tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5060593324936581367.post5516729632348540935..comments2024-03-27T23:34:25.884-04:00Comments on SafeLibraries®: Notice of Possible Legal Action Regarding Meeting Room PolicySafeLibraries®http://www.blogger.com/profile/06756725065032196698noreply@blogger.comBlogger10125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5060593324936581367.post-79443625601057557242017-05-23T18:26:07.016-04:002017-05-23T18:26:07.016-04:00@Anonymous, thanks for writing again.
Your nami...@Anonymous, thanks for writing again. <br /><br />Your naming those two women indicates you are just a SafeLibraries® brand library services fan from years ago and not local to the issue currently at hand in Maryland. You may even be with ALA's Office for Intellectual Freedom itself because no one else would otherwise put those two together.<br /><br />I do have standing, under Maryland law, to begin to act to rectify the lawlessness. I am making extraordinary efforts to try to avoid taking such actions. I know it will drive up the government's legal costs to defend its lawlessness. It would be so much easier for all involved, and way less costly, to simply publish the recording of the illegal executive session from April 2017 discussing meeting room policy. That done, I'd have no further standing to bring legal attention to bear on the lawlessness of the library board as the lawlessness will have been removed.<br /><br />Sincerely, I hope the library board simply releases the video tape of the illegal meeting. I'm trying really hard to urge them to follow the law instead of being forced into following the law. I'm not going away until justice is done under the law. <br /><br />Your repeated efforts to make me the issue instead of the lawlessness of the library board will be of no avail. One way or the other, justice will prevail. I hope the library board does justice voluntarily instead of using taxpayer funding to fight a losing effort to protect American Library Association interests by defying Maryland law. Even if the library board should win, which I doubt because the law is the law it is, the effort will still have been costly.<br /><br />It is so easy to simply release the video recording of the illegal executive session discussing meeting room policy, which discussion behind closed doors is against the law.<br /><br />In my opinion, naturally.<br /><br />And, to be extra clear, meeting minutes are not good enough. The recording itself must be released. And under Maryland law, the recording cannot be destroyed until one year after the meeting minutes are finalized. And I put the library board on notice not to commit spoliation of evidence. So if they announce the recording has been destroyed, even if by accident, something ALA advises librarians to do, the community will instantly know illegality has been proven, and stakes will grow higher, significantly higher. And it could have all been avoided if they were just honest in the first place and guided by the public trust and not the American Library Association.SafeLibraries®https://www.blogger.com/profile/18062190840838123628noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5060593324936581367.post-50883371115945422812017-05-23T16:10:55.716-04:002017-05-23T16:10:55.716-04:00The board will not spend hundreds of thousands def...The board will not spend hundreds of thousands defending anything unless you find a local Megan Fox or Ginny Maziarka to buy into your arguments (and foot the legal bills), because you don't have standing.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5060593324936581367.post-535914676528588502017-05-23T14:45:09.047-04:002017-05-23T14:45:09.047-04:00@Anonymous, thanks for writing.
Making me the tar...@Anonymous, thanks for writing.<br /><br />Making me the target for ridicule, as you have just done, is the lead tactic being taken by the library board, as directed by the American Library Association. It makes you and them feel really terrific, but it does nothing to remedy the underlying lawlessness.<br /><br />The longer the library board ignores the lawlessness, the more likely will there be resultant consequences, and the more serious will they be.<br /><br />Mock me all you want, then ask yourself later if your tactic worked to stop the mounting consequences of lawlessness.<br /><br />What I have done with the notice and with the offer is to provide a means for the library board to be aware of the lawlessness, advise of the possibly for resultant responses, then de-escalate as quickly as possible. The library board simply needs to comply with the law, as evidenced by making public the recording of the executive session held in violation of the law, and I will stop whatever I'm doing to see that the law is followed. It is an honest effort to help the library board instead of blindsiding them, or using them, as ALA is doing. I have laid out the laws and policies that are the problem and the library board has unlimited resources to determine if the laws and policies really have been broken. If they take a hard stance just to feel good about sticking it to me, that is their problem, not mine. I'm not intimidated by those defending lawlessness.<br /><br />If that library board releases to the public the recording of what happened in that executive session, all this goes away and taxpayers can breathe a big sigh of relief that their public body will not spend hundreds of thousands defending lawlessness that will ultimately fail because the law is the law even if you have tremendous goodwill as a public library.SafeLibraries®https://www.blogger.com/profile/06756725065032196698noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5060593324936581367.post-18122619207629618862017-05-23T12:28:20.806-04:002017-05-23T12:28:20.806-04:00"If you or someone convinces the library boar..."If you or someone convinces the library board to release the video recording of the illegal April executive session and show it to the public, your library board will have righted its wrong, and I will withdraw all my concerns over the illegality of that 1st meeting and the subsequent fruit of the poisonous tree."<br /><br />Translation: I don't have standing, and even if I did I can't afford the filing fee, so here are some more words.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5060593324936581367.post-34798273377980983312017-05-20T23:48:30.953-04:002017-05-20T23:48:30.953-04:00@Lexington Park Parent, thanks for writing.
I add...@Lexington Park Parent, thanks for writing.<br /><br />I addressed the illegality by the library board, not the contents of the meeting, except to the extent those contents were discussed by the library board itself.<br /><br />As to making a mountain out of a molehill, it appears to me that the library board has or will have violated two laws and three policies four times, for a total of six violations. If this were President Donald Trump, there would be multiple organizations suing several times over each of those six violations and the media would be going on for months about how the President should be impeached. <br /><br />That the library repeatedly violates the law and its own polices is a serious problem. Violating the civil rights of the people and undermining the civil society is a serious problem. It's not a molehill. That it’s a library board violating the law matters not one iota, except to the extent librarians know they have great good will and use that good will to their advantage. But violating civil rights is not an advantage anyone should be supporting.<br /><br />As to your comments about what you think I think, I have never even given a hint that the contents of the speech were in any way relevant to the library repeatedly violating the law and its own policies. If this private meeting was about basket weaving, the exact same arguments would apply.<br /><br />Now this is interesting: "This baloney that they are breaking Library rules because it will disrupt other patrons is ridiculous." What's interesting is that it is the library board's own prior statements that prove the violation exists. Rarely do you see a library make such a prior admission that sinks its own case with respect to a policy. I've been advising communities for about 15 years and this is for me the first time I have ever seen that. But it is the case in this matter. So it is directly relevant. And it directly affects the application of the library board's meeting room policy. It might be baloney in another case, but here it's a real concern given the library board's own prior statements on the matter. That's why I raised it. If you wish to vent about the library board's prior statements, speak directly with the library board.<br /><br />Should your library board continue in violating the law and its own policy, there will likely be serious consequences that will be the library board’s responsibility, no matter how hard they spin it as busybody whistleblowers. <br /><br />That kind of tactic works in a pinch, but in the long run people realize the library board should have followed the law and policy instead of hiring attorneys and spending scads of money to defend illegality, policy violations, and to hound the whistleblowers. <br /><br />A library in Illinois spent well over half a million dollars on a wasted effort to defy the law, and people’s taxes were raised as a direct result. You don’t want to go down that road (but your library board might). In the end the library board will lose, like in Illinois, and be forced to follow the law and policy, like in Illinois. It would be so easy right now to avoid it all by following the law and their own policy right now without having to have a court or the Attorney General force them to follow the law. <br /><br />We’ll see what they do.SafeLibraries®https://www.blogger.com/profile/06756725065032196698noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5060593324936581367.post-78404656905771416432017-05-20T18:22:45.692-04:002017-05-20T18:22:45.692-04:00Its a private meeting, by a private group of which...Its a private meeting, by a private group of which any child that attends must have written permission from their parent or guardian. For you to disrupt this meeting because you feel the parents should be there is way off base. I am a parent and if I choose to allow my child to go to this meeting without me, then that is my business and none of yours. You are making a mountain out of a molehill only because you don't think that it is right that a lesbian should teach a sex education class and your fear of homosexuals is making you think that they are going to try and change these kids. You need to grow up and get a life. This baloney that they are breaking Library rules because it will disrupt other patrons is ridiculous. The only way that is going to happen is if you and people like you don't mind their own business and let us parents decide how we want to teach our kids.Lexington Park Parenthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14792276251621179144noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5060593324936581367.post-23313468408362022932017-05-20T11:59:37.350-04:002017-05-20T11:59:37.350-04:00@Anonymous, thanks for writing.
You said, "S...@Anonymous, thanks for writing.<br /><br />You said, "So are you saying...." No, I'm not saying that. That's just what you are thinking and writing here.<br /><br />As currently constituted, the meeting is illegal if you consider it illegal for a meeting to be held in a manner that violates the library board's own meeting room policy. And now the illegal meeting features two separate violations of that same policy, if it occurs as currently constituted.SafeLibraries®https://www.blogger.com/profile/06756725065032196698noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5060593324936581367.post-34323301667664455692017-05-20T01:38:36.444-04:002017-05-20T01:38:36.444-04:00"Media reports now include that St. Mary’s Co..."Media reports now include that St. Mary’s County Sheriff’s Department will be providing security for the illegal meeting."<br /><br />So are you saying the sheriff's department is somehow under the control of the public library, or that its staff's legal experience, education, and training have somehow failed to render it capable of determining what is and is not an 'illegal meeting'?<br /><br />I look forward to your exciting lawsuit.<br />Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5060593324936581367.post-73137485616697317452017-05-19T13:41:51.886-04:002017-05-19T13:41:51.886-04:00@Unknown, thanks for writing.
My observations h...@Unknown, thanks for writing. <br /><br />My observations have to do solely with the library's violations of various policies and various state laws. My suggestion was to either follow the meeting room policy or rework things until the policy is followed, not to "shut down" anything. The subject matter of the meeting is irrelevant to the library's violations.<br /><br />The problem here is the library board's refusal to follow its own policies and Maryland state law, not the whistleblower's who point out the illegality. <br /><br />Consider asking the library board to comply with its own policies and with state law. As you say the information provided is relevant, so I hope you can help convince the library board to comply with its own policies and the law.SafeLibraries®https://www.blogger.com/profile/06756725065032196698noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5060593324936581367.post-88806851691272359112017-05-18T23:19:48.714-04:002017-05-18T23:19:48.714-04:00I think you impede free speech by trying to shut d...I think you impede free speech by trying to shut down this relevant class being offered, which supplements regular sex ed in public schools (A woefully poor source of accurate, clinical information in St. Mary's schools). It would be to the benefit of the community if you and yours leave it be and let teens get educated in a safe, nonjudgmental environment.Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08446809497879198661noreply@blogger.com