Column -- Libraries for Everyone

The city's public library director isn't a big fan of bus depots and the people who use them.

Bob Pasicznyuk told The Gazette's Rick Smith this week that he'd rather not have the new public library built next door to a new city Ground Transportation Center, aka bus depot for city and intercity buses. He doesn't want the library to become a “waiting room” for bus riders, or as council member Chuck Wieneke called them, “bus people.” And Pasicznyuk has been to the depot in St. Louis, where he saw hookers and pushers. I bet they weren't carrying library cards.

Clearly, Pasicznyuk has some anxieties about this. Maybe he even has dreams about busloads of scruffy invaders storming the new library to wreak havoc. But rather than tell a therapist, he told a reporter.

The director is a very, very smart guy. He's the kind of guy who believes that a rational, intelligent explanation can justify almost anything. But I think it's very tough for a public library director to explain why we should start making a list of members of those he'd rather not see darken his taxpayer-funded doors.

The City Council didn't seem to share his concerns. It voted 7-2 for the TrueNorth library site Wednesday night, which is close to the location of a proposed transportation center.

But in his defense, this is our world. Pasicznyuk's just trying to run a library in it.

Our society once pushed us together, shoulder to shoulder, into more frequent common experiences. Lots of people, from all backgrounds, rode buses and trains. Most stores were in a business district frequented by everyone. It was no big harmonious hug, certainly, but social discomfort was something you just had to deal with.

Now, thanks to technology, mobility, etc., we have choices. That's great. But one of those choices is to isolate ourselves from our discomforts. That leads some folks to wish for a library that's essentially a Pottery Barn with Wi-Fi and lattes and Jane Austen.

Pasicznyuk knows if some of those folks get uncomfortable, it's back to Marion in a flash.

His concern is so reasonable. But it's also so wrong.

The public library is the family room for this community, open to everyone. Once we start flagging undesirables - out-of-town bus riders, homeless people, etc. - we undermine the core reason why libraries exist. If we don't believe in equal access to knowledge anymore, what's the point?

There's plenty of other evidence to show Pasicznyuk still believes. What he needs to remember is that even our darkest fears don't make that belief negotiable.

» Comments: (319) 398-8452; todd.dorman@gazcomm.com