Lawsuit Settled After OhioLibrary Bars Group Wishing To Hold Bible-Related Session

Norman Oder -- Library Journal, 01/13/2009

• Couple wanted to hold Bible-based financial seminar
• Library now prohibits all outside groups
• Dispute went to court rather than through library channels

After a local couple planned to hold a free financial planning seminar based on Biblical principles, the Clermont County Public Library (CCPL), OH, said no, leading to a federal lawsuit settled ambiguously last week and a narrowed library policy that limits meeting room usage to library-sponsored events.

The sequence of events began last spring when George and Cathy Vandergriff asked to host a Crown Financial Ministries "Financial Freedom" workshop—which provides biblically based advice on money issues—at CCPL. The Vandergriffs were rebuffed by CCPL staffers.

CCPL at the time limited “use of Library meeting rooms for political, religious, or social events, or any other reasons specifically designated by the Board of Trustees.” Shortly after the lawsuit, the library changed its policy. Board President Joe Braun, queried by the Cincinnati Enquirer, wouldn’t say whether the cost to defend the previous policy influenced the change. 

The earlier policy likely ran afoul of the American Library Association’s interpretation of the Library Bill of Rights regarding meeting rooms, which states, “If meeting rooms in libraries supported by public funds are made available to the general public for non-library sponsored events, the library may not exclude any group based on the subject matter to be discussed or based on the ideas that the group advocates. For example, if a library allows charities and sports clubs to discuss their activities in library meeting rooms, then the library should not exclude partisan political or religious groups from discussing their actives in the same facilities.”

Lawsuit rather than appeal
However, according to CCPL’s legal response, the earlier policy allowed appeal of denials to the library board, but the Vandergriffs neither chose to appeal the denial nor request a change in the meeting room use policy. Also, CPPL contended that the plaintiffs’ claims were moot, because the library board changed the policy and “also offered to find a suitable place for Plaintiffs to conduct its proposed meetings.”

In the settlement, lawyers for the Vandergriffs were paid $10,000—half of it covered by the library’s insurance—while the Vandergriffs were paid $2 and the Institute for Principled Policy, a think tank with “a Biblical world-view” that joined them in the suit, received $1, according to the Cincinnati Enquirer. 

The Vandergriffs, who are putting on the seminar at another library, declared victory, while the library board said the case could have been resolved without the courts.