The Davis Library in Wanganui, New Zealand, is putting some daylight between its holdings for children and teens, according to this article in the Chronicle.
“In a report to the [Wanganui District Council] [Cultural and Community Manager Sally] Patrick said she had made a request to the Davis library to relocate its teenage area and the graphic novel collection to an place which was clearly separated from the children’s area in order to ‘eliminate’ future confusion.
“In her recommendation to council she said that councillors should agree that the matter would be resolved once the teen area and graphic novels were moved.”
Does anyone else detect a whiff of impatience in the second part of that recommendation? I couldn’t blame her if there was.
Mayor Michael Laws seems satisfied with the resolution:
“‘In essence, this is to ensure that contentious material, available to teenagers, is located further away from the children’s section…my pick is that Council will not want to play censor but alert library management that a heightened sensitivity is in order,’ he said.”
It seems as though the books that sparked the dust-up are going to be kept in the restricted-access dungeon, and that some other similar books might join them after a second look from library staff.
Background and links to earlier articles can be found here.
And just because I can’t resist, readers can get another look at Mayor Laws’ leadership style in this article about a request from Amnesty International:
“‘They are a bunch of idiots, and I don’t respond to idiots.’”