Can’t support tax rise

For the first time in my life, I am voting no for additional funding of public libraries. I enjoy the library and have found that downloadable books are convenient and safe to access. I recently discovered that among the various collections being offered by the Central Arkansas Library System (CALS) for download are “Audio Erotica.” That is not good.

So far as I can tell, there are no parental controls or age restrictions on access or download. I will not support an increase in my property taxes to provide funding for downloadable “Audio Erotica.” I encourage others who have historically supported funding for public libraries to join me in voting no.

In a concurring opinion in the 1964 Jacobellis v. Ohio case, Supreme Court Justice Potter Stewart wrote the well-known phrase related to pornography: “I know it when I see it.” While I haven’t listened to the “Audio Erotica” in the CALS collection, I saw enough of the titles (“Dirty Together,” “Dirty Pleasures,” “Erotic City,” “Make Me Burn,” “Candy Licker” and “Thong on Fire”) and researched the definition of “Audio Erotica” enough to “know when I see it” that this material is not anything that I am happy to support at my current rate of taxation, much less at a higher tax.

As to the current “Audio Erotica” collection at CALS, I am asking the CALS executive director and the CALS board of directors to do the following: 1. Immediately put safeguards in place (if they are not already in operation) to ensure children are not accessing adult subject matter. 2. Invest public tax dollars in books and other resources that better relate to the social mores of central Arkansas communities.

I expect better. And our community deserves better.

TERESA BELEW

Little Rock