Statewide Iowa (RI) — Some agreements between public schools and local libraries would be blocked under a bill approved by an Education Committee in the Iowa House.
Library bookmobiles would be barred from school property, and the bill prohibits schools from letting students use school IDs to access books and other materials from public libraries.
Katherine Bogaards with a group called “Protect My Innocence” says the bill is needed to stop Iowa schools from going around a state law that bans school libraries from having books with sexually explicit content.
Republican Representative Brooke Boden of Indianola says the bill reinforces the 2023 law she and other legislators passed after learning kids and teens were able to check out books with graphic sexual content from some school libraries.
Representative Elinor Levin, a Democrat from Iowa City, is a former public school teacher who opposes this year’s bill, especially the ban on bookmobile visits to public schools.
Other critics say the bill would create barriers for students in schools that don’t have libraries or have limited book collections.
Christopher Rants, a lobbyist for Des Moines Public Schools, says five of the district’s schools do not have libraries and about 12,000 middle and high school students use their school ID cards at Des Moines Public Libraries.
Representative Heather Matson, a Democrat from Ankeny, says the Huxley Public Library operates as the library for middle school students in the Ballard School District.
Representative Helena Hayes of New Sharon says Republican legislators will try to find a way to let some of those agreements continue, but the bill is meant to reinforce guardrails.
The bill as currently written prohibits Iowa schools from entering into any agreement with a public library that would let students use a school ID to access any books, electronic resources or other educational materials at the public library.
