Rochester Residents Debate Library's Web Policy
-- Library Journal, 4/16/2007
Citizens in Rochester don't seem as keen as Monroe County Executive Maggie Brooks to crack down on "porn at the library" if it means a draconian filter policy. Brooks had threatened to pull $6.6 million in funding for the Central Library in Rochester and its services to 34 member libraries in the Monroe County Library System if they didn't block all pornography. The board in Rochester as well as library administrators agreed to take another look at the library policy. The policy had allowed disabling of the filter on request by adults, tracking advice given by the American Library Association regarding the Children's Internet Protection Agency; however, in the wake of Brooks's threat, the library decided to stop disabling the filter.
According to a report in the Democrat and Chronicle, a forum last Thursday drew more than 100 people; about one in three of the attendees spoke, with two-thirds of them supporting the library's previous policy. "The current discussion is not about pornography, rather it is about censorship," said one commenter. Another responded that pornography didn't belong in the library, period: "We don't let strip clubs open next to schools." John Lovenheim, president of the Rochester Public Library and a member of the task force established to review the policy, said they were taking Brooks' threat seriously, "because she said it, and she put it in writing."
