Drug users take advantage of access, quiet of public libraries

The same qualities that make libraries ideal for studying and reading — unfettered public access, quiet corners and nooks, minimal interaction with other people — also make them appealing places to shoot up heroin, librarians are finding.

In Norfolk, Virginia, a 47-year-old man died after a patron found him in a library restroom. In Batesville, Indiana, and New Brunswick, New Jersey, police revived others in library restrooms using a popular overdose antidote.

The body of a homeless man who frequented the Oak Park Public Library in suburban Chicago might have been there for days, fully clothed and slumped on the toilet in a restroom on the quiet third floor, before a maintenance worker unlocked it on a Monday morning in April and discovered his inglorious demise. The empty syringe and lighter in his pockets and the cut soda can in the trash pointed to the cause, an accidental heroin overdose.

“On both a personal and a professional level, we were all very shocked and of course worried about how this could happen in our spaces,” said executive director David Seleb, who fired the security company responsible for clearing the library before closing.

The country’s heroin and painkiller problem has produced public overdoses in many places, including restaurants, gas stations, alleys and even hospitals, but the inherent attributes of public libraries leave them especially exposed. They’re free and open for whoever walks in, and lingering is welcome, no transaction or interaction required.

“People need to know that this is happening everywhere and that public libraries haven’t done anything wrong to cause it to happen in public libraries,” said Josie Parker, director of the Ann Arbor District Library in Michigan.

Her library already had removed bathroom ceilings and toilet tanks where people could hide drugs and restroom entrances that could be locked — changes made over a decade ago to curb cocaine trafficking, Parker said.

She raised drug-abuse concerns again in 2014 when officials were discussing a proposed park next to the library. Though unpleasant, starting a public discussion about drug and alcohol abuse observed at the library spurred a beneficial community response, Parker said.

These days, police routinely walk through the library, and social workers set up shop there, checking in with folks. All that, Parker said, strips away some anonymity.

KATIE MCLEAN/ THE ANN ARBOR NEWS VIA THE ASSOCIATED PRESS Emergency personnel respond to an overdose Sept. 9, 2014, at the Ann Arbor District Library in Ann Arbor, Mich. Librarians are finding themselves face-to-face with the heroin and opioid epidemic as drug users take advantage of the free access to quiet...