Library board nominations up again

By John Labriola - Five months after Citrus County sparked a statewide movement to defund the American Library Association (ALA), county leaders will be meeting in their capacity as the Library District Governing Body to make their annual appointments to the Library Advisory Board (LAB), the nine-member volunteer panel that makes policy and budget recommendations for the county's library system.

The meeting will take place at 9 a.m. on Monday, Jan. 22, at the Citrus County Courthouse, 110 N. Apopka Ave., Inverness, FL 34450. County commissioners will be joined by Inverness Councilwoman Jacquie Hepfer and Crystal River Councilman Ken Brown, who are part of the nominating body that appoints LAB members. 

Four of the five LAB incumbents whose terms are expiring this month are seeking reappointment. Of those, two have a long track record of supporting "LGBT Pride Month" propaganda displays in the libraries and the ALA, which Citrus County cut ties with last August amid a national backlash against the organization's aggressive promotion of Drag Queen Story Hours and explicit LGBT materials targeting children.

The two liberal incumbents seeking reappointment are LAB Chairwoman April McLaughlin and Vice Chairwoman Neale Brennan.

McLaughlin has been on the LAB for eight years. She became an outspoken defender of the LGBT agenda following the public outcry over the Citrus County library system's infamous June 2021 "Gay Pride" displays. After some commissioners expressed unease with the displays, McLaughlin began speaking out at commission meetings to defend the displays and accuse critics of "hate speech."

Neale Brennan, a former Citrus County Chronicle editor, has been on the LAB for over six years. In 2021, she described the LGBT propaganda displays as "information we can trust" and urged commissioners to keep them going. At a 2022 LAB meeting, Brennan recited LGBT talking points from the ALA's so-called "Bill of Rights" to defend the displays, although the ALA is a private organization with no legal authority to dictate library policy.  This past September, Brennan had a liberal meltdown at a county commission meeting where she vented her rage over the county's decision to terminate its membership in the ALA, claiming the move was motivated by "fear of lesbians."  

This month's round of LAB applicants also includes Terry Morriston, a liberal online professor, retired teacher-librarian and former LAB member. During the months of controversy surrounding the LGBT displays and subsequent library policy debates, she was part of a band of Friends of the Library members who began showing up at commission meetings in their group's yellow T-shirts in a show of solidarity for the LGBT agenda. In 2022, she spoke out against an unsuccessful motion by former County Commissioner Ron Kitchen to establish a policy to prohibit sexual orientation displays in the libraries. She also was one of just three hard-core ALA supporters who showed up at a LAB meeting last August to urge members to reject a move to end the county's affiliation with the ALA, which nonetheless passed and has since led to at least a dozen other Florida counties following in Citrus' footsteps. 

Other liberal applicants include Anthony Wayne Mozo, a retired government employee. Mozo has repeatedly made the blasphemous claim that Jesus would have welcomed "gay couples" as apostles and has insulted opponents of the LGBT agenda as "wolves" who "have no business" being on the Library Advisory Board. 

A number of conservatives also have applied for the LAB. They include two current members: Mari-Elain Ebitz, a self-employed part-time web designer who was first appointed in September to fill an open seat; and Edith Ramlow, a librarian at the College of Central Florida. Both are seeking to extend their time on the LAB. Other conservative applicants include Mark Conley, a retired corporate attorney; Lenora Jones-Nelson, a longtime Citrus County school teacher; and Mike O'Connell, a local homebuilder and business owner. 

Show your support for Ebitz, Ramlow, Conley, Jones-Nelson and O'Connell by attending and speaking at Monday morning's meeting. If you can't attend, email county leaders at the email addresses below to urge them to appoint LAB members who reflect Citrus County's conservative values and won't use their position to push the county to rejoin the ALA or bring back LGBT propaganda displays.

Ruthie Schlabach <ruthie.schlabach@citrusbocc.com> 

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