http://www.snponline.com/articles/2010/03/15/upper_arlington_news/opinion/letters/ualytlelet_20100310_0508pm_3.txt

Letter: Library board appointees raise a lot of questions

Published: Wednesday, March 10, 2010 5:42 PM EST

To the Editor:

I was appalled when I read about Upper Arlington City Council's president, Frank Ciotola, and his appointments to the Library Board.

Sixteen people put in their applications by the published deadline, Nov. 16, but apparently they were not the right people. All three of those appointed to the board submitted their applications more than seven weeks late, between Jan. 6 and 9.

My question is, "What was wrong with the other 16 applicants?" Why did Mr. Ciotola choose three people who all submitted their applications far past the published deadline?

You may remember that some anti-gay conservatives tried to have materials censored in the library that they did not like. They promised to pack the Library Board to get those materials removed, and now they have done that.

I am one citizen of Upper Arlington who believes that having the sole authority to appoint Library Board members places too much power in the hands of the president of council. We have seen that this authority can be abused. A true deadline should be set and all Library Board members voted on by City Council.

I suspect the Library Board will soon vote to ban materials in the library. We will have Frank Ciotola to thank for that sad day.

John Lytle

Krista Sisterhen was recently appointed to Upper Arlington's Library Board of Trustees.

Unlike the 16 other applications for Trustees who submitted their applications using the publicly posted process, Sisterhen's and her fellow appointees applications were handled privately and kept away from the sunshine of the normal submission process through the UA City Clerk.

Here's a summary and links to some publicly available information about Sisterhen:

Under the Taft administration, the Governor's Office on Faith-based and Community Initiatives awarded We Care America, a firm with ties to the Bush administration, a $2.1 million, 20-month contract beginning in September 2005.

As Director of this office, Sisterhen approved and signed the $3,500 a day contract with We Care America to administer faith based and community based contracts.

Things went astray with We Care America, but they weren't discovered until 2007 --- after Sisterhen was already out of office.

• Dayton Daily News: Money for faith-based work went astray, records show. The article revealed that the organization use TANF funds to pay for reserved parking spaces, two 50-inch flat screen televisions that don’t work, and a “study” that praised their work.
• Then suddenly We Care America closed, staff disappeared, phone lines were disconnected, and 15 groups complained that they have not received payments totaling $78,370 from We Care
• Dayton Daily News: Faith-based grant company shuts down
• Dayton Daily News: Contractor's offices are vacant; only questions remain

Governor Strickland then asked the Ohio Inspector General Tom Charles to investigate the whole mess.

After leaving the post in the Taft administration Sisterhen found her way on to another quasi public payroll, serving as the area manager for faith-based and community initiatives at the Corporation for National and Community Service.

Timeline

July 2003: Governor's Office on Faith-based and Community Initiatives established by law.

October 2003: Gov. Taft appointed Sisterhen the director of the newly established Governor's Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives

September 2005: Sisterhen contracts with ‘We Care America’ to administer contracts.

January 2006: Sisterhen resigns, and new Gov. Ted Strickland replaces staff and begins reviewing grants and contracts.

March 2006: Strickland asks state Inspector General Tom Charles to investigate, and the Ohio Department of Job and Family Services to audit the office.

June 2006: Sisterhen teaches class at the 10th Annual 2006 Smart Marriages Conference:

Getting State Money: The 1% Solution
Chris Gersten, Krista Sisterhen, Mary Myrick
Learn how to access state marriage money - how to open doors and build relationships with state and federal elected and appointed officials.

2007: Results of Strickland's audit of Sisterhen's office is made public

New mayor starts term with closed-door decision

"...nearly all of the residents who were interested submitted their [Library Board of Trustees] applications by the deadline published by the city -- except for the three who were actually appointed, all of whom prepared their applications nearly two months late and within a few days of each other." Click on the newspaper image to see the full story with the chart.

During his effort to censor gay periodicals in the Upper Arlington Public Library in 2005, then UA Council member Tim Rankin said,

"If we have to put people on this [Library] board who reflect the values of the community, we'll do that."

According to a story in the February 4th, 2010 edition of ThisWeek [PDF] [JPG], it would seem that UA's new mayor, Frank Ciotola, has made good on Rankin's threat.

Within a few days of being elected Council President, Ciotola made it one of his first acts to appoint three hand-picked recruits to the Library Board. All 3 appointees:

• delivered their applications directly to the current Council President, Frank Ciotola, not to the City Clerks Office (source: UA Clerk's Office)
• submitted applications a month and a half after the posted November 16, 2009 deadline
• completed their applications within 4 days of each other on Jan 6, 8 and 9th, 2010

Ciotola's appointees to the Library Board of Trustees had a fast track outside the normal process, which typically includes a review of applicants with other Council members.

Ciotola: "I wish the deadline had not been published"

And now Ciotola wants to remove what little transparency remains in the current Library Board appointment process. In the ThisWeek story, Ciotola said he wishes the Library Board application deadline had not been published at all!

https://members.ala.org/nif/v54n6/success_stories.html

Upper Arlington, Ohio

Two free newspapers distributed in Upper Arlington library lobbies are not obscene and are not harmful to juveniles, according to a preliminary report presented at a library board meeting July 12. The Gay People's Chronicle and Outlook Weekly will continue to be distributed at the libraries. But a separate legal opinion by the Franklin County prosecutor's office said that all free publications could be removed from the lobbies and put behind a counter.

The report was prepared by library board president Mark Magill and trustee Dan Boda, who held a public hearing five days earlier on whether the two lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender papers should be removed from the Columbus suburb's library system. Led by resident Mark Bloom and Upper Arlington council member Tim Rankin, a small group wanted the papers taken out of the libraries, where many free publications are available to be picked up.

The board meeting drew a much smaller crowd of about forty people, compared to the over one hundred twenty attending the public hearing. Boda recapped the nature of the hearing. “Even though almost all of the forty-two people [speaking at the hearing] addressed the Gay People's Chronicle and Outlook,” he said, “we are forming a policy that addresses all aspects of all the free material available at our libraries.”

Two issues were examined by Magill and Boda: if the two gay publications should be immediately removed for being first, pornographic or second, harmful to juveniles. Boda said that after consulting with the city's prosecutor's office, they determined that the two papers “were neither.” They “don't fit any of those definitions,” he said.

Franklin County Prosecuting Attorney Ron O'Brien's office wrote an opinion on the matter's legal aspects for the library. Written by First Assistant Prosecuting Attorney Patrick E. Sheeran, the document has three main findings. First, if and when the board decided to take any action, “materials may not be totally banned unless they are found by the board to be obscene.” The second finding was that, “Access to such material may not be restricted unless the board finds them to be, or tending to be, materials that are harmful to juveniles.” The third finding states, “The Upper Arlington Library Board may constitutionally avoid making such determinations by removing all materials from the foyer and restricting them to library patrons who request them.”

The legal brief, which cites precedents in similar matters, also said, “The fact that some materials may be harmful to juveniles does not authorize a library from an outright prohibition of those items. In fact, the Supreme Court has held to the contrary: a total ban is not constitutionally permissible.”

Reported in: Gay People's Chronicle, July 22.

http://www.acrl.org/ala/alonline/currentnews/newsarchive/2005abc/september2005abc/upperarlington.cfm

Ohio Library Retains Gay Weeklies Despite Protests

The board of the Upper Arlington (Ohio) Public Library has voted unanimously to retain for free distribution the gay-interest periodicals Outlook Weekly and Gay People’s Chronicle, although trustees agreed that the weeklies’ location be moved to a more secure area of the library. “We are a public library receiving tax dollars and have an obligation to provide materials and not censor those materials on a content basis,” stated trustee John Burtch at the board’s August 30 meeting.

A report explaining the reasons for the materials’ relocation noted, “We have learned that some controversial material is being taken in bulk, so as to prevent distribution to other patrons”—an apparent allusion to resident Mark Bloom’s June 14 admission to trustees that he and his four children had been throwing copies of the two periodicals in the trash.

Citing advice from legal counsel as well as library staff, the document explains how circulating community newspapers fit into the library’s mission: “Free access to material can raise public awareness of issues, help people become better informed, and provide them the tools necessary to form their own opinions.” It goes on to say, “One of the most important First Amendment principles is that government may not prohibit expression because of the viewpoint expressed.”

Opponents of the weeklies’ presence in the library disrupted the August 30 meeting by reading passages from Outlook Weekly and Gay People’s Chronicle; some people were removed by police officers after refusing to stop. “The materials are lewd, salacious, lascivious—and a bunch of other big words of legal significance,” resident Bruce Cameron said in the September 1 Chillicothe Gazette, adding, “In normal parlance, [they’re] disgusting, obscene, and pornographic.”

Posted September 2, 2005.

http://www.acrl.org/ala/alonline/currentnews/newsarchive/2005abc/july2005a/upperarlington.cfm

Ohio Library Pressured to Pull Free Gay Weeklies

Officials of the Upper Arlington (Ohio) Public Library have sought legal counsel in the wake of demands by several area residents that the library stop making available in its lobby the free newspapers Outlook Weekly and Gay People’s Chronicle. Characterizing the publications’ library presence as “out front strictly for politically correct reasons,” resident Mark Bloom admitted to UAPL trustees June 14 that he and his four children have removed the newspapers and thrown them in the trash on several occasions. “I’m not a homophobe. This is just a no-brainer. These magazines have nothing to offer,” Bloom asserted, according to the June 22–29 issue of the weekly Upper Arlington News.

A member of the Upper Arlington Republican Club, Bloom was joined in his protest by club President and city council member Tim Rankin, who told the board he advocated removal of all sexually provocative materials, specifying the annual swimsuit issue of Sports Illustrated. “Do what’s right for Upper Arlington, not what people do in other communities,” Rankin urged.

Board President John Magill promised that trustees “will take all of this into consideration” but cautioned that “our response may not be the one you want.” Bloom replied, “I’m not going away until [the gay-interest weeklies] go away.” The board’s Operations Committee, which reviews all library policies, has placed on its July 7 meeting agenda a reexamination of guidelines about offering distribution space at the library for free publications.

UAPL Director Ann Moore, who did not attend the June 14 meeting, told the News, “I am sure there are gay people in Upper Arlington, and I run a library for everybody, including them.”

Posted July 1, 2005.

http://www.dispatch.com/live/contentbe/dispatch/2005/06/24/20050624-B1-04.html

Residents want gay publications out of libraries

Friday, June 24, 2005

Leah Rupp

THE COLUMBUS DISPATCH

The gay newspapers Outlook Weekly and Gay People’s Chronicle are among the free weeklies available at the Upper Arlington libraries.

Several Upper Arlington residents want two gay publications removed from their local libraries’ lobbies.

The libraries have several free periodicals in their foyers, but the group is objecting only to Outlook Weekly and Gay People?s Chronicle, calling them "disgraceful."

A full-color cover photograph of two men about to kiss and articles about explicit sex cross the line, Mark Bloom said.

"I’m angry about this," he said. "As a heterosexual male, I can’t get a copy of Playboy at the library. What’s next? Pornographic, homosexual DVDs available to check out?"

Upper Arlington Library Director Ann Moore said the group is unfairly targeting gays.

"This just feels a little discriminatory," she said. "I am sure that there are some gay or lesbian people who live around here, and they are taxpayers, too."

Upper Arlington’s population hovers at about 34,000, but the library has more than double that number of people registered as cardholders.

"We are like any other library in Franklin County, we recognize anybody in the state of Ohio and represent all kinds of people," Moore said.

It isn’t about being opposed to homosexuality, said Tim Rankin, one of five residents who spoke to library-board members at their June 14 meeting. Rankin is a city councilman and the president of the Upper Arlington Republican Club, but said he is speaking as a concerned citizen and a father.

"I would feel the same way about a woman and man kissing," he said. "This material is a ticking time bomb ? there is no one standing around it, watching who picks it up."

The library should be rid of all materials that are sexual in nature, including Maxim and the swimsuit edition of Sports Illustrated, Rankin said. He isn’t opposing other free publications such as The Other Paper and Columbus Alive.

"You have to dig for something explicit in those," he said.

Bloom said he and his two children periodically discard stacks of the gay newspapers in bins outside their local library, which the city attorney’s office says is legal.

"Once it is in their possession, they can do it, unless they are breaking another law like littering," Jeanine Amid Hummer said.

A disclaimer on Outlook calls it theft and asks that only those who intend to read an issue take one, said Editor Chris Hayes.

He said Outlook has faced opposition in other Columbus suburbs, including Dublin.

"Our content is automatically considered more explicit because it’s on a hot topic."

The library board has asked for legal advice on the matter. Moore said the residents were told that their concerns will be taken into consideration when the board reviews the library’s operations.

"It’s best when these decisions are made at the local level so that they reflect the community," said Lynda Murray, spokeswoman for the Ohio Library Council.

She said she believes the board members are representative of Upper Arlington and is confident they’ll make the right decision.

In the meantime, Rankin says his group isn’t going away.

"I’m not opposed to any type of lifestyle. Just don’t throw it in my face."

lrupp@dispatch.com

http://www.presspassq.com/detail.cfm?id=66

October 2006

LETTERS TO THE EDITOR

Papers not restricted at Ohio library

The article “Fighting a library ban: Start with publicity, then make phone calls” (Press Pass Q, June 2006) mentions that Brian Perera, a trustee for the Upper Arlington Public Library in Ohio "introduced a measure to restrict access to" publications. Not so. I know this because I am trustee Brian Perera.

Another member of the board was sponsoring a resolution to ban four publications by name, and I suggested an alternative that would move all free publications to an area of the library where other periodicals were placed. Not in the basement or behind the counter, or where someone would have to request them — reported as such, yet inaccurate.

After the ban motion was withdrawn, I did not pursue my alternative, so the papers continue to reside on shelves in the library, where I continue to support their presence.

Many people in the alternative newspaper community were led to believe that I wanted to ban or restrict access to the papers in question. That is not true, as I am a supporter of the First Amendment and the newspapers in question.

I think this issue will resurface at some point in my serving on the board, and I plan to continue to support open access to materials.

Thank you for the opportunity to correct this item.

Brian Perera

In Upper Arlington, there was a growing intolerance of others’ views by a small, vocal social conservative minority. One of the most egregious examples is the 2005 dispute about the distribution of gay publications at the Upper Arlington Public Library. A group of conservatives tried to sway the Library Board with the claim it was protecting children.

During the effort to censor library holdings, then Councilman Tim Rankin was quoted in the September 14, 2005, Upper Arlington News as declaring that “There is a lot of talk about doing what is legally right … it’s up to the board to do what is morally right … If we have to put people on this board who reflect the values of this community, we’ll do that.”