Huckabee: Fayetteville School Board Should Address Libraries' Porn Problem
by Jim Brown
September 2, 2005
(AgapePress) - Arkansas' Governor Mike Huckabee is weighing in on the controversy regarding books in the Fayetteville public school libraries that a group of concerned parents have identified as pornographic and inappropriate for children. Upon being presented with their findings, the public official says he was "surprised and concerned to learn that schoolchildren in the Fayetteville School District may have access to books of a pornographic nature."Huckabee says if children do in fact have access to pornographic books, he "would certainly expect the school board to take the necessary actions to remove them from circulation." He adds that parents "have every right to expect that their children will not have access to obscene material while at school."
Local activist Laurie Taylor has been spearheading an effort to get more than 50 sexually explicit books removed from Fayetteville school libraries. She welcomes the governor's response and notes, "I certainly appreciate his stance and his affirmation of my position to petition the school board for redress of something that is definitely a concern for many, many parents -- thousands of parents here."
Taylor has been posting information about the controversial books on the Internet at wpaag.org [Caution: Links to information on this website are not suitable for children] in an effort to make the public thoroughly aware of the kind of objectionable material to be found in the Fayetteville school libraries. However, although the community advocate was encouraged when Governor Huckabee stated parents have the right to petition the school board to remove the obscene books, she feels the way the governor phrased his statement raised some questions about whether he has taken the opportunity to become fully informed about the extent of the problem.
"When he said that [the students] 'may' have access to pornographic materials," Taylor notes, "it's like I'm not sure that he's looked at or seen the material." What the leader of the anti-porn effort would like from the governor, she explains, is "to know his opinion on the material specifically -- if he's taken the time to look at it and also come to hold the opinion that it is material that is inappropriate for children -- and [for him to] make a statement that way."
In a statement released to American Family Radio News, Huckabee pointed out that, while he is concerned about the parents' allegations of pornographic material in the Fayetteville schools, there are limits on what he can do about it. School districts, he notes, "are political subdivisions, much like cities and counties," and therefore he says he does not have the power to compel a school board to change library policies.
Jim Brown, a regular contributor to AgapePress, is a reporter for American Family Radio News, which can be heard online.
