Two Wisconsin state bills may impact local library costs

GREEN BAY, Wis. (WBAY) – A bill still at the committee stage may impact the cost to local libraries.

There are two bills. The first one focuses on notifying parents about the materials their children check out from the library.

The bill requires public libraries to develop and implement a policy where the parent of a child who is under the age of 16 is notified about each document or material the child checks out. The bill also requires the library to post notice of this policy.

Brown County Public Library already utilizes an app, so parents can log in and see what’s checked out. This bill makes notification required and within 24 hours.

Action 2 News reached out to one of the authors of the bill. Representative Jerry O’Connor gave this statement:

It says in part: “I am in support of this bill which secures the rights of parents to be informed of the library materials their children are exposed to in our schools. Many school districts choose appropriate materials for their libraries while many schools are exposing our children to increasingly harmful materials in our libraries.”

So far, a fiscal estimate has been done on this bill and it could increase costs, but we don’t know by how much.

“In addition, if those bills go forward there would be additional costs that libraries would incur in terms of trying to implement these policies that would be in place for notification services. those would be new services, would require you know for some libraries a shift in services to be able to accommodate those new costs,” said Sarah Sugden, the Executive Director of Brown County Library.

The other bill relates to materials in school libraries and protections from prosecution for employees of libraries and educational institutions possessing obscene materials.

Action 2 News spoke with several parents off camera they said they hadn’t heard anything about these bills. The bills are still in the committee stage and a representative said the bills are not yet moving to the floor in the next two weeks.

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