ST. CHARLES COUNTY — After a tumultuous 13 months, the St. Charles City-County Library Board could be headed toward a shakeup as five board positions could be up for grabs. But almost all current board members say they would serve another term if city and county officials reappoint them.
The terms of Nevada Smith and board President Staci Alvarez, two of the board’s longest-serving members, will expire July 31. Richard Gartner’s term will expire next week. Two other board members — T.J. Rains and Josiah Schmidt — have been serving for months under expired terms, which is allowed until a new appointment is made.
Alvarez, Smith, Rains, and Schmidt all say they are willing to serve another term on the nine-member board despite the recent controversies. Gartner, who was appointed last year to finish a term vacated by Melissa Setser, could not be reached for this story.
People are also reading…
The non-partisan library board has been thrust to the forefront of partisan politics over the past year as conservatives have criticized board members over the inclusion of LGBTQ-themed books and other materials that some patrons deemed to be too sexually explicit or immoral to be in a public library. Some also chastised the library for not heeding calls to implement a more strict dress code after one library patron complained about a library clerk wearing makeup, nail polish, and a goatee.
But in recent months, the topic of criticism has changed, as both progressives and conservatives railed against a now-nixed plan to shutter three library branches amid financial concerns for the countywide library system. Residents called for the resignation of the library district’s CEO Jason Kuhl and library trustees, and they’ve urged County Executive Steve Ehlmann, who oversees five of the nine library board appointments, to overhaul the board.
Ehlmann said in an interview that he’s received “tons of texts” and emails urging him to replace Alvarez, who’s in her second and final term as board president, and Smith, who’s been on the board since 2017.
For now, at least, Ehlmann hasn’t indicated what he’ll do with the positions for which he’s responsible.
“I am certainly giving it all careful consideration,” Ehlmann said. “My only reluctance to appointing people is that I don’t want people thinking that I only appointed this person or that person because I got a lot of emails. My job is to ignore all of the noise and do what I think is best.”
St. Charles Mayor Dan Borgmeyer oversees the appointment of the other four members of the library board, including Rains and Schmidt. He said he’s received more than 100 emails about the appointments, but he plans to let his appointments continue to serve with expired terms.
Ehlmann said for his board appointments, he is looking for a “statesman, not a stuntman.”
“I’m looking for somebody who has some sort of record that I can base my decision on. I want to see that they are problem-solvers, that they have some sort of administrative experience,” he said.
Ehlmann and Borgmeyer don’t have the final say; they appoint potential board members, but a majority of the St. Charles County Council, in Ehlmann’s case, or the St. Charles City Council, in Borgmeyer’s, have to vote in favor of the appointments.
While the culture war fights have quieted in recent months, Ehlman said he no longer feels pressure to appoint “avowed conservatives” like he did in October when he appointed William “Buddy” Hardin, a former candidate for the state House of Representatives, and reappointed Matthew Seeds, who has at times been critical of the library district’s administration.
“The library business has changed tremendously over the decades, Ehlmann said. “It used to be that library was shelves of books, but not now. People have come to expect a whole lot more from their libraries here in St. Charles County.”