Embattled Alabama Public Library Service Director Nancy Pack submitted a letter of resignation on March 20, effective later this year. The APLS board voted instead to terminate Pack’s employment immediately.
For the last two years, Pack has defended the library system and local libraries’ content choices as conservative groups raised objections to children and teens’ access to sexual and gender ideology-based reading material in public libraries.
The Alabama Public Library Service is a state-funded agency that provides resources, training and long-range planning to local libraries.
“The Alabama Public Library Service is committed to the highest standards,” board Chairman John Wahl said in a written statement. Wahl is also the chair of the Alabama Republican Party. “The board felt that immediate change was needed to streamline operations and best serve the people of Alabama. We are looking forward to this new chapter and working together as a team.”
18-month process
Wahl and APLS board member Amy Minton, a member of MeadowBrook Baptist Church in Gadsden, signaled their recent concerns and displeasure with Pack in an Inside Alabama Politics article earlier this month after a recording of Pack from October 2023 surfaced in which Pack says “Republicans are promoting an agenda” and discusses state leaders’ threats of funding cuts to the agency.
“After this thing at the board meeting today, and after all the things that they wanted to do, it just pointed out how much I do not want to work for this board and support their ideology of what public libraries in Alabama should be,” Pack told The Alabama Reflector after the March 20 meeting.
In the fall of 2023, Gov. Kay Ivey sent an open letter to Pack in which she raised concerns over the accessibility of sexually explicit content to children and teens, and included a series of questions, many of which centered around APLS’s relationship with the American Library Association. The largest library association in the world, the ALA has received scrutiny in recent years over its reading recommendations and leadership.
Republican leadership later threatened to cut APLS’ state funding if it didn’t sever ties with the national association. It did.
It also saw an 8.5% cut in the 2025 education budget.
Fairhope library
The APLS board also voted Thursday to temporarily suspend state funding for the Fairhope Public Library “due to non-compliance with APLS code regarding inappropriate material in children’s sections,” according to a release from Wahl.
“The APLS Board has a strong track record of defending parental rights and safeguarding children from sexually explicit material,” Wahl said. “Recent code changes made it clear that local libraries had to relocate inappropriate content from youth sections. Our goal is not to punish anyone but to ensure that all libraries receiving state funding adhere to the established standards that protect our children.
“We look forward to working with Fairhope Public Library to resolve this matter so that funding can be restored as soon as possible.”
EDITOR’S NOTE — Previous coverage by The Alabama Baptist includes a May 2024 report regarding tighter policies approved for children’s sections of Alabama public libraries and a podcast interview detailing the various concerns raised by parents and other concern citizens in early 2024.
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