James LaRue - myliblog

[This column appeared in the August 28, 2024 edition of the Sopris Sun.] Did you know that there are more public library buildings in Garfield County (and in the nation) than there are McDonald's, Starbucks, or City Markets? We hold our own with traffic, too. There are the young ones who come to storytimes, the moms who bring them, the local businessmen and women working from laptops and library wifi, the seniors showing up for meetings and exercises to stay sharp. But there's something more important than the presence and use of the library. People trust us. A study by Pew Research found that 40% trust libraries "a lot," and 38% trust us "some"--both of which are about double the rate of local and national media. Part of that, I'm convinced, is that libraries have typically been established and administered by smart and service-oriented women. They're not in it for glory or money. They're in it because they believe institutions of knowledge mak...

[This column appeared in the Post Independent (serving Glenwood Springs and Garfield County, Colorado) on August 23, 2024.] Back in 2007 I wrote a book about understanding and responding to attempts to remove or restrict access to library resources. Mostly, that meant challenges to books. But I fielded challenges to almost everything a library offers: exhibits, programs, artwork, databases. On the one hand, those challenges represented a tiny percentage of library use. In the 24 years I was director of the Douglas County Libraries we had 250 challenges. That sounds like a lot. But in my last year alone we checked out over 8 million titles. We offered thousands of programs. Every public institution has its critics, but they were clearly a minority of our community. (The same thing is true in Garfield County. So far in 2024, we've received two challenges to graphic novels. In the same time period, we've checked out over 50,000 children's books.) I got interested in the deep...