RICHMOND, Va. -- As a culture war over school libraries and reading material swirls nationally, Virginia Democrats are turning their focus on a parental notification law that they argue some school districts are using to remove or censor books deemed offensive by some parents.
Signed by Governor Glenn Youngkin (R) in 2022, the parental notification law requires schools to notify parents if sexually explicit books or resources are being used during instruction, and families have the option to opt their children out.
Senator Ghazala Hashmi (D-Henrico) and local librarian groups have said the law has been used by some school boards and districts to remove dozens of titles from school libraries without going through the proper review process.
Hashmi's bill would clarify that the notification law does not allow cities or counties to censor school library shelves. The initial bill included that type of language in an enactment clause, Hashmi said, but it was not specially laid out in Virginia code available online, which her bill seeks to change.
"I feared the direction we were going in the Commonwealth — the direction that we actually saw come to pass — that is the direction of book bans and censorship," Hashmi said on the Senate floor Tuesday afternoon. "We had superintendents who actually began to remove books from school libraries.”
SB 235 passed the Virginia Senate 22 to 18, with every Democrat but only one Republican supporting it.
"This bill is stopping localities from ripping books off the shelf with no process, no rigorous process, to determine whether they should be taken off or not," said Sen. Schuyler VanValkenburg (D-Henrico).
Republicans and religious rights groups have pushed back against the legislation, saying localities have the right to remove books they deem sexually explicit or not age-appropriate for school children and that the bill chips away at that fact. Opponents said there is nothing preventing students or families from accessing certain titles on their own but that schools should be able to choose whether they want to carry them on their shelves.
“This now does prohibit a school board from removing something that is totally egregious. You may call that censorship, that’s good parenting in my mind," said Sen. Christopher Head (R-Botetourt).
The backdrop to this specific Virginia issue is the push by some groups to remove what they deem offensive or vulgar from public school settings. Preliminary data from the American Library Association showed 356 challenges to books in Virginia libraries in 2023.
Chesterfield parent and education advocate Mike Karabinos spoke in favor of Hashmi's bill last week during a hearing, saying a small group of parents should not have the power to remove titles quickly without a full review.
"As a parent, you have the right absolutely to decide what your child can read. You do not have the right to decide what my child can read," he said. "We need to remember that people banning books have never been the good guys throughout history.”
Anne Taydus, who also is a parent in Chesterfield, spoke in opposition at the same hearing.
She said children should not have easy access to books at school that contain material they are not developed enough to process appropriately.
"We’re not talking about ‘To Kill a Mockingbird.’ I’m not talking about ‘Huckleberry Finn.’ I’m talking about blatant, graphic sexual pornography that is destroying the pre-frontal cortex of children," Taydus said at the hearing.
Hashmi said her bill does not prevent school districts from removing books since most have a process in place to do so.
"Because this is a {code} section that deals with parental notification, this is the kind of restriction that we need to have so it doesn’t get translated into banning books. Those are two entirely different things," Hashmi said.
There is a similar bill in the House of Delegates, and with Democrats in control of that chamber too, a version of the bill is almost certainly going to reach Youngkin, who was a vocal backer of the original parental notification law.
When reached for comment about his thinking on this bill, a spokesperson said, "The Governor will review any legislation that comes to his desk."
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