Letter to the Editor

Book removal proposal is pure government overreach

Mat-Su Borough District 1 Assembly member Mike Bowles and the Mat-Su Valley book banners now want to be in the library with you — adult Alaskan — so they can decide if your chosen material is virtuous. Bowles, who is up for re-election this fall, has sponsored ordinance 26-017, which will be introduced at the Feb. 3 regular Assembly meeting. The ordinance, labeled as an effort to protect minors from sexually explicit material, would actually remove and not make available within the entire Borough library system any material depicting human sexuality.

This ordinance is government overreach and censorship — all in an attempt to satisfy a small group of people who don't trust parents to know what's best for their children. Residents of the Mat-Su Valley have the freedom to choose what they and their children read and view. If a parent doesn't think a book or video is age appropriate, then common sense tell us that is a parenting decision and does not require a whole government approach.

It would be a shame to see our Borough libraries decimated because a small group of people think that books such as “Verity”, “Death in the Jungle” and “When We Were Monsters” as well as DVDs such as “The White Lotus” should not even be in the same public building as a minor.

Belle Merritt,

Palmer