Volusia Council backs away from children's book review

After getting public pushback, Volusia County Council members voted 6-0 to drop plans to examine how children's library books are reviewed and how controversial books might be prohibited for kids.

Councilman Don Dempsey and Council Chair Jeff Brower said a "book ban" process was never the intent. Councilman David Santiago wasn't at the meeting.

In April Dempsey asked for county staff to bring back information on how library books for children are reviewed. Dempsey said at the time that he wanted to discuss the current process and whether there should be more oversight on what books are made available for children.

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He said after the meeting in April that he was not in favor of "any type of prohibition or censorship by government on what people can read as adults."

"But when it comes to children I think, you know, there needs to be at least a forum for parents to vet their concerns," Dempsey said.

Dropping the discussion

The issue came up during a discussion about advisory boards and possibly ending the library board and some other boards. The council still plans to discuss that issue.

But Dempsey said on Tuesday that he wanted to drop the discussion on the review process. He said before eliminating the library advisory board he wanted to make sure that they didn't have decision-making authority about books, which he learned that they don't. He also said he's learned that there have been no complaints about library books.

"I know we voted unanimously to look at this, but I don't think any of us intended to create a book-banning type of scenario. We just wanted to see how the library was running. So in order to alleviate a lot of this fear I was going to move that we just remove that discussion from the future agenda," Dempsey said.

Public pushback

In his closing comments at the meeting, Brower said he's been getting posts on social media asking why he would participate in book bannings and book burnings.

"I want to make it clear to the public that although Mr. Dempsey just took that discussion on books off, that was never said. It was never said that we were going to ban any books, certainly not burn any books. The concern was children's books, what is the process for getting there ... (and) what happens if a member of the public has a problem with it," Brower said.

In other business...

• The Volusia Sheriff's Office already has a presence at the county's Beach Safety operations unit as both agencies prepare for a transition in light of pending legislation, County Manager George Recktenwald said. If approved, the legislation would put beach law enforcement under the control of the sheriff's office.

• Councilman Jake Johansson said he wants to discuss the option of posting county legal notices on the county website instead of in the newspaper.

• The council confirmed a few new leaders on Tuesday. They unanimously confirmed John Bailey as Information Technology Division director, Kevin Captain as Emergency Medical Services Division director, and Bobbie King as Transit Services Division director. Bailey is leaving the assistant IT director position, Captain is leaving his role as county spokesman and King has been serving as interim director of the Transit Services Division.

• The county has begun installing TrapBag systems along vulnerable parts of the coast as part of $5 million in emergency sand placement funding from the state, Public Works Director Ben Bartlett said.

• The county council unanimously approved paying about $747,122 total over five years to Axon Enterprises to add body cameras for corrections officers who deal with inmates. The county plans to have cameras up and running in a couple of months.

• The county denied an appeal of the county's decision that a short-term rental at 6901 S. Atlantic Avenue in New Smyrna Beach is not a legal nonconforming use. Owner Pete Vega is part of litigation against the county over its handling of vacation rentals and enforcement against his property.

• The council will have a goal-setting special meeting at 3 p.m. on May 10 in council chambers at the administration building at 123 W. Indiana Ave. in DeLand. The meeting will be streamed live at volusia.org.

• District 4 Councilman Troy Kent will host a community meeting from 5 p.m. to 6 p.m. on May 15 in the Ormond Beach Regional Library auditorium at 30 S. Beach St. For information call the county manager’s office at 386-736-5920.

This article originally appeared on The Daytona Beach News-Journal: Volusia Council takes kids' library book review discussion off table