Editor's Note: This story is republished with permission from The Trussville Tribune.
CLAY — The Clay City Council voted to withdraw its local library from the Alabama Public Library Service (APLS) in the wake of a contentious library advisory board meeting earlier that day where board members confronted Mayor Charles Webster and city manager Ronnie Dixon over multiple controversies surrounding library operations and management.
The dispute concerned an alleged new book purchasing review policy and powers that the city withheld from the library board in violation of the Code of Alabama.
Earlier this year, the library purchased a book titled “Hero Tales: A Family Treasury of True Stories from the Lives of Christian Heroes” by Dave and Neta Jackson.
Despite reporting from another news outlet, the city did not block the purchase of the book, according to Dixon.
Dixon explained that the requisition requests he receives from the library never list the titles of the books, only the cost of the total number of books the library requests to purchase that month.
“I never see the title of the books, ever,” Dixon said.
According to Dixon, after the library purchased the book, a citizen came to City Hall to voice concerns about watchdog groups targeting the library if it had books about Christianity but not about other religions.
“Somebody came into City Hall, brought it to my attention that we had ordered this book, 15 Bible heroes, and if we were gonna order that book we needed to be prepared to order a book about 15 Muslim heroes,” Dixon explained.
“So, at the next library board meeting, I told them, 'You know, if y’all are going to order this kind of book, then you have to be prepared to order 15 Muslim heroes also and it’s better to just not order either one because we’re a member of JCLC and if somebody comes in and requests one of those books then you just request it from JCLC and it will be delivered the next day or whenever it’s available and that way we don’t have to worry about spending money, city money on individual books.”
The Jefferson County Library Cooperative (JCLC) is a cooperative of 40 public libraries in the county that allows residents to check out and request books from across its network.
During that library advisory board meeting on June 11, Dixon stated that the library should not purchase books that were already in the JCLC since the books could draw attention to the Clay Library based on their content being of a religious, gender or sexual nature, according to the meeting minutes and multiple people in attendance.
Multiple members of the library board reported that Dixon also stated that no books should be purchased if a religious text is used as the only source.
According to emails obtained by The Trussville Tribune, soon after that meeting, Library Board Secretary Sarah Grafman requested Dixon clarify his statements about book purchases.
Dixon responded by stating that if the JCLC did not have a book requested by a local patron, they could ask them to add it to the collection and that library staff could “tell them it’s available on Amazon for private purchase or they can wait for JCLC to add it.”
“While most of our community would accept any Christian books we were to purchase, who do have watchers that will object and possibly escalate," Dixon wrote. "That’s the reason for deference to JCLC."
After Grafman posed more questions about the library’s ability to purchase religious materials and shared her concerns that the city would be exposing itself to religious discrimination liability, Dixon stated, “I have not had to review in the past but I will now” regarding local book purchases.
Dixon also added there have been accusations the city is spending local money for a specific Christian group’s homeschool curriculum in purchasing the “Hero Tales” book.
Soon after the exchange, on June 21, Library Director Tara Gearhart tendered her resignation.
In an email, Gearhart stated that her decision to resign “stems from consistent challenges related to management’s decisions and communication.”
She also cited difficulties navigating through “frequent shifts in direction, unclear expectations, and a lack of transparent communication.”
With the specifics of the book review policy still up in the air, the library board met for another special meeting on July 9.
Library Board President Jane Anderton stated that she did not agree with the city’s new policy that book purchases would be reviewed by the city manager as she believed it to be the library director’s responsibility.
According to the minutes and attendees at that meeting, Webster stated the policy's purpose was to prevent the city from being sued.
Webster and Dixon reportedly defended the book policy on the basis that the city was not violating religious liberties since books of that nature were still available through the JCLC.
In an interview with The Trussville Tribune on July 22, Dixon asserted that there being a policy about what books the library could or could not purchase was “just not true.”
Dixon also denied that the city has a policy of no longer purchasing religious, gender-related, or LGBT books.
“In 12 and a half years I have never turned down a requisition from the library. Period,” Dixon said.
He said the city would not be opposed to buying books as long as they were placed in the correct section of the library and said there was no truth to the allegation that the mayor directed him to review all purchase orders and deny purchasing any books with scripture as its only basis.
“The mayor has not directed me to do anything where the library’s concerned about reviewing any titles," Dixon added. "I’m not there for that. If I tried to micromanage every department of the city, it would be physically impossible. That’s why I have directors that I trust to do that."
“That’s all I was doing was warning them that if you start something like this, then you can call attention to yourself and these watchdog organizations are going to start bombarding us with letters and that we could wind up spending tens if not hundreds of thousands of dollars on attorneys to respond to these letters and correspondences," he continued.
It all came to a head at a packed library board meeting on July 23, after Grafman said she had been in contact with the Alliance Defending Freedom, a conservative Christian legal advocacy group, who believed the policy violated religious liberties.
In a heated exchange, Webster said the city would not refuse any Christian books or books about other religions in the library and claimed he never said that the city would not allow religious books in the library.
After Grafman challenged the mayor’s denial of the existence of the book review policy, Webster said, “I don’t appreciate what y’all have been doing to stir all this up.”
Webster went on to say, “I can tell you we’ll make fast changes if y’all keep this up.”
Dixon then addressed the emails and again clarified his position on the library’s curation process saying that there has been no change in policy.
“I never said the library couldn’t purchase religious materials, I said if you’re going to, you have to be willing to purchase them all.”
He added, “You have to be willing to purchase Muslim, Hindu, Buddhist, whatever and there’s no point in our library having a stack that includes all of those books when they’ll never be asked for. And we’re members of JCLC so they can be borrowed from JCLC and then returned.”
The discussion of curation policies also renewed interest in the library board's powers, which led to the board’s discovery that the city was limiting its duties in violation of the Code of Alabama.
According to the code, public library boards should have the “full power and authority” to control library expenditures, purchase books, hire library employees, and manage and control the library.
However, as it had currently been operating, the library board did not have these powers, which were instead held by the city manager.
Nancy Pack, the director of the Alabama Public Library Service (APLS), a state agency that advises and provides funding to public libraries, cited the Code of Alabama and said that libraries must comply with it to receive funding from the agency.
“That is the responsibility of the board," Pack said. "If you want to continue to be in the APLS network this is what has to happen. If you decide you want to be an independent library, a city library, and not involved with APLS, you do whatever you want to as a city."
She later said, “You have a choice to make—whether you want to comply with the Code of Alabama or whether you want to be an independent library and withdraw from the Alabama Public Library Service.”
According to Pack, if the city chose to withdraw, it would lose about $10,000 annually in state aid and access to support materials and workshops.
Though Clay had violated the code in recent years, it was unclear if the city would be penalized for receiving state aid during that time, but Pack said funding would be reviewed going forward.
In response, Webster said, “We’ve run this library like it’s been run for 12 years and we haven’t had a problem” and questioned the need to make changes.
Near the end of the library board meeting, attendees expressed concerns about the mayor's apparent intent on pulling out of the APLS.
Discussion of the library picked up almost immediately at the city council meeting, which followed the library board’s meeting.
Without prior advertisement or inclusion in the meeting agenda, Councilman Dean Kirkner made a motion to pull the city out of the APLS, which would mean continuing to run the library as the city has done.
“I’m seeing that we are fortunate to be sitting on $10 million in the bank. We would be giving up $10,000 a year from the State of Alabama but in relinquishing the $10,000 we would gain complete control of the library, keep a library committee, dissolve the library board,” Kirkner said.
The motion was seconded by Councilman Chris Nail and it passed in a 4 - 1 vote.
Council members Kirkner, Nail and Orletta Rush and Mayor Webster voted in favor of the motion.
Councilor Bo Johnson voted no, saying that he felt it was rushed and Councilor Becky Johnson, who did not attend the library board meeting, abstained.
Prior to the vote, library board members and library staffers were not given an opportunity or asked to give their input on the decision.
According to Webster, despite leaving the APLS, the library would continue to be a part of the JCLC.
After the council meeting, multiple library board members expressed doubts there would even continue to be a library board since it had essentially no input on how the library should run.
“If I heard correctly, the mayor’s position was that he wants Ronnie Dixon to be in charge of everything concerning the city,” Anderton said.
“I don’t really see the point of a board if our opinions are totally negated because they’re all going to have to be under the authority of Ronnie Dixon. Why am I wasting my time?”
She added, “The city is run by one man.”
At the same time, Grafman said she counted the apparent backtracking of the book review policy as a “win.”
“When we brought all this up they backtracked it completely and said that it was never a thing but it absolutely was,” Grafman said.
“We all heard the same thing when he said, ‘We won’t be buying that book,'” Anderton added.
“I followed the proper channels and spoke to several councilmen and they said, ‘Well we want Ronnie to approve the purchases.’ They said Ronnie will look at all the purchases,” Grafman said.
“We shined so much light on the city that they shut us down.”
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