In the small town of Alpena, Michigan, pop. 10,197, an obsession with “pornographic” LGBTQ+ library materials has rewarded two conservative activists with seats on the board that determines official library policy, Book Riot reports.
Campaigns to ban the coming-of-age memoir All Boys Aren’t Blue and a dozen other books that “parents rights” advocates have deemed “grooming” materials landed the two long-time book challengers and public comment speakers, Traci Collins and Julie Brynes, with appointments to the Board of Library Trustees by county officials allied with their book-banning efforts.
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The two conservative activists joined the board after a years-long campaign that saw multiple resignations from the library and the board overseeing it, public attacks on library staff, and threats from religious activists and county commissioners to defund the library entirely if their demands weren’t met.
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Byrnes met with newly-hired library director Debra Greenacre and assistant director Jessica Luther in 2023 to complain about All Boys Aren’t Blue, George M. Johnson’s queer coming-of-age story that has become a favorite target among right-wing book-banning groups. Byrnes had earlier demanded the book be relocated out of the teen book section but was rebuffed. She filed a formal request with the new director but was again told the book wouldn’t be relocated.
Incensed, Byrnes filed an appeal, this time stating that her request was at the behest of a previously unknown “parents’ rights” group she called STAC, or Save The Alpena Children.
In response to inquiries from the Board of Trustees, Director Greenacre provided an updated collection management policy to explain how decisions are made on where to place collection materials, citing age-appropriate guidance from publishers and their own research.
The board responded by deleting the entire section on Intellectual Freedom in the proposed new collection development policy, opening the door to the moving or banning of books in the collection unilaterally, a function explicitly prohibited in trustee bylaws.
The next month, a petition began circulating in Alpena, sponsored by the local Shoreline Church, where Collins’ husband is pastor. The petition expressed shock that children could browse the local library unattended and encounter books the church deemed “pornographic”
“We just started checking into it and realizing that any child walking up would see those books and then be exposed to things that, if somebody gave those books to our kids on the street, they would be called groomers and people who are preparing kids for sexual exploits,” Collins’ husband told The Alpena News.
The group cited 14 books out of the library’s collection of 50,000 items, including Making a Baby, which elicited concern from the church for its portrayal of “What may be seen as grooming techniques: images of naked adult men next to children in the same locker room showering and changing together.”
Throughout this period, both Collins and Byrnes were regular attendees at library board meetings pressing their demands, which were seconded by Trustee Dustin Budd, who was aligned with conservative members of the County Commission. They used an upcoming funding referendum for the library as leverage to carry out bans on books they agreed were “grooming materials.” They also threatened to sack the entire Board of Trustees if the collection management policy wasn’t changed to suit their demands.
By the end of 2024, both library Director Greenacre and her successor, Jessica Luther, resigned under pressure. In the wake of a successful funding referendum, The County Commission rescinded its threat to fire the library board, which now had two open seats. Collins and Brynes took their seats in December.
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