NSLS Blogs
Ad Lib: Advocacy for Libraries
April 1, 2009
Get House Support for LSTA Today!
ALA has sent out an urgent call to action:
Please contact your Representative and ask him or her to sign the “Dear Colleague” letter being circulated by Congressman Raul Grijalva in support of funding for the Library Services and Technology Act (LSTA) and the Improving Literacy Through School Libraries Program.
The deadline to sign the letter is Wednesday April 1! LSTA and Improving Literacy Through School Libraries are two of the most important federal programs for libraries today. The letter will not be taken seriously, and it will appear as if Members of Congress do not care about libraries if we don’t have hundreds of signers on the letter. Programs that don’t have a vocal support network are in danger of being cut.
The letter is addressed to the House Labor, Health and Human Services and Education Appropriation Subcommittees and requests that the House include $300 million for the Library Services and Technology Act (LSTA) and $100 million for the Improving Literacy Through School Libraries program for FY 2010.
Once you have convinced your Representative to sign onto the letter, you must have him or her call Joseph Mais in order to co-sign the letter at 202.225.2435.
NSLS doesn’t have any Congressmen on the Subcommittee of Labor, Health and Human Services, and Education (but Illinois does: Rep. Jesse Jackson, Jr., IL-2), but that shouldn’t stop you from letting your representatives from knowing your position on this issue. All members of the House can sign on to the “Dear Colleague” letter, and as ALA says, the more legislators who have signed on, the more importance the issue is seen to have.
As always, you can find your legislators’ contact information in NSLS’s Legislative Directory.
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Alan
at
11:06 am
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September 25, 2008
Senate Overrides a Mixed Bag for Illinois Libraries
As you may know, the Illinois state Senate reconvened this week to vote on a couple of the governor’s vetoes — HB 4527 and SB 2321 — with mixed results for the library community. As ILA reports in ILA Update #13 (not yet on their website):
The Illinois Senate just overrode the governor’s amendatory veto of HB 4527 increasing the equalization and school grants formulas. The senate override passed on a vote 55 to 0. As the Illinois House of Representatives has already overridden the governor’s veto, this bill will now become law as originally passed in the form ILA supported. [emphasis in original] Just to be clear, the governor’s suggested changes that would have mandated minimum operating hours for libraries will not become law. Senator Watson (R-51, Greenville) gave an impassioned speech in favor of local library control and opposing the governor’s proposed operating hours mandate.
…
The Illinois Senate just defeated the motion to override the governor’s veto of [SB 2321] the county law library fee increase bill. The override motion fell two votes short of the super majority needed to override. The vote was 34 to override, 21 against the ride override. This bill now appears dead for this year and would have to be resurrected next session.
Sponsored by Senator Donne E. Trotter (D-17, Chicago), the bill would have allowed county boards to authorize an increase in county law library fees (now, $13) of not more than (i) $18 in 2008, (ii) $19 in 2009, and (iii) $21 in 2010 and thereafter.
If either of these votes impacts your libraries for the better, or if you just want to be a voice of support to the library community, why not give your legislators a call to let them know that their vote is important to you. You can find out how your senator voted on SB 2321 at the ILGA site, and of course you can always get your legislators’ contact info from NSLS’s legislative directory.
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Alan
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9:18 am
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August 21, 2008
Blagojevich Goes 1-2 on Library Bills
Governor Blagojevich has been busy this week.
As ILA reports, he has signed the Internet Safety Education Curriculum Bill into law, but has vetoed two other library-related bills: a per capita equalization grant bill, and a bill supporting an increase in county law library fees.
On the first vetoed bill, ILA’s Bob Doyle writes:
In ILA’s estimation, the governor’s changes take away local control and greatly adds to the cost of providing local library service. While the ILA Public Policy Committee and the ILA Executive Board have not taken a formal position yet, ILA will most likely oppose the governor’s changes. The sponsor of the bill will likely ask for an override of the governor’s changes during the Fall 2008 Veto Session in November. ILA assumes that the Illinois Secretary of State’s Office will oppose the governor’s action, since this changes the intention of their legislation.
The House is expected to override the governor’s action; it is unclear what action the Senate may take; and if both chambers override the governor’s veto, then HB 4527 will become law as originally passed. If the Illinois General Assembly fails to override the governor veto, then both the original bill and the amendatorily vetoed bill will both fail.
And on the second, Bob just states that “ILA will work for an override of the governor’s veto during the Fall 2008 Veto Session in November.”
If you’re interested in hearing more about these bills, or want to get a sense of ILA’s next steps on them, you might want to stop by NSLS (or another system headquarters, if one is closer to you) on Monday, September 8 at noon for ILA’s Public Policy Committee meeting.
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Alan
at
12:15 pm
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July 23, 2008
COPA Struck Down by 3rd Circuit Court
A bit of news on the internet access front today:
The Child Online Protection Act suffers from a slew of fatal flaws that render the law unconstitutional under the First Amendment, the 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals has ruled.
. . .
The unanimous three-judge panel found that COPA’s criminal penalties for allowing minors to access “harmful” material on the Internet is not the “least restrictive” means of protecting children because filtering software accomplishes the same goals.
This law has been fought by the ACLU for going on ten years now, and this is not the first time it’s been struck down by the courts. Federally-mandated steps to protect (or try to protect, anyhow) children on the internet is a topic that’s long been on the radar of library associations, so this decision is being touted as a victory in many library circles.
The Law.com article linked to above has a pretty detailed history of this legislation and the court cases surrounding it, and the ALA page I linked to can give you a good sense of where they stand on the various laws on this subject. Give them a look!
posted by
Alan
at
2:25 pm
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