Well, this is cool....

One thing that I love about the library proffession is that we serve everyone, we are inclusive, we pioneer good customer service, and librarians are usually up to something cool.

Check out the gay-themed library of Fort Lauderdale!


Fort Lauderdale gay-themed library out of the closet
The county's first gay-themed library celebrates its official opening in Fort Lauderdale on the eve of a GLBT literary festival.
BY AMY SHERMAN
asherman@MiamiHerald.com
In decades past, when gay residents wanted to find books about their community they had to borrow from friends or from a closet where some were stored at a gay-friendly church.
But the gay-themed library in Broward is now out of the closet.
On Thursday, the Stonewall Library and Archives, a collection of gay-themed material that was the subject of political controversy two years ago, celebrated its grand opening in Fort Lauderdale.
The new location is a sign of how mainstream the gay community has become in Broward: the gay library shares a building with a county library and ArtServe and is situated on the edge of a city park where children play ball and seniors gather for tennis lessons.
Jack Rutland, library executive director, lauded the city and county for entering a partnership to make the library possible.
''Imagine me saying that 20 years ago,'' Rutland said.
The grand opening coincides with the Gay and Lesbian Literary Arts Festival, which will be held at the library Friday and Saturday.
The library collection has moved from the Gay and Lesbian Community Center, which is slated to be torn down for development, into a city-owned building at 1300 Sunrise Blvd. The library opened at its new home in January.
When gay activists proposed the move in 2007, then-Mayor Jim Naugle balked.
''I feel troubled a city building would be housing materials with content we have arrested people for in the past,'' Naugle said at a 2007 City Commission meeting, one of many comments he made that angered gay activists.
The library move was narrowly approved by the Fort Lauderdale City Commission with Naugle and then-City Commissioner Christine Teel voting against it. Naugle retired due to term limits in March, while Teel lost to former police Chief Bruce Roberts.
Stonewall is the largest independent, circulating gay-themed library, with about 20,000 books and movies, Rutland said.
Named after the 1969 Stonewall riots in New York that preceded the modern gay rights movement, the library was founded in 1973 by a group of local college students who were exchanging books.
As the number of books grew, they incorporated as a nonprofit and moved multiple times over the years from a tiny closet in a church to its new 4,200-square-foot space.
Library visitors must be 18 to access the circulating materials, which include ''nothing you are not going to see at Barnes & Noble and Amazon. It's all gay-themed, nothing remotely objectionable,'' Rutland said.
The library has a wall with a timeline about the gay rights movement and T-shirts depicting various gay rights causes. Book titles include The Gay Church and Sweet Tea: Black Gay Men of the South.
Several elected officials -- including Broward Sheriff Al Lamberti and Ken Keechl -- the first and only openly gay county commissioner -- attended the celebration.
Lamberti talked about the importance of different groups of people coming together to celebrate the county's diversity. The sheriff highlighted a Florida Attorney General report that said Broward led the state in hate crimes in 2007.
''When I read that, it was kind of disturbing,'' Lamberti told the crowd of a few dozen gay activists and residents. ``We basically don't understand each other.''
Stonewall is open 11 a.m. to 8 p.m. Monday through Friday and 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Saturday. It's free to visit but a library membership, necessary to borrow materials, costs $30 a year.

Washington DC Here I come!

My proposal for ALA 2010 has gotten accepted! Check it:

Hello Angela -

I am writing to let you know that your program proposal for ‘Technology Skills for Incarcerated Teens’ for the annual conference of 2010 has been accepted as is by the board. Nichole will be following up later with time slot information. If you have any questions in the meantime you can let me or Nichole know.

Thanks, and congratulations!


Awesome! I'm glad that I have a year to prepare my presentation, time is on my side.