Opinion: A Sad Day
Update 4/4/2025: F2RCCC is allowed to coordinate with the CC Libraries Manager for future food/beverage donations as long as we don't post pictures or politicize the gift. That was never our intent so that's easy enough. Regarding volunteers, I was assured that at the current time there isn't a need for volunteers however Scott Johnson will ensure that nobody is turned away regardless of affiliation in the future. However "...we will not use nor tolerate volunteers with agendas regardless of affiliation." I found that ironic because if that were true they wouldn't allow the chair of the library board to volunteer to serve with such an overt agenda. It's interesting that there appears to be a higher standard for community volunteers than for people in positions of power. Regardless, it was never anyone's intent from our group to do anything other than to support the library in whatever way would be beneficial for the library, which could have been communicated in a phone conversation instead of behind the scenes speculations.
A group of us from Freedom To Read Coalition of Columbia County (#F2RCCC) coordinated to provide lunch to the local libraries today. We weren't going to publicize it and it wasn't anything fancy - just Publix. We just wanted to show appreciation to library staff for Library Appreciation Week early because Masters is next week
We were notified early this morning that we aren't allowed to buy lunch for library staff. We also saw evidence through Open Records Requests through the weekend, and it's been confirmed anonymously by library staff, that we are also blacklisted from volunteering at the libraries as well. I know many of us in our little ragtag group of folks that just want to protect our libraries and speak out against these censorship efforts, are feeling disheartened, angry and heart broken at the discriminatory actions by our County leadership and elected officials.
I don't have many answers except, I know I must continue this fight against censorship and continue to do everything in my power to fight against these attacks on our First Amendment Rights. ~ Karin Parham
"You may encounter many defeats, but you must not be defeated." ~ Maya Angelou
Email traffic between Keisha Evans and staff members in response to her decision to not allow volunteers from “Karin’s group” to volunteer at the library. Edited to add: In this email, staff thought it would be fair to not take any new volunteer applications. However, if you look at the next document you can see that volunteers are still allowed.
A document summarizing the topics discussed at the meeting. The 2nd page is very interesting. Volunteers are allowed but it was stated verbally during this meeting that nobody from “Karin’s group” is allowed to volunteer.
From the perspective of a former employee of the CCO library who moved to a different workplace and out of the area before the pandemic, this is appalling. Like any other time when school was out, Masters week tended to be super hectic, so it was always such a deeply appreciated surprise and morale boost when volunteers and folks who wanted to support the library staff would offer or bring in food or other goodies. It seems deliberately cruel to deny staff this gift simply because it was associated with a particular group. It's concerning that staff seem to be under a lot of pressure to mask any potential stress or discomfort (due to the actions of leadership) and keep mum about potentially unethical or illegal reshelving/cataloging efforts.
As I read through these notes, I interpreted the mention of instituting staff uniforms to be a red flag for where leadership is taking the library. And those paragraphs at the end of the notes are...interesting:
"I’m not here to intimidate, scare or lead with terrorization...at the end of the day, I don’t need your agreement...Enough is enough, you either want this to work or you don’t... we do not do what we want, we do what is required."
In addition, I noticed that as of April 2025, library board meetings now commence with an invocation and the pledge of allegiance (?!). Very bizarre, very Christian nationalist-y. I wonder how much influence Mrs. Bence had over that decision. I would pretend that I don't know why such changes have been made, but the intentions behind them are patently apparent: forcing their far-right ideological standpoint on the library, its staff, and all community members who may patronize the library.
This is the sad truth and library staff had to hide it from the public. Thank you for shining a light on how deep the corruption has gone.