed the award in Jordan’s honor because of his commitment to its continuance. Australian librarian Ros Dorsman picked up first place in the IFLA International Marketing Award, sponsored by Emerald Group Publishing. Dorsman won for a classroom partnership involving homework help for students in the Central West Libraries service area in New South Wales. The Shawky Salem Conference Attendance Grant for 2008 was awarded to Mahmoud Khalifa, a cataloger at the Library of Congress Cairo Office in Egypt.

Plenary session speakers included French-born artist, sociologist, and philosopher Hervé Fischer; Herman Pabbruwe, CEO of Brill Publishing in the Netherlands; and James Bartleman, Canadian diplomat and member of the Chippewas of Mnjikaning First Nation. Fischer began by showing photographs of new national libraries around the world and praising government investment in both digitization and monumental buildings. While defending the eternal value of books, Fischer also decried the notion that private companies such as Google somehow represent an evil threat to libraries. He admitted, however, that “I prefer the dust of library shelves to digital dust.” Pabbruwe talked about his 325-year-old company’s work in preserving the record of the world’s languages, many of which, particularly those of small indigenous populations, are threatened with extinction by the globalization of media.

Loriene Roy, immediate past president of the American Library Association, keynoted a session called “Indigenous Knowledge: Language, Culture, and Information Technology.” Along with another past president of ALA, Barbara Ford, and Veronda Pitchford of the Urban Libraries Council, Lesley Farmer of California State University at Long Beach, Michele M. Reid of North Dakota State University in Fargo, Lori Driscoll of the University of Florida in Gainesville, and delegates from the U.K. and Canada, she participated in a discussion group on “Women, Information, and Libraries,” with a focus on “empowering women professionals to lead in the information society.”

At an August 11 press conference, IFLA Headquarters Secretary-General Peter Lor explained the circumstances surrounding what became the major downside of the conference—the refusal of Canada to grant visas to 27 delegates, 13 of whom were ultimately turned away despite the federation’s attempts to intervene. Among those denied entry was Fariborz Khosrav, deputy director of the National Library of Iran. Five Colombians, two delegates each from Egypt and Nepal, and one each from Nigeria, Pakistan, and South Africa were also turned away. The August 9 Toronto Star reported that Citizenship and Immigration Canada spokesperson Danielle Norris said that with more than 3,200 participants, only 13 outright rejections means “they did very well.” Claudia Lux said the government had “expressed regret.”

Lux also introduced Jennefer Nicholson, who will replace Lor as IFLA secretary-general in September. The former executive director of the Australian Library and Information Association said she was looking forward to leveraging the “intellectual capital” of IFLA’s membership. “IFLA is what it is and who it is because of its members and partners,” she said. The conference also marked the release of Reaching Out: Innovations in Canadian Libraries, from Library and Archives Canada and the Bibliothèque et Archives Nationales du Québec.

Posted on August 13, 2008. Discuss.

A computer and internet training program designed to help some of Mexico’s poorest people gain educational and economic opportunities has been awarded the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation’s 2008 Access to Learning Award, presented August 13 at the International Federation of Library Associations and Institution’s world congress in Québec, Canada. The award of $1 million went to the Vasconcelos Program in Mexico’s Veracruz state “for its innovative efforts to connect people to information and knowledge through free access to computers, the internet, and training,” according to a Gates Foundation statement.

The organization is being rewarded for bringing library services to rural, indigenous communities using all-terrain vehicles equipped with technology classrooms. Microsoft, will also contribute to the Vasconcelos Program by providing software and technology training curriculum through its applicable programs.

“Veracruz is a rural state. Its towns and villages are poor and remote. There isn’t enough electricity or equipment or money or staff to make sure that every one of them can maintain a good library with computers and internet access,” said William H. Gates Sr., cochair of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, who was in Québec to announce the winner. “So the Vasconcelos Program delivers all the resources people need via bus, with top-of-the-line equipment and a skilled, dedicated staff. When Vasconcelos visits a community, it opens up new worlds of opportunity.”

Created and managed by the Veracruz secretary of public education, Vasconcelos targets communities where state and federal authorities have provided computers in public spaces such as schools and community centers but the equipment remains underused because residents lack basic computer skills. A bus and training team spends up to two weeks in each village providing computer literacy and other training to people of all ages. Prior to each visit, Vasconcelos works with local leaders to make sure the training meets each community’s needs and identifies support so the centers can continue these services. Since 2005, Vasconcelos’s fleet of 24 all-terrain vehicles—each equipped with computers, satellite internet connections, and a team of experienced trainers—has supported more than 120,000 people in more than 200 communities.

“Let me give you a few examples of how Vasconcelos has changed people’s lives, in large and small ways,” Gates explained. “First, the large: Coffee is key to the economy of Veracruz, and Vasconcelos is helping to grow that industry. Thousands of coffee farmers have worked with Vasconcelos’ staffers to build up their businesses. They learn how to look up coffee prices so they can make more strategic marketing decisions. They get loans to expand their operations. And they participate in government-sponsored fertilizer programs that help increase their yields.”

Gates went on to say that “there are countless small examples. One craftsman, a candle maker, produced a brochure to help him sell his products—with Vasconcelos’ help. Two things have happened as a result. He is earning more money, and more people in more places are being exposed to the beautiful, traditional art he makes.” Vasconcelos devises a curriculum and outreach activities tailored to the needs of each community. A typical curriculum combines technology literacy training and community-specific activities, such as health education, cultural preservation, and indigenous art and dance projects.

“When people understand the world of opportunity they can find through computers and the Internet, they are inspired to learn 21st-century technology skills,” said Victor Arredondo, Veracruz’s secretary of public education and founder of the Vasconcelos Program, in Quebec City to accept the award. “Many of the communities we visit are initially hesitant to embrace information technology, but we remove this barrier by tailoring our programs to meet local economic, health, and educational needs, and ensuring our approach aligns with the indigenous cultures in which we work.”

Deborah Jacobs, the foundation’s newly appointed deputy director for global libraries and former Seattle Public Library director, hosted the award presentation. The Access to Learning Award, now in its ninth year, recognizes the innovative efforts of libraries and similar organizations outside the United States in providing free access to computers and the internet. It is awarded by Global Libraries, a special initiative of the Gates Foundation’s Global Development Program, which works to create opportunities for people to lift themselves out of poverty and hunger. More information about the award can be found at on the foundation’s website.

Posted on August 13, 2008. Discuss.

On August 9, the town of Tualatin, Oregon, celebrated the dedication of its new $9.1-million city library. Four years in the making, Tualatin Public Library was built thanks to a combination of capital-improvement bonds approved in 2004 and revenue earmarked for increased library expenses from property development in the city, which is situated in Washington County. “We wanted to have people walk in and say ‘Wow,’ and that’s what we’re hearing,” Library Manager Darrel Condra said in the July 17 Portland Tigard Times, a week after the facility's soft opening to the public.

Tualatin’s success story stands in stark contrast to the fiscal struggles of public libraries in four other Oregon counties, which continue to seek solid financial footing after having their fear realized: the loss of as much as $6 million of some $238 million in federal funds that the state won’t be receiving after all. The shortfall for libraries in Clackamas, Douglas, Jackson, and Josephine counties resulted from Congress rejecting in June a multiyear renewal of timber payments that had been a fiscal lifeline ever since logging regulations implemented in the 1990s all but eliminated logging revenues on federal lands that were shared with the counties.

Oregon State Librarian Jim Scheppke told American Libraries that “the large majority of Oregon’s 132 public libraries” are not impacted by the subsidy loss, and many have established library districts with their own taxing authority over the past 20 years. Officials in these communities “looked into the future and saw that libraries could not rely on federal county payments for the long term,” he asserted. The four counties that are particularly hard-hit have traditionally relied on county general-fund appropriations, not a dedicated property tax, and happen to be comprised of “large amounts of federal forest lands.”

Among those seeking stable funding sources elsewhere are Clackamas County’s 13 libraries. In the wake of losing $12.5 million in federal timber support, the Clackamas Board of County Commissioners has decided to phase out the $8.2 million it provides in library financing by 2014, and is advocating for the November 4 passage of a library-district initiative that would dedicate to library service 39 cents per $1,000 of assessed property valuation. Should the measure fail, the Clackamas Corner Library in Happy Valley, Hoodland Library in Welches, and the Oak Lodge Library in Oak Grove—the only three libraries funded and operated solely by the county—would close. “Folks need to know that this is the tipping point for library services in this county,” county Commissioner Martha Schrader said in the August 7 Clackamas Review.

Meantime, the four-branch Josephine County Library System continues its struggle to reopen after voters rejected a library district measure in 2006 that eventually forced its closure. The private Josephine Community Library fundraising group has been offered a $1-per-year lease from the county to run all four shuttered facilities once JCL has secured the funds. A sustained effort that began last fall has brought in $177,000 as of July 29 from 1,000 library members and area sponsors, in a model fashioned after public television’s public/private partnership. “The beauty of our model, I think, is that those who don’t support us don’t have to become members or give us a dime,” JCL board member Jennifer Roberts said in the July 28 Portland Oregonian. “Of course, we’ll still be there when they want to use the library for free.”

JCL organizers had hoped to raise enough to sustain a $1 million annual budget for the operation of all four facilities with a credentialed library director at the helm, although five years ago the system’s budget was $1.7 million, according to Scheppke. But the slow fundraising pace has necessitated scaling back the group’s 2008 goals to reopening by year-end only the Grants Pass library and recruiting a library administrator—the first step toward securing a $100,000 grant from Josephine County. “The other branches will open as we get the money and the skilled volunteers to do it,” JCL board President Doug Walker told the Oregonian.

The piecemeal approach is characterized by Josephine County Commissioner Dave Toler as “the only way” to reinstate library service there in the next few years. “There is nothing on the horizon as far as a levy or a district or anything like that.”

Also searching the horizon for a solution is Oregon Gov. Ted Kulongoski, who formed the Governor’s Task Force on Federal Forest Payments and County Services last fall. The initial report, issued in June, recommends that Oregon continue to lobby for a four-year reauthorization of the federal Secure Rural Schools and Community Self-Determination Act with a built-in phase-out of support, so local governing bodies have time to establish alternate revenue sources.

Posted on August 13, 2008. Discuss.

A week after removing two public-access computers from the Frederick County (Md.) Public Libraries’ C. Burr Artz Library, the FBI has obtained a court order to search the machines for clues to their July 24 use by Army scientist Bruce Ivins. A suspect in the 2001 anthrax letter attacks who killed himself July 29, Ivins was under surveillance by agents who observed him going to the library and accessing a website about the case, according to a search warrant request granted August 7 in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia.

The warrant specified that what is being sought was electronic evidence of “threats to witnesses related to the anthrax investigation, and obstruction of that investigation,” allegedly by Ivins. The court document reveals that FBI agents observed Ivins visiting the Artz branch on the evening of July 24 and using library workstations 41 and 54; it goes on to specify that “Special Agents of the FBI observed Dr. Ivins reviewing a website dedicated to the Anthrax Investigation and examining e-mail accounts.”

The New York Times reported August 8 that the need for a court order to examine the library computers was the reason why investigators did not close the case after unsealing hundreds of documents two days earlier. The affidavit stated that the FBI was hoping to find electronic files or e-mails about plans to commit suicide and/or murder.

Posted on August 8, 2008. Discuss.

The Sacramento (Calif.) Public Library governing board met August 6 to approve a 21-page response to a scathing county grand jury report that charged both the board and library director Anne Marie Gold with mismanagement. The board response essentially rejects most of the panel’s findings and ignores the recommendation that Gold be replaced.

According to the August 7 Sacramento Bee, the board declined to respond to criticism of Gold’s performance because employee appraisals should not be discussed in a public document. “While the grand jury can—and should—speak freely about the Library director's management style, and critique her management skills, we cannot, and will not, participate in a public discussion of what must for us be a private personnel issue,” the response says.

Gold was the subject of a 70-minute, closed-door evaluation at the start of the meeting, according to the Bee, and she said afterwards that she has no intention of stepping down. “I’m planning on continuing to provide leadership to this library,” she said. “There are issues to be addressed.”

The board will meet again August 28 to review Gold’s response to the grand jury report, which will also be confidential.

Posted on August 8, 2008. Discuss.

The mayor and city manager of Long Beach, California, proposed August 1 as part of the FY2009 budget the closure of the downtown library to the public while expanding hours at neighborhood branches, as part of the city’s effort to close a $17-million shortfall.

The budget, which must be approved by and may be altered by the city council, would expand service at each of the 11 neighborhood branches to seven days a week, the Long Beach Press-Telegram reported August 1. Currently, four branches offer service six days a week, while the others are open five days a week. The main library would be closed to the public, although some administrative functions would continue to be housed there.

The current plan calls for a “satellite” or temporary branch in an as-yet-unspecified downtown location. Director of Library Services Eleanore Schmidt told American Libraries that the precise services that would be offered have not yet been defined, and that the city manager has convened a task force to discuss options.

The net savings from closing the library is anticipated to be $1.8 million. Schmidt said that she could not estimate the effect on library staffing levels, because of uncertainty about the service levels that would be provided.

The Long Beach Public Library Foundation, the Friends of the Long Beach Public Library, and other supporters have started a campaign advocating that the Main Library remain open until an interim library is in place. “We have 27,000 children in the downtown area, and for them this is their neighborhood library,” foundation Executive Director Sara Pillet said in the August 3 Press-Telegram. The downtown library is larger than the other 11 branches combined and serves 500,000 visitors a year.

Members of the public have protested the proposal in several letters published in the Press-Telegram, among them author Ray Bradbury. He wrote August 5, “City Hall decisions will remove access to over 1.5 million books from one square mile of the city! Is Long Beach at war with the printed word and books?”

The downtown library has problems with mold, leaks from pipes and the roof, and seismic issues, the Long Beach Grunion Gazette reported July 31, and the mayor’s office estimates repairs at some $10 million. However, “There’s nothing that I’m aware of that indicates the building needs to be closed immediately. We need time to develop a plan to get a temporary library up and running,” Schmidt said. She added that city studies indicated options to repair the building that cost as little as $3.5 million; the difference in estimates depends on whether and to what extent the library’s rooftop park is restored.

A $571-million bond issue set for a vote November 4 would pay for construction of a new, smaller downtown library among other municipal infrastructure improvements. If it passes, $18 million would go toward construction of a new library, supplemented by $8 million from the Long Beach Redevelopment Agency and funding from other sources, Schmidt said.

The city council was scheduled to consider the plan during mid-August budget hearings, and is mandated to approve a budget by September 15 for the fiscal year that begins October 1.

Posted on August 8, 2008. Discuss.

The FBI removed two public-access computers from the Frederick County Public Libraries’ C. Burr Artz Library in downtown Frederick, Maryland, at the end of July, anticipating their return within a week. The seizure is thought to be connected to the case of Army scientist Bruce E. Ivins, a suspect in the 2001 anthrax letter attacks.

Two FBI agents took the computers July 30 without presenting a court order, although the library’s normal procedure for such requests requires one, Director Darrell Batson said in the August 3 Frederick News-Post that he was persuaded to give the agents access after the case and situation was described to him. “They had an awful lot of information,” he said, explaining that “It was a decision I made on my experience and the information given to me.” Batson added that, while this was the third time the FBI has sought library records in his 10 years with FCPL, it was the first time agents didn’t bring a court order.

Ivins, a biodefense researcher at Fort Detrick, Maryland, killed himself July 29 as federal prosecutors planned to charge him with sending the anthrax-laden letters that killed five people and sickened 17 in the fall of 2001. Batson told the News-Post the agents made no mention of Ivins, anthrax, or Fort Detrick. He went on to say, “Obviously it coincided with the events everyone is talking about.”

Although the library refused  interview requests from American Libraries and other news outlets, FCPL officials issued a written statement about the FBI raid stressing that “no mention of any person or suspect was ever stated by either party, and FCPL continues to be unaware of the details of the FBI’s investigation. Public-access computers are not connected to FCPL’s library patron records. No library patron records were provided to the FBI. Library patrons’ records are not made available to law enforcement authorities without a court order.”

Articles in the New York Times and the Washington Post linked the removal of the library computers to the case against Ivins. ABC-TV affiliate WJLA reported August 4 that the FBI had been trailing Ivins and had seized his personal computers.

Posted on August 6, 2008; modified August 8, 2008. Discuss.

The University of Oxford and VTLS have ended their agreement to implement the Virtua library management system. The August 1 press release from Oxford announcing the decision noted several top-level personnel changes since the university contracted with VTLS in 2005, including the retirement of Oxford University Library Services Director Reg Carr, the departure of OULS Acting Director Ronald Milne, and the appointment of Sarah Thomas as Bodley’s librarian and director of OULS.

“Oxford is a complex organization,” said Thomas, “and it needs to simplify and standardize its operations to take full advantage of system functionality and efficiency. Until we resolve some of the issues around the diverse practices prevalent in our libraries, we are hampered in implementing an advanced library management system such as Virtua.”

The press release said Oxford planned to delay system implementation until it can resolve various issues, notably those relating to its need for a custom-designed automated stack request feature; the library receives some 9,000 closed-stack delivery requests per week.

When the contract was signed in October 2005, Oxford said the steering group responsible for the procurement chose Virtua over six other tendered systems, noting that VTLS’s proposals to enhance Virtua addressed the university’s “unique and complex needs.” OULS is the largest university library service in the United Kingdom, holding some 15 million items in over 100 separate libraries.

VTLS declined to comment on the development, citing an agreement with Oxford that the university would be the sole source of information on the matter. Oxford had not responded to e-mailed questions from American Libraries as of August 6.

Posted on August 6, 2008. Discuss.

District of Columbia Mayor Adrian Fenty and Ginnie Cooper, chief librarian for D. C. Public Library, announced at an August 4 press conference that funding has been found to reverse $2 million in projected budget cuts that would have drastically cut library hours. “Residents can rest assured that they can continue to access all of D.C. Public Library’s resources seven days a week next year,” Fenty said, explaining that city officials never intended to trigger cuts to library service. The money is now available because payment for the District’s debt service on capital projects is less than originally budgeted—due to a combination of low interest rates on short-term borrowing and other factors..

Cooper told American Libraries that 71 staff positions will be restored because of the newfound funds, and that staffing levels will remain the same over the next fiscal year. The library expects to begin advertising jobs on its website soon, she said, and this fall the system is planning to hire 100 D.C. high school students to work 12 hours per week. In addition to the restored hours, the five kiosk libraries slated to close will remain open.

Library Board President John Hill also announced at the press conference that four replacement or remodeled libraries, including the Georgetown branch that suffered significant fire damage a year ago, are on target to open in 2010. The city is trying to accelerate the opening of the long-delayed Tenley branch, which was stalled by neighborhood redevelopment disputes, Hill said.

“Mayor Fenty has been a strong supporter of the library,” Cooper told AL. “That is why I remained hopeful that the potential reduction in the hours libraries would be open would not occur. Once the impact of the reduction was clear, we were delighted to see how swiftly the mayor responded to the need for additional funding.”

Posted on August 6, 2008. Discuss.

The District of Columbia Public Library is weighing the potential impact of its 2009 budget, which calls for the elimination of 74 unfilled staff positions from FY2008, a 14% reduction in its workforce. Adopted in June by the city council, the new budget may require all the city’s libraries to reduce hours, but neither layoffs nor suspension of a years-long capital-improvement project are anticipated.

DCPL Director Ginnie Cooper told American Libraries July 29 that “no library staff will lose their jobs as a result of the elimination of these positions. We have held more than enough vacancies to accommodate the reductions,” she explained. “In fact, some of the existing vacancies will be filled this fiscal year.” Cooper said the reduction of full-time employees will be taken proportionally throughout the system. She also noted that the staff is currently maintaining service hours through “lots and lots of overtime.”

Because 71% of the library staff works in public service, Cooper expects that Friday closings may be necessary at neighborhood libraries and at the central Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial Library—with the neighborhood libraries losing 15 hours per week and the main library losing 16. DCPL also anticipates closing its five 900-square-foot kiosk libraries, which have been open only weekdays and were established as temporary service points in the early 1970s. “Use is very low—the busiest kiosk circulates less than 25% of the least-busy neighborhood library—and the buildings are inefficient and expensive to heat and cool,” Cooper explained. “That would account for 11 or 12 positions.”

“Nobody meant to hurt the library,” Cooper asserted, pointing out that in fact the FY09 budget is up by $16,000 over FY08. The problem is that cost increases have outpaced it, and it would take $2.05 million to make the budget whole. Until about a week before sending a July 24 memo to staff explaining the situation, “we had anticipated that additional funding would be made available to the library” to bring it up to 2008 levels and absorb those cost increases. “This still might happen,” she added hopefully. “If not, the changes go into effect October 1.”

Richard Huffine, president of the Federation of Friends of the D.C. Public Library, sent an e-mail plea July 28 urging recipients to “appeal to the district council to find the $2 million that will avoid this calamity.”

Posted on July 30, 2008. Discuss.

The Swan’s Island (Maine) Library burned to the ground July 24 after it was hit by lightning during an early morning thunderstorm. Librarian Candis Joyce said in the July 25 Bangor Daily News that in addition to more than 10,000 volumes, the library held irreplaceable local-history materials, including genealogical records, historic photographs, archives from local quarries, weather data, and ferry logs. “It just goes on and on,” Joyce said. “We really need to get this back. It had become a community center.”

The collection had been housed for the past 10 years in the Atlantic Schoolhouse, a century-old two-story structure that served as a village school from 1903 to 1954 and was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1996. The building had gone through an extensive renovation in 2004 that added a large reading room, computer lab, exhibit space, and an archives and genealogy room.

Neighbors noticed the blaze around 3:40 a.m. and immediately called the town’s emergency response team. Flames were already erupting from the structure by the time volunteers arrived. Local resident Siobhan Ryan, a school librarian at the Conners-Emerson School in nearby Bar Harbor who had been a volunteer at the Swan’s Island Library, said in the July 24 Mount Desert Islander that no one was hurt and no other structures were damaged. “It is a complete loss,” Ryan said. “You should see all the charred, wet books. It’s really devastating.”

Joyce told American Libraries that firefighters recovered only a few items from the building, “mostly iron tools, some organizational files, a couple of quilts in pieces. A few of us sifted through the rubble later and found more metal tools and, believe it or not, a tobacco tin whose paint hadn’t blistered, and a corn-cob pipe that looked like it was just purchased at a store.”

Although the building was insured, a relief fund has been set up to help raise money for a new library. Donations, payable to the Swan’s Island Education Fund, can be sent to First National Bank of Bar Harbor, 102 Main Street, Bar Harbor, ME 04609.

Posted on July 25, 2008; revised July 28, 2008. Discuss.

Fred Armstrong, West Virginia state archivist for 22 years until abruptly being fired last November, is appealing in Kanawha Circuit Court the dismissal of his case, arguing that he deserves a full hearing with the state Public Employees Grievance Board.

Armstrong’s original personnel grievance was dismissed in June by Acting Chief Administrative Law Judge Denise Spatafore because Armstrong was an at-will employee, the Charleston Gazette reported July 17. “An at-will employee may be dismissed for good reasons, bad reasons, or no reasons, unless the employer’s motivation for the discharge is to contravene some substantial public policy,” Spatafore said in her judgment.

State officials have not specified a reason for Armstrong’s termination, although his supervisor, Culture and History Commissioner Randall Reid-Smith, said in his deposition that Armstrong was “not a team player” and disrespectful in commission staff meetings. Armstrong, however, believes that the action was taken because of his opposition to a plan to put a café in the archive’s space after physically merging the archive with the state library. “Either or both of these actions would violate state law if they endangered the preservation of public records as required by state code,” argued Armstrong's attorney, Jim Lees, in the appeal. “If an employee is fired for attempting to insure that his superiors do indeed follow the law, then the firing is a wrongful discharge under state law.”

Posted on July 25, 2008; modified August 11, 2008. Discuss.

Gannett News Service released a searchable database July 17 that compares trends affecting public library systems between 2002 and 2006. The analysis used data from the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) as well as statistics collected from state library data coordinators, compared figures for the some 9,200 library systems, and found that library visits increased by roughly 10% during that five-year period and that circulation of materials rose by 9%.

Database users can select a library system from a dropdown list of counties by state to learn about changes in book and video circulation, number of visits, operating expenses, and the number of public-use computers. The Library Systems Database also offers lists of public libraries serving populations of 10,000 or more that have the highest circulation per capita, the most internet-capable computers per capita, and the highest operating expenses per capita. “If you didn’t do that you’d have very small systems looking very robust and off the charts,” Ledge King, one of the two reporters who created the database, told American Libraries. “Rate is always truer than whole numbers. If you did straight numbers of computers, all the big cities would be on top but might actually be below average per capita.”

With 85 newspapers around the country “Gannett News Services has taken a particular interest in a lot of data-rich stories,” King said. Local papers are more interested in running stories supplied by Gannett when they are accompanied by “specific information about what’s happening in their local libraries,” he explained. Libraries are “not a well-covered issue in the media,” King observed, “yet every community has one.” He added that local reporters were being encouraged to “use us as a national lens but talk to their local libraries and talk to people about why are they are there, what they like about it, or don’t like about it.”

King said that he and news assistant William Risser initially believed they could construct the database with information collected by NCES but they soon realized that the latest information available to them would be from 2004, “which was too old for us.” The only way to get current data was to go directly to the data coordinators for all 50 states, who were “for most part helpful, eager in some cases,” to cooperate. Robert Benincasa, Gannett database editor, joined the team, and it took only about three months to collect all the numbers.

Immediately after the launch of the database, a number of news outlets did pick up the story and give it a local angle. The Honolulu Advertiser reported that Hawaii public libraries are seeing fewer patrons than they did just a few years ago, which is “bucking a national trend of increased traffic at public libraries.” At most libraries “on the Mainland,” traffic is up by some 10% in recent years, the report goes on to say, and “those figures can be attributed to libraries transforming—despite hefty budget cuts—from staid institutions to hip public spaces offering internet service, programs for seniors and kids, and a wide range of materials, from DVDs to audiobooks on mp3 players to manga graphic novels.” The story attributes circulation and visit decreases to libraries being open less often due to the state’s budget squeeze.

While the Gannett findings do not rank libraries per se, they are based on much of the same statistical information analyzed by Thomas Hennen in his annual HAPLR public library rankings and published in American Libraries. Reed Elsevier’s Library Journal announced June 15 that, in partnership with Bibliostat, it will publish a new ranking system that focuses “more transparently on ranking libraries based on their performance” than HAPLR does. SirsiDynix recently suspended work on the Normative Data Project, an effort similar to the Gannett database.

Asked if Gannett plans to continue to update the database, King said, “I don’t know. We have set the template, but the next federal data is for 2005, so it’s going to be a year behind ours.” He said many people at the state level observed that NCES “does not move fast enough” to make the numbers useful to news reporters. The Gannett database, said King, “gives us a fairly up-to-date and geographically accurate impression of what is happening in libraries around the country, how some are progressing more than others in computers available or funding available. It gives our newspapers much more of a connection to libraries in general and what’s happening, and allows them to see what’s happening in their own backyard in the context of national trends. Different places are different in what they emphasize and how much they value libraries. It gave our papers and me a better sense of what’s happening where.” He also noted that the Gannett’s 23 TV stations are being encouraged to use the database for local stories about libraries. The news service has already released a prototype video (3:05) about services at the District of Columbia Public Library’s Waltha T. Daniels/Shaw Interim Library.

Larra Clark of the American Library Association’s Office for Research and Statistics told American Libraries,“There are many statistics and stories that go into painting a complete picture of the value our libraries provide their communities.” While the Gannett lists on circulation, internet workstations, and operating expenses exclude libraries serving a population lower than 10,000 (about 59% of U.S. public libraries), Clark said the data is nevertheless “a very rich resource.” She added, “Libraries of all sizes can use the peer comparison tool, now supported by the Institute of Museum and Library Services, to benchmark a full range of inputs and outputs against their peers. Perhaps more importantly, the news service provided a model for how this data can be used to tell a compelling story about how libraries continue to innovate, expand, and serve all people.”

King said that his team’s research ended with a big surprise: “When we started, I did not know a whole lot about libraries. I tended to suppose that the internet age would mean libraries were not doing as well as they are doing.” The outcome was “counterintuitive” and “went in a different direction than what we thought it would.”

Posted and modified on July 23, 2008; corrected July 25 and August 19, 2008. Discuss.

After a decade of federal litigation and two decisions that were returned to lower courts from the Supreme Court for further review, the Third Circuit Court of Appeals July 22 unanimously declared unconstitutional for the third time the Child Online Protection Act of 1998 on First and Fifth Amendment grounds. “The government has no more right to censor the internet than it does books and magazines,” Chris Hansen, ACLU senior staff attorney, remarked after the ruling was handed down.

During the string of legal proceedings, the American Library Association’s Freedom to Read Foundation filed several amicus curiae briefs on behalf of the plaintiffs, the latest in November 2007 in American Civil Liberties Union v. Mukasey. (The first was filed in 1999 in support of ACLU v. Reno; as the challenge proceeded, it became known successively as ACLU v. Ashcroft and ACLU v. Gonzales.)

Signed into law by Pres. Bill Clinton in 1998, COPA mandated a $50,000-per-day fine and up to six months’ incarceration for a website owner who posts a commercial online communication “that includes any material that is harmful to minors,” defined as anyone 17 or younger, unless the site keeps minors out through a digital age-verification gateway. The law was intended as a more narrowly tailored version of the Communications Decency Act of 2006, whose criminalization of “indecent speech” was overturned in 1997.

Due to an injunction granted in February 1999, COPA has never been enforced. The Supreme Court upheld the injunction in 2004 and sent the case back to the lower courts for trial. The COPA challenge returned to the Supreme Court in 2004, when the justices once again remanded the case to the district court level—this time to weigh whether filtering technology had evolved into a less restrictive alternative than COPA in the years since the law was originally enacted.

In its latest decision, the appeals court ruled that COPA “effectively suppresses a large amount of speech that adults have a constitutional right to receive and to address to one another.” Agreeing with the lower court’s March 2007 findings, the decision stated that blocking software, “although not flawless,” is a less-restrictive means of shielding youngsters from sexually explicit material. The court asserted that parents can tailor software settings “to the age and maturity of their children and thus use an appropriate flexible approach differing from COPA’s ‘one size fits all’ approach,” which the decision deemed “impermissibly vague” in violation of the Fifth Amendment by not specifying what would constitute a criminal violation. Filters “do not subject speakers to criminal or civil penalties,” and can block access to non-U.S. websites as COPA cannot, the ruling asserted.

Expressing disappointment that the court “struck down a congressional statute designed to protect our children from exposure to sexually explicit material on the internet,” Justice Department spokesperson Charles Miller told American Libraries that the government was reviewing its options and "deciding what our next step will be."

Posted on July 23, 2008. Discuss.

Batavia (Ill.) Public Library has moved a link to Planned Parenthood’s Teenwire sex education website from the “Young Adult” page on BPL’s website to the general health section of its “Web Reference” page. The board voted 4–2 to move the link July 15 in response to resident Kerry Knott’s request to have it removed from the site entirely.

More than 120 people attended the board meeting while picketers walked outside the library carrying signs with anti–Planned Parenthood messages, the Arlington Heights Daily Herald reported July 16. More than 30 spoke on the issue, with a majority in favor of removing the link. “I need to implore the board to listen to your constituents,” resident Jennifer Russell argued. “If you are elected to represent the citizens of the library district of Batavia, you need to listen to your constituents.”

Others equated removing the link with censorship. “I am constitutionally frightened and offended that political agendas are trying to dictate what this library offers,” said resident Susan Tatnall. “Your job is to provide information and avenues of learning and education for this community. It is a slippery slope when you start to limit that information because of the political views of some members of the community.”

Posted on July 18, 2008. Discuss.

President George Bush signed into law July 10 the FISA Amendments Act of 2008, a bill expanding legal authority for wiretaps by spy agencies that has been hotly debated since the February expiration of the Protect America Act. Within hours of the bill’s signing, the American Civil Liberties Union filed suit in the U.S. Southern District Court of New York challenging its constitutionality on First and Fourth Amendment grounds.

“H.R. 6304 rewrites the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act in a way that expands the executive branch’s spying powers without doing enough to protect the privacy of innocent people whose communications are being monitored,” stated Emily Sheketoff, executive director of the American Library Association’s Washington Office July 9, after the Senate passed the bill 69–28. The House approved the legislation 293–129 three weeks earlier.

The amended FISA “could affect any library user who uses the internet in the library to communicate with foreign friends, family members living in other countries, foreign companies—any international communications,” said Deborah Caldwell-Stone, deputy executive director of ALA’s Office for Intellectual Freedom. “Similarly, any librarian who contacts colleagues overseas or conducts business with foreign publishers could have their international communications monitored under the new FISA,” she told American Libraries.

Caldwell-Stone explained that the FISA Amendments Act alters the requirement for obtaining a warrant from the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (FISC) to conduct wiretapping. The amended law eliminates the need for any specificity in an eavesdropping request, so FISC judges would no longer know whose communications they were allowing to be intercepted. For example, she said, federal agents could obtain an order that “could simply collect e-mails that pass through AT&T servers in San Francisco going to Asia in bulk under a warrant issued under the FISA rules, and then peruse them at their leisure.”

The legislation also grants retroactive immunity to telecommunications firms that allegedly shared with the federal government all telephone and internet communications routed through their networks since 2001, as some 40 civil lawsuits contend.

Plaintiffs in the ACLU’s Amnesty v. McConnell suit include international human rights organizations such as Amnesty International, PEN American Center, and the International Criminal Defence Attorneys Association, as well as the political journal The Nation and its contributing journalists Naomi Klein and Chris Hedges. The ACLU also filed a motion asking that it be apprised of any consideration of its lawsuit by the secret FISA court and that the court’s decisions be made public “with only those redactions necessary to protect information that is properly classified.”

Posted on July 16, 2008. Discuss.

Thomas Pilaar, 34, who pleaded guilty in May to stealing thousands of items from Denver Public Library and the systems in nearby Aurora, Arapahoe County, and Douglas County, was sentenced July 8 to 10 years in prison and $53,549 in restitution.

Pilaar took about 1,400 books and DVDs by checking them out on his own and other people’s library cards, the Rocky Mountain News reported July 9. He sold many on Craigslist, although about 500 items were recovered.

“As a strategy for quick wealth, Mr. Pilaar would have been better off reading some investment management books,” James LaRue, director of Douglas County Libraries, told American Libraries. after the sentencing.

Posted on July 11, 2008. Discuss.

Library supply company Highsmith, headquartered in Fort Atkinson, Wisconsin, has been purchased by Lab Safety Supply, a direct-marketing subsidiary of Chicago-based facilities maintenance supplier W. W. Grainger. Terms of the acquisition, announced in the business press July 10, were not disclosed. Highsmith’s operations, with anticipated sales for 2008 in the range of $20–$30 million, will be integrated with LSS by the end of the year.

”We are pleased to be adding Highsmith to our specialty catalog group,” said LSS President Larry Loizzo. “They have built a solid brand position in the library and school supplies market over the past 50 years; we intend to build upon it.”

Founded in 1956, Highsmith is a distributor of equipment, supplies, and furniture to public, academic, and school libraries. The company is an American Library Association Library Champion and funds two ALA awards, the Public Library Association’s Highsmith Library Innovation Award, and the American Association of School Librarians’ Highsmith Research Grant. It also supports state library association initiatives, including the Campaign for Wisconsin Libraries, an initiative of the Wisconsin Library Association Foundation.

In 2006, Highsmith cosponsored the interior renovation of the historic Children’s Resource Center branch of the New Orleans Public Library, which suffered damage from Hurricane Katrina.

Posted on July 11, 2008. Discuss.

Two libraries in central California were forced to evacuate staff and materials because of the facilities’ proximity to the wildfires that hundreds of state and federal firefighters as well as brigades of volunteers are trying to bring under control.

The private Henry Miller Memorial Library has moved its materials to safety twice; on June 22 Director Magnus Torén evacuated “all original artwork, primary source material, [and] rare books,” according to the update Torén posted July 7 to the library website. Although the mandatory evacuation has since been lifted for the Big Sur area in which the library, as well as Torén’s home, is located, the materials had to be transported July 2 to more-distant Carmel because the location was in an established evacuation zone. “Next time we’ll take it to Seattle!” he quipped.

Torén added that the Basin Complex Fire was stopped “almost literally on the doorstep” of the library by firefighters “supported by two helicopters running in tandem up and down to the ocean with 400–600-gallon loads of water.”

Even as library staff members were moving materials for the second time July 2, employees of the Monterey County Free Libraries were packing up the entire collection of the system’s Big Sur branch, as well as its computers, because the Basin Complex Fire was advancing there, County Librarian Jayanti Addleman told American Libraries. “Though we are still optimistic that the library structure will be saved from the fire,” she explained that materials and equipment were removed “since water and smoke can cause irreparable damage.” She added that staff “left the phone plugged in, in case someone takes shelter in there.”

Adddleman praised the dedication of library workers in completing the evacuation two hours earlier than the mandatory 7 p.m. deadline set by firefighters—particularly because several staff members were already exhausted from evacuating their own homes. Their speed enabled a staff member to prepare a package of reading materials that they delivered to “a very grateful group of firefighters at the base camp at Andrew Molera State Park” as the library group left the area, she told AL.

Both libraries remain closed while the fire is active, a period that experts believe could last through July.

July 9 UPDATE:

As some 200 National Guard troops were completing their firefighting training so they could join the 18,000 professionals and volunteers combating wildfires in the Golden State, the residents of some 3,200 homes in the town of Paradise were issued mandatory evacuation orders. Despite the movement of the Butte Lightning Complex Fires, the Butte County Library System’s Paradise facility “remains in a relatively safe area, though the air is thick with smoke,” Branch Manager Rochelle Carr told American Libraries; nonetheless, it is under a precautionary evacuation order. She reported that staff members’ homes “are currently out of harm’s way, though with our last [wildfire] scare in June several had to evacuate.”

Despite—or perhaps because—of the crisis, the library saw an uptick in patron visits until July 9, when most remaining area residents “were not venturing out in this ashy air,” Carr said. She added that, before the air quality deteriorated, patrons “were waiting at the door, many with face masks. All ages came in wanting books and trying to communicate with friends via e-mail and to get news. This has been surreal for us all.”

Carr is posting news bulletins, fire locations, and evacuation maps as she receives them from BCLS Director Derek Wolfgram, who is stationed at the town’s emergency command center, and keeps a radio tuned to the local emergency information station.

Posted on July 8, 2008; updated on July 9, 2008. Discuss.