Midland County officials on Tuesday voted to establish a new citizen-led committee that will be in charge of assessing whether books in the children’s and young adult sections at local libraries should remain on the shelves.
The move by the Midland County Commissioners Court institutes a new library policy that changes how books that library patrons flag as potentially inappropriate or harmful are assessed. The new process is referred to as the “Reconsideration of Library Materials Policy.”
The policy establishes a number of changes, including the citizens review committee that will have the “sole authority” over assessing children’s and young adult books that are brought up for formal reconsideration. County commissioners will appoint members to the committee who will serve up to four years. Under the policy, the review committee will have the power to recategorize titles to a “more restrictive portion of the library” or to completely remove books with a unanimous vote.
Commissioner Dianne Anderson, who proposed the policy, said it will help librarians deal with a backlog of reconsideration requests.
“ Reconsiderations are so backed up,” she said. “ This committee is to help the librarian get through these reconsiderations so that she can continue the business of running the library.”
Under the county’s previous library policy, the local library director reviewed any material brought up for reconsideration and then responded to the complaint within 10 days. However, Anderson said library staff haven’t been able to keep up with the reconsideration requests being filed.
Anderson has spearheaded previous efforts to remove books from the children’s and young adult sections at Midland County Libraries. Many of the titles she and her allies wanted to remove dealt with sex, the LGBTQ community and race.
The new policy approved Tuesday is modeled after a policy established last year by Montgomery County, near Houston. However, Montgomery County’s citizen review committee was suspended in October after officials agreed to reassess the committee's policy and procedures. The pause came after issues with the committee emerged, including the committee reclassifying a historical novel about Native Americans as fiction.
During Tuesday’s meeting, Midland County Attorney Russell Malm cited Montgomery County’s experience and warned local officials that the new reconsideration policy may violate the Texas Open Meetings Act.
The policy bars the public from attending meetings of the citizen review committee, which Malm said could be a problem.
“ If you appoint a committee that has authority to take action, then they probably are subject to [the] Open Meetings Act,” he said. “If they have closed meetings, then they could be committing a criminal violation.”
Midland County Judge Terry Johnson disagreed with Malm’s assessment.
“I think they would make the recommendation and it would be up to the court to direct the librarian to act or not act on the recommendation,” he said.
However, the county’s policy states that decisions made by the review committee “shall be final.”
