Yancey commissioners take over library board, add 7 new members after June Pride display

BURNSVILLE - The Yancey County Board of Commissioners voted at its Sept. 11 meeting to bring in seven new members to the nine-member Library Board, effectively packing the library oversight board with those who opposed a June LGBTQ+ Pride Month display.

"Tonight, we finished what we set out to do as far as placing and structuring the board because we were wanting to take it over as a department, like we have other departments in the past," commission Chair Jeff Whitson told The Citizen Times.

"We're wanting to try to enhance and do some things, which is hard to do because our library system is good, as far as the programs and the different things like that, if they would just leave all the social issues out and the political issues out. That's our goal there."

Amber Westall Briggs is the regional director of the AMY Library System that serves Avery, Mitchell and Yancey Counties, as well as Spruce Pine.

According to Briggs, the two remaining board members are Gail Parker and Julia Silvers. The seven new members are Christy Byrd, Christie Edwards, current commissioner Stacey McEntyre Greene, Sheila Poehler, Michelle Presnell, Andrew Waterman and Anna Webb.

The Citizen Times asked Whitson what he would say to people who would contend that the commissioners "packed" the library board with a majority of members who agreed with them on the issue and felt the libraries should not participate in Pride Month displays.

"Just like any board that has control, whether it be Democrat or Republican, conservative or liberal, they're going to put their people in there because they want to make sure that the policy that they think is right. Next election, if the majority of the people of Yancey County don't like it, there's a process every November," Whitson said. "Those people can come out, and they can put their people in, and they can change that board after their term is out.

"Are we packing the board? I want you to consider this: There are at least two people that we kept on the board that are not in our political persuasion, and most likely don't agree with us on 90% of the stuff that we stand for."

According to Whitson, he first addressed the topic of displays more than three years ago in response to a previous library display.

"It just continued to escalate, and got bigger," Whitson said.

In the June 2023 commission meeting, Whitson again addressed the displays, and made a motion "to give County Manager Lynn Austin research and the process of taking all necessary steps in taking control of the current library system, and making it a county-ran library, an operation showing no bias to any religious, political or ethnic platform with oversight from the Yancey County Board of Commissioners until a proper new library board can be established."

With the new library board in place now, Whitson said the commissioners "have learned a lot" since June.

"The library board has not held to the standards of other boards that the commissioners are engaged in," Whitson said. "The local library board is totally controlled by the county commissioners. That's not our policy. That's the policy. That's North Carolina General Statutes. Those policies and procedures have not been followed for decades."

According to Briggs, who has served as the regional board director for eight years, the local advisory board had not been relevant until June, when Whitson made the motion.

Briggs said the AMY Regional Library System is the governing body of the whole system. She said Whitson's appointments of non-advisory board members to the regional library board goes against the regional board's bylaws.

"Commissioners cannot appoint regional board members unless they are sitting local advisory board members," Briggs said.

Regional library director's thoughts

In a phone call with The Citizen Times Sept. 12, Briggs said she was not surprised by the commissioners' appointments of seven new members to the local advisory board.

"I knew that they would be appointing whomever they wanted to serve," Briggs said. "It's challenging for me just because we've also submitted about seven names. So, because our local board is, according to the bylaws, supposed to make suggestions of board members to the commissioners, to be ignored on that is rather disheartening simply because we take it seriously as far as who serves on the board that they are an advocate of the library and are a current library user."

According to Briggs, Whitson has continued to say he wants to build a diverse local advisory board, but she challenged him in his efforts to do that.

"I work with diverse boards throughout the AMY system, and I mean diversity as far as nonpartisan boards," Briggs said. "We've always had that wonderful collaborative spirit as a public library where we have Republicans and Democrats serving serving on our boards, and they are generally advocates all around."

Briggs said of the nine members on the board, only one is registered Democrat.

While she said she isn't surprised by the Sept. 11 meeting's proceedings, Briggs said she is "frustrated."

"I came to this with the idea of compromise, and with the idea that our community would not be divisive, and I feel like I've led in that way," Briggs said.

Briggs also said she was "thrown off guard" when a commissioner interrupted her while she was reading the Bill of Rights, which serves as the foundation of all public libraries.

"It really boils down to, I just want to do my job, and I feel like I have the experience and the education to be able to do that," Briggs said.

Residents' thoughts

According to Whitson, 17 people signed up for public comment in the Sept. 11 meeting.

There were mixed opinions among the residents, with some speaking in favor of the commissioners' wishes to ban public displays, and a number of other residents who spoke in favor of the library's displays.

Ellen Decker said she was thinking about Sept. 11 and how many people were lost.

"Our enemies are watching us, and the petty divisiveness is something we need to be really careful of, because this is what our enemies want," Decker said. "We would do much better to find common ground rather than battleground."

Cathy Weisfeld said the library was the first place she came to in the county in 1986.

"Our libraries represent everyone in our community," she said. "Rather than having no displays, why don't we do as the library already does - have displays that represent all ideas, all politicals, all religions, all ethnicities, all minorities, and that way everyone in our community continues to be represented?"

Suzanne Gavenus is a licensed clinical social worker who worked many years at Mountain Heritage High School.

Gavenus said she and her husband, Gary Gavenus, a Superior Court judge, have lived in the county for more than 20 years and have three children.

"When we went to the voting polls, most people note that we cancel out one another's votes," Gavenus said. "But we raised children who learned to think for themselves and we had many discussions in our homes. What we did share was our core values about family and community, and that has always kept us together."

Gavenus said she worked with many LGBTQA+ youths during her time at Mountain Heritage.

According to Gavenus, she and her husband have one son who served two tours in Afghanistan and currently works for the Veterans Administration, as well as another son who works as an airman and a pilot.

"I know they're disheartened to see what's going on in our country because they serve for everybody," Gavenus. "To think that we would take rights away rather than give more rights, I think, is very hard for many veterans to hear.

"It doesn't have to be divisive. We can talk to each other, and we can even be in the same households with different thoughts and ideas and still think of the best for everyone."

Others, like Gerald Chandler, agreed with the commissioners' efforts to take control of the library and do away with the displays.

"I thought somebody from Yancey County that's on the other side of this problem needs to speak," Chandler said. "My family moved here from South Carolina in 1802. I think I know these people pretty well. There's none of them, the ones I know, that want to see a Pride display in our library."

Edward Fortner also spoke out against Pride displays at the libraries, and said he felt the "whole conversation had been hijacked."

"From the beginning, it appeared that the library was going to have some accountability," Fortner said. "But it's almost become a soap box for every lifestyle, every agenda that's possible. Every governing agency has to have accountability to be operational, from what I see."

Whitson said social media has "gotten in the way" of having a dialogue about the issue.

"This thing has been blown out of proportion," Whitson said. "We're wanting to make everything equity, and just talk. We're trying to search out some ways to bring everything together, and I think we're going to do it."

This article originally appeared on Asheville Citizen Times: Yancey appoints 7 library board members in response to Pride display