Crooked Library Board Forces Out Library Director

Sad News for Community as Bellwood Public Library’s Director Jacqueline Spratt Forced Out by Board Power Plays

by Kevin DuJan
Illinois Leaks "Edgar County Watchdogs"
29 March 2018


BELLWOOD, ILLINOIS —

In a shocking and sad development, Bellwood Public Library Director Jacqueline Spratt announced her resignation (effective April 6th).

Spratt has been a tenacious advocate for fiscal responsibility and government accountability during her 4-year tenure as Bellwood’s director. (She has worked at the Bellwood Public Library for a total of 25 years.) She is a rare figure in Chicagoland, being a public employee who routinely said “NO!” to public officials who wanted to squander the public’s money and abuse their elected positions. Spratt is a woman of great integrity who stood up to bullying by board members the likes of which it is rare to see, even in Chicago. Being only human, it appears she reached the point where she just couldn’t take any more grief or abuse from the Bellwood Public Library Board of Trustees…and so she is calling it quits. While it’s hard to blame her, it’s also heartbreaking to see someone who loves her community and her library forced out of a job she clearly loves.

This is the latest in an ongoing struggle in Bellwood for a number of years, as we reported on here in the past. Bellwood Public Library has been plagued by board members who allegedly steal from the public, demand exorbitant reimbursements (including checks written in advance) for conference trips that some didn’t even bother to attend, (with other board members staying longer than a conference required, thus turning that trip into a “free” vacation the public had to pay for). Board members in Bellwood demanded to be fed dinner during board meetings and plotted to award lucrative renovation contracts and other highly-paid positions to friends or cronies. All the while, a shadowy and mysterious local political figure seemed to be pulling strings and influencing board members, giving the community the impression that the machinations ongoing at the library were similar to other schemes that appeared to be unfolding within Bellwood’s school district. It’s unfortunate that media outlets with the resources to fund investigative reporting and forensic accounting don’t make Bellwood a priority because there appear to be more layers upon layers (upon layers) of scandal in Bellwood than in the movie Chinatown.

So much happens there that it’s hard to follow all of the twists and turns. In the last election, it appeared that things would start to improve for Bellwood’s library when several n’er-do-well board members lost their positions. But even with those bad apples removed, the Board as a whole seemed to continue harassing Spratt in what appears to be a power play to force her to back off of her reform agenda. Spratt triumphed several times when various Board members invented false accusations against her or trumped up ridiculous excuses to fire her; some of these stunts triggered legal actions that resulted in judges protecting Spratt and her position. In recent remarks to the press, Spratt appears exhausted and at wit’s end.

“I’ve been fighting with the board almost since I’ve been the director and I just don’t want to fight anymore…I think that some people have hidden agendas that I’m not willing to go with,” Spratt told the Village Free Press on March 28th.

Bellwood’s library board has a long reputation for violating the Open Meetings Act by inappropriately holding closed meetings, calling improper special meetings as power plays on days when certain board members are not able to attend a meeting or voting on matters without a proper quorum. Last summer, the Board appears to have tried a new tactic to remove Spratt as an obstacle to their lawbreaking by filing a restraining order against her…but a judge quashed that gambit. This followed the Board attempting to remove Spratt as the director without any proper grounds for doing so…and the Board not being able to list a single thing she did wrong as director. The Board appeared intent on getting rid of Spratt because she was a consistent voice of reason that got in the way of whatever crazy or illegal thing the Board wanted to do.

This being Illinois, it should come as no surprise that this story ends with the good person feeling forced to leave her job while the bad public officials succeed in getting rid of her. Without Jacqueline Spratt in place to push back against the lawbreaking and looting of the Library’s coffers, it’s sad to think about the Bellwood community having no one to say “NO!” to this reckless and out-of-control board. The Bellwood Public Library is a true gem in an area often neglected in Chicagoland. It needs people like Spratt to thrive (let alone survive).

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Source: "Sad News for Community as Bellwood Public Library’s Director Jacqueline Spratt Forced Out by Board Power Plays," by Kevin DuJan, Illinois Leaks "Edgar County Watchdogs," 29 March 2018.

Sad News for Community as Bellwood Public Library’s Director Jacqueline Spratt Forced Out by Board Power Plays https://t.co/4ZYbNw96X0 pic.twitter.com/MPtX8UsFWJ

— EdgarCountyWatchdogs (@ECWDogs) March 29, 2018

Library director Jacqueline Spratt quits @BellwoodPubLib cuz Board of Trustees is corrupt: https://t.co/G0XB63z3eQ via @ECWDogs

She should win @DanielHandler @lemonysnicket award @ALALibrary for adversity. @ala_united #OpenGov #FOIA #FoiaFriday #libchat #women pic.twitter.com/QBBWjpNtVD

— Dan Kleinman (@SafeLibraries) March 30, 2018

I hereby recommend the American Library Association award former Bellwood Public Library Director Jacqueline Spratt with its "Paul Howard Award for Courage" or its "Lemony Snicket Prize for Noble Librarians Faced With Adversity":

http://www.ala.org/awardsgrants/lemony-snicket

—

URL of this page: 
safelibraries.blogspot.com/2018/03/crooked-library-board.html

On Twitter: 
@ALALibrary @BellwoodPubLib @ECWDogs

Follow @SafeLibraries

Brave Librarian Ignores False Censorship Charges to Keep Fifty Shades of Grey Out of Harford County Public Library

Mary Hastler is a brave library director who has ignored the false censorship charges to keep Fifty Shades of Grey out of the Harford County Public Library.  She is a model library director.  Read about her and her decision here:

• "Harford County Librarian Comfortable With Her Decision Not To Carry 'Fifty Shades of Grey'; Lifelong Book Lover Says She's Not a Censor But Novel Strays Too Close to Pornography to Fit County Collection," by Childs Walker, The Baltimore Sun, 4 June 2012.

Think about it—why is it even news that a library director properly applies library selection policy to keep out pornography?

Here is an email I wrote to her and to the Harford County government:

Dear Mary Hastler, Harford County Public Library Director,

Re: http://www.baltimoresun.com/features/books/read-street/bal-fifty-shades-of-grey-ban-defended-by-librarian-20120605,0,7776944.story

You are a true gem, someone willing to do what's right, someone fulfilling her duties on behalf of the public.  You have stood up to the false claims of "censorship" and "banning" by complying with your library's book selection policy, then standing by that decision in the face of the tremendous pressure otherwise.  Such pressure has, for example, caused other library directors, such as in Brevard County, FL, to cave in to the pressure and reverse their original decisions.

I feel your local government should appropriately recognize and/or reward you for being a true public servant dedicated to the public, not to the diktat of people and organizations bringing great pressure to bear on you and your community, including the media with its false talk about bans and censorship.  After all, your library was created by some legal instrument and given broad but not unlimited power, and the government has the right and duty to ensure the library complies with that law, and I'll bet "anything goes" is not part of that law.

As if you did not already know, the US Supreme Court stands four square behind you regarding your decision on Fifty Shades of Grey:

US v. American Library Association, 539 US 194 (2003) [US v. ALA], is mainly about Internet filters, but the plurality and various dissents discuss book selection policies, says that libraries have broad discretion to make decisions under these policies if not ideologically driven, anything-goes policies are not appropriate for public libraries, and most libraries exclude pornography from print collections:

     Public libraries pursue the worthy missions of facilitating learning and cultural enrichment.  Appellee ALA's Library Bill of Rights states that libraries should provide "[b]ooks and other ... resources ... for the interest, information, and enlightenment of all people of the community the library serves."  201 F. Supp. 2d, at 420 (internal quotation marks omitted).  To fulfill their traditional missions, public libraries must have broad discretion to decide what material to provide to their patrons.  Although they seek to provide a wide array of information, their goal has never been to provide "universal coverage."  Id., at 421. Instead, public libraries seek to provide materials "that would be of the greatest direct benefit or interest to the community."  Ibid.  To this end, libraries collect only those materials deemed to have "requisite and appropriate quality."  Ibid.  See W. Katz, Collection Development: The Selection of Materials for Libraries 6 (1980) ("The librarian's responsibility ... is to separate out the gold from the garbage, not to preserve everything"); F. Drury, Book Selection xi (1930) ("[I]t is the aim of the selector to give the public, not everything it wants, but the best that it will read or use to advantage"); App. 636 (Rebuttal Expert Report of Donald G. Davis, Jr.) ("A hypothetical collection of everything that has been produced is not only of dubious value, but actually detrimental to users trying to find what they want to find and really need").
....
A library's need to exercise judgment in making collection decisions depends on its traditional role in identifying suitable and worthwhile material....  Most libraries already exclude pornography from their print collections because they deem it inappropriate for inclusion.  We do not subject these decisions to heightened scrutiny....
....  

[Justice Stevens dissent:]
      As the plurality recognizes, we have always assumed that libraries have discretion when making decisions regarding what to include in, and exclude from, their collections.  That discretion is comparable to the " 'business of a university ... to determine for itself on academic grounds who may teach, what may be taught, how it shall be taught, and who may be admitted to study.' "  Sweezy v. New Hampshire, 354 U. S. 234, 263 (1957) (Frankfurter, J., concurring in result) (citation omitted).4  As the District Court found, one of the central purposes of a library is to provide information for educational purposes: " 'Books and other library resources should be provided for the interest, information, and enlightenment of all people of the community the library serves.' "  201 F. Supp. 2d, at 420 (quoting the American Library Association's Library Bill of Rights).  Given our Nation's deep commitment "to safeguarding academic freedom" and to the "robust exchange of ideas," Keyishian v. Board of Regents of Univ. of State of N. Y., 385 U. S. 589, 603 (1967), a library's exercise of judgment with respect to its collection is entitled to First Amendment protection.  

[Justice Souter dissent, Justice Ginsburg joining:]
     Public libraries are indeed selective in what they acquire to place in their stacks, as they must be.  There is only so much money and so much shelf space, and the necessity to choose some material and reject the rest justifies the effort to be selective with an eye to demand, quality, and the object of maintaining the library as a place of civilized enquiry by widely different sorts of people.  Selectivity is thus necessary and complex, and these two characteristics explain why review of a library's selection decisions must be limited: the decisions are made all the time, and only in extreme cases could one expect particular choices to reveal impermissible reasons (reasons even the plurality would consider to be illegitimate), like excluding books because their authors are Democrats or their critiques of organized Christianity are unsympathetic.  See Board of Ed., Island Trees Union Free School Dist. No. 26 v. Pico, 457 U. S. 853, 870-871 (1982) (plurality opinion).  Review for rational basis is probably the most that any court could conduct, owing to the myriad particular selections that might be attacked by someone, and the difficulty of untangling the play of factors behind a particular decision.

I included that US Supreme Court language so that anyone else who sees it can begin to realize they need to clear their heads of the false claims of book banning and censorship when a library chooses to apply its selection policy.  After all, why even have a selection policy if anything goes?  Why have material reconsideration policies if anything goes?

I can say so much more, but I'll save it for now.

Given the caving in of the library director in Brevard County, FL, the ACLU/NCAC will use that opportunity to file additional legal threats with other libraries to force them to jettison their own selection policies.  You, Mary Hastler, stand out as a bright example to show just how empty are such legal threats.  You have to be heard.

Above I linked the article where I learned about your true grit.  It is entitled with the word "ban" right in the title even though that has absolutely nothing to do with the story.  It is an example of how the media bends stories to the will of others to fool the public into thinking something nefarious has occurred, instead of something actually praised by the US Supreme Court in US v. ALA, etc.

Therefore, I hereby offer you a forum to write freely on the matter, and I stress the importance of doing so to counter the pyrrhic success of the ACLU/NCAC in Brevard County, and the like.  People need to hear from you so that the ACLU/NCAC/ALA is not the only voice discussing the issue, and they intentionally mislead people.  For example, they did not advise Brevard County of the US v. ALA decision that says the exact opposite of the misinformation they chose to spread.  As I am the nation's leading critic of the ALA's Office for Intellectual Freedom negative policies (as opposed to its positive ones), my SafeLibraries blog gets a lot of views and would be an ideal platform to have your say.  I hope you will consider guest posting on my blog, as others have: http://safelibraries.blogspot.com/p/guest-posts.html  Your words will go a long way toward educating other communities when they come under legal threats and heavy pressure from various interest groups and the media.  And you can interact with people in the comments section as well.

So brava to you for the excellent work you have done and for your backbone.  I hope the Harford County government sees you as the gem I do.

Call any time.


NOTE ADDED 8 JUNE 2012:

Found this from the library director herself:

• "Harford County Library Did Not Censor 'Fifty Shades of Grey,'" by Mary Hastler, The Baltimore Sun, 6 June 2012.

And look at one example of how she is attacked by her own profession (a common occurrence), an example the ALA sent around to thousands.  See how the ALA is held up as the authoritative voice to follow, even though the US Supreme Court proved the "Library Bill of Rights" to be flawed/overbroad:

• "Censoring Books Isn't Part of a Librarian's Job Description," by Anna A. Baker, The Baltimore Sun, 7 June 2012.

That reminds me:

"The ... elites have convinced themselves that they are taking a stand against cultural tyranny.  ....  [T]he reality is that it is those who cry 'Censorship!' the loudest who are the ones trying to stifle speech and force their moral world-view on others."

And libraries use the same selection policy to censor out any books whatsoever with which they disagree politically, say books about ex-gays:

• "How Selection is Used to Censor: The ALA, Conservative Christians, and the Annoyed Librarian's Tour de Force," by Dan Kleinman, SafeLibraries, 8 October 2008. 

NOTE ADDED 11 JUNE 2012:

THIS IS A MUST READ:

• "Fifty Shades of Illogical," by Annoyed Librarian, Library Journal, 11 June 2012.

NOTE ADDED 13 JUNE 2012:

As the NCAC is now directly attacking the Harford County Public Library and using substantially the same letter as it used in Brevard County, I just published this in support of Harford County:

• "NCAC Pushes Porn on Libraries; Fifty Shades of Grey Propaganda: Brevard Buckles, Harford Holds," by Dan Kleinman, SafeLibraries, 13 June 2012.

Follow @SafeLibraries