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Library no place for gay pride display, Storms says

The Hillsborough commissioner said she will ask that displays like those at two area libraries be banned.

By BILL VARIAN
Published June 9, 2005

TAMPA - Two Hillsborough County commissioners say public libraries are no place for Gay and Lesbian Pride Month exhibits.

Commissioner Ronda Storms said she will schedule the issue for a board discussion where she intends to ask that such displays be banned. As the mother of a 6-year-old daughter, she said she does not want to be forced to explain homosexuality and transexuality if her child passes such a display and starts asking questions.

"I do not want to have to explain to my daughter what it means to question one's sexuality," Storms said during a budget workshop Wednesday.

Commission Chairman Jim Norman said that he, too, is concerned and said a policy discussion is warranted given that commissioners approve how money is spent on library operations. He noted that commissioners have previously taken a stand on such issues, voting roughly a decade ago to yank county funding from the annual Gay and Lesbian Film Festival.

Commissioner Kathy Castor was alone in expressing opposition to such a move Wednesday.

"I would hope this board would not use this dais to promote discrimination," Castor said. "I think it would be a terrible thing to put something like this on the agenda."

The exchange came a day after a story in the St. Petersburg Times noted that a book display honoring Gay and Lesbian Pride Month was taken down at West Gate Regional Library in Town 'N Country after some patrons complained. Library officials have since said it was a misunderstanding that led to the dismantling of the display, which they intend put back up in another part of the building.

A similar display is at the John F. Germany Library on Ashley Drive in downtown Tampa. It includes three shelves of books in the adult fiction section.

Library Services Director Joe Stines said the West Gate display was initially done by a part-time employee and a student who had designed a poster to highlight a bibliography of books with gay or lesbian themes. The poster was not professionally prepared, he said, which is why it was taken down.

"It certainly isn't in the children's area," Stines said after the meeting Wednesday.

Storms said she is not seeking to have any books about gay issues removed from the libraries. She said she just doesn't want them promoted in places where children are likely to see them, which could be anyplace in the library.

"This uses government to promote a political perspective," she said after Wednesday's meeting. "Whether we should have pride in homosexuality is a political perspective."

--Bill Varian can be reached at 813 226-3387 or varian@sptimes.com

[Last modified June 9, 2005, 06:12:45]