Saratoga News

County libraries will filter children's section terminals

Council on record favoring some control

By Sarah Lombardo

The recent debate between the Saratoga Library Commission and the Saratoga City Council on the issue of filtering Internet access on Saratoga Library computers became moot April 23, when the Santa Clara County Joint Powers Authority voted to install filters on children's terminals but to leave all adult machines with open access.

Before the vote, JPA members heard a recommendation by their Internet task force to require filters on all computers in the children's sections of county libraries and one computer in the adult sections.

The Saratoga Library Commission on April 21 had reiterated to the City Council its support of an open-access policy at its Internet terminals, saying it's too early to impose filters when so much work countywide and statewide is being done to look into the issue.

That discussion sparked a heated debate between commissioners and councilmembers, who informally voted last year to support some sort of filters on terminals at the Saratoga Community Library. At about the same time, the commission voted to support an open-access policy, and the JPA citizens advisory committee also voted to support open access, but to form the task force that researched available filters before delivering its findings to the JPA.

Straying from the issue of filtering vs. open access, commissioners and councilmembers argued over who should have consulted whom before passing votes supporting one idea or another.

"You didn't even ask us for our opinion," commission chairwoman Marcia Manzo said.

"Well, you didn't ask us," Councilmember Paul Jacobs returned.

The issue came before the two groups just two days before the county task force--of which Councilmember Stan Bogosian is a member--delivered its recommendation to the JPA. Commissioners expressed disappointment that they and the council had differing opinions.

In addition, commissioners told the council they thought the city was getting involved too early in the debate, especially since there have been no complaints at the community library or reported incidents of children viewing pornography.

"The truth of the matter is that the library hasn't had any problems," Manzo said. "I don't know why we're jumping into this fray."

"We have made a policy decision," Jacobs said, adding that the councilmembers didn't have the answers for questions about filters, but they needed to philosophically support some sort of control on access to pornography on the Internet.

Commissioner Sally Towse said the whole issue came down to determining what exactly people were concerned about, a 5-year-old girl stumbling across pornography on the Internet or a 17-year-old boy seeking it out.

"If you're worried about a child walking by and seeing something you don't want them to see, the solution is to install a privacy screen and have the terminal turned toward the wall so no one can see it. If you're worried about my 17-year-old doing something you don't want him to see, the solution is to take off the privacy screen and turn the terminal so that it faces everybody else," she said.

Commissioners said they feared that filters would give parents a false sense of security. And filters, they said, are not foolproof and sometimes filter out Web sites that may be educational or not filter out sites that may be inappropriate for children.

"Parents need to know that they can't dump little Johnny in front of a computer and [be] home free," Towse said.

Commissioners also said they were not opposed to filters completely, but want to wait until they are able to provide a choice on the terminals so that patrons can decide if they want filtered or open access to the Internet.

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