Library budget full of woke spending

By John Labriola - For years, Citrus County libraries have subscribed to a magazine called BookPage, a monthly publication with reviews of recommended new books to read. 

A stack of the magazines are prominently displayed in each of the system's five branch libraries, so anyone walking into a library can see them. The taxpayer-funded library system spends $3,300 a year on this annual subscription because it purchases a total of 500 copies so that patrons can pick them up, take them home and keep them without having to check them out. 

In case you haven't ever leafed through it, the magazine is extremely woke and specializes in recommending books that push LGBT, DEI, CRT and witchcraft themes, and it demonizes parents who try to shield their children from pornography as "book banners." 

While not every book recommended in BookPage is overtly political, the books that do have a political bent are invariably left-wing. The magazine never recommends a book by a conservative author such as Ben Carson, and its reviews and interviews with authors drip with scorn and contempt for conservative and Christian values, which are often labeled "transphobic," "racist," and "authoritarian."
 
Recent editions have included such recommended titles as:
  • "That Librarian" by Amanda Jones, in which the author describes being a pro-LGBT school librarian who openly defies parents wishing to remove pornographic materials from the school, which the magazine characterizes as "book bans" that cause kids to kill themselves, a ridiculous claim with no evidence behind it. In the review, the author is quoted as militantly declaring: "I'll be damned if I'm going to stand in silence while we lose another kid because of something our community has done to make them feel less." 
  • "The Unlikely Pursuit of Mary Bennet" by Carina Adores, which reimagines Jane Austen characters as lesbians, a change the reviewer states is "the best and only way to improve upon Austen."
  • "Rebel in the Deep" by Katee Robert, about a "queer power throuple."
  • "Hot Girls with Balls" by Benedict Nguyen, a book about "trans girls."
  • "The Lilac People" by Milo Todd, which compares modern conservatives working to stop trans madness to Hitler in 1930s Germany. The reviewer states: "Todd's soulful and suspenseful account of trans people fighting for survival amid political persecution could hardly be timelier." (The review clearly reeks of scorn for anyone wanting to stop the terrible (and increasingly homicidal) harm the trans movement inflicts on women and children.)
  • "The Honey Witch" by Sidney J. Shields, about lesbian witches.
  • "The Witching Year" by Diana Helmuth, in which the author describes gathering pentacles and other witchcraft paraphernalia, using spells, and engaging in rituals with fellow witches.
  • "The 1619 Project: A Visual Experience," a reframing of American history that completely distorts facts and casts the country as irredeemably racist.
  • "Misbehaving at the Crossroads" by Honorée Fanonne Jeffers, which not only attacks Donald Trump as "authoritarian" but casts the foundation of the United States as racist, and attacks Thomas Jefferson and the Declaration of Independence for "not covering any Indigenous peoples, or White women, or Black folks with the grace of liberty." 
  • "The Girls who Grew Big" by Leila Mottley, which complains about "the many intertwined injustices of racism, restricted abortion access, homophobia, prejudice and the lack of secure safety nets."
Sadly, BookPage's prominent place in the library amounts to an endorsement by the Citrus County Library System of its far-left views, and the magazine's recommendations create a demand by patrons for the library to purchase the very books it recommends.

But the Citrus County Library Advisory Board (LAB) can put an end to the county's BookPage subscription this coming Tuesday during its annual budget meeting, where it will be considering the entire $5.6 million proposed library budget for 2025-26. 

In addition to the BookPage subscription, the proposed library budget includes a $322,570 line item to purchase 1,300 books a month for the library system, which often allows highly inappropriate materials to slip in unvetted, as happened recently with "Jack of Hearts (and Other Parts)," an LGBT teen novel that was discovered to be pornographic and removed from Citrus County's library shelves after a citizen complained. 

After listening to residents on Tuesday, the LAB will make its recommendations on the budget, which could include canceling the BookPage subscription and making other cuts. The County Commission generally adopts the LAB's recommendations.

The meeting will take place on Tuesday, Aug. 26, at 9 a.m. in Room 166 of the Lecanto Government Building, 3600 W Sovereign Path, Lecanto, FL 34461. Residents are encouraged to attend and give their input.

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