Across Arkansas, debate over public libraries has largely centered on what books belong on library shelves.
The Arkansas State Library Board is considering new rules that would require libraries receiving state funding to place so-called "sexually explicit materials" in sections designated for adults. Under the proposal, anyone younger than 16 would need parental consent before checking out these materials. Libraries that fail to comply could lose state aid.
The proposal is still under review. During the board’s May meeting, members discussed releasing the draft rules for public comment before any final approval. If adopted, the rules would then go through additional review before taking effect.
Supporters say the proposal is intended to protect children. Critics, including the American Civil Liberties Union of Arkansas, argue the rules are overly broad and would restrict access to constitutionally protected materials.
Librarians who testified before the board at the meeting questioned whether the proposal could realistically be implemented. Several said many libraries are not physically designed to separate adult and children’s collections. Others said they lack the staff or space to monitor who accesses materials or create adult-only areas, especially in smaller libraries.
But for many librarians, the debate extends beyond what sits on library shelves. They say much of the discussion also raises questions about the broader services supported through state aid, including internet access, educational programming and shared resources used by communities across America.
Inside the Max Milam Library in Perryville, those services are on display before anyone checks out a book.
Before the doors open every morning, some residents are already sitting in the parking lot using the library’s Wi-Fi, said Allen Jarvis, manager of the Central Arkansas Library System’s Perryville branch.
Once inside, patrons apply for jobs, print paperwork, scan documents and use computers to access services that have increasingly moved online.
According to the U.S. Census Bureau estimates, 84.2% of Perry County households had a broadband internet subscription between 2020 and 2024. That trails Arkansas’s statewide rate of 86.7% and Pulaski County’s rate of 89.5%, leaving many residents to rely on public internet access.
Jarvis said that gap has reshaped what many people expect from their public library.
“It’s not just about checking out books anymore,” Jarvis said in an interview with Little Rock Public Radio. “It’s internet access, meeting room space, study space, printing, faxing, scanning to email. We have a digital library, and we’re very big into programming for children, homeschoolers and adults.”
As employers, schools and government agencies continue shifting services online, Jarvis said libraries have become a bridge for residents without reliable internet at home.
“Most jobs out there, you have to apply online,” he said. “People come to us for that.”
For youth services librarian Trinity Neeley, that expanded role also means taking the library beyond its own walls.
Each week, Neeley visits hosts story times in daycare centers across Perry County, leads a monthly bookclub at Perryville Elementary School and Anne Watson Elementary School, and reads to third-grade classrooms, bringing library programming directly to students who may not otherwise be able to participate.
“About 15 years ago we noticed a decrease in story times,” Neeley told Little Rock Public Radio. “If the kids couldn’t come to us, then we had to go to them. We took our story time on the road, and it’s just opened a lot of doors as far as being in the community.”
She said the outreach is especially important in a rural county where some students live as far as 30 miles from the library.
“For me to be able to go to the school and do programs for them at school, that cuts out them having to travel and come to the library,” Neeley said.
What happens in Perryville reflects a broader trend across the state.
Public libraries recorded more than 6.9 million visits in 2024, according to data compiled by the Arkansas State Library. Patrons used public computers more than 729,000 times and logged nearly 3.5 million wireless internet sessions. Libraries also hosted more than 21,000 public events and programs that drew more than one million participants.
For librarians, those numbers suggest how public libraries have evolved beyond places to borrow books. They have become community centers and access points for services many residents cannot easily find elsewhere.
“I wish people really knew all of the things we have,” Neeley said. “We have fishing poles, telescopes, microscopes, backpack kits, downloadable books and audiobooks. We’re definitely not just books.”
Technology is only one example of how libraries have expanded their role. In Wrightsville, the Millie Brooks Library has become a gathering place for residents across food assistance, educational programs and community resources alongside traditional library services.
Millie Brooks Library specialty programmer Jodi Morris said libraries have become places where residents gather not only to use computers and internet services but also to better understand the issues affecting their communities.
“The library isn’t there to take a side or position,” Morris told Little Rock Public Radio. “We provide spaces for people to come together, discuss issues, ask questions and research them for themselves.”
The Central Arkansas Library System branch sits between two proposed data centers. The proposals are also showing how dependent libraries themselves have become on digital infrastructure to service their communities. Morris said reliable internet has become important to nearly every service the library provides.
“We have to have internet. We have to have Wi-Fi,” she said.
Without it, many of the services patrons now expect, from public computers to digital collections and online research tools become inaccessible.
The library has also expanded to meet other community needs. After Wrightsville’s only grocery store closed last year, residents were left with a roughly 10-mile drive to buy groceries. The library now partners with Potluck Food Rescue to distribute food each week while offering gardening workshops, seed giveaways and nutrition programs designed to help residents grow food at home.
Morris said the library has become one of the few places where residents can gather without spending money.
“We’re one of those third spaces when you need somewhere to go besides work, school or home,” she said.
For Morris, that is why conversations about libraries often look different inside the communities they serve than they do in statewide policy debates.
“People think of libraries and don’t think of controversial topics,” she said. “I think it is important people realize all the things libraries offer.”
As libraries have taken on more responsibilities, librarians say state funding now supports far more than materials on their shelves. The funding also helps support the technology, programs and shared resources libraries provide statewide.
Arkansas distributed $5.68 million in state aid to public libraries for the fiscal year 2026, according to the Arkansas Department of Education. The funding is distributed through a formula that provides base allocations to counties, cities and multi-county library systems, with the remaining funds divided on a per-capita basis according to the population each system services. Kaelin Clay, press secretary for the Arkansas Department of Education, told Little Rock Public Radio the funding is intended to supplement, rather than replace, local support for public libraries.
In Conway, where the Faulkner-Van Buren County Regional Library System serves one of Arkansas’s fastest-growing regions, many of those same needs appear on a larger scale.
Director John McGraw told Little Rock Public Radio the library has steadily expanded its services because residents continue asking for them.
During the summer, the Conway library serves approximately 125 free lunches to children and families three days each week while showing movies during the hottest part of the day. Throughout the year, it offers free tax preparation, adult literacy instruction, gardening classes, volunteer opportunities for students and resources for small businesses.
“We’re trying to be all things to all people,” McGraw told Little Rock Public Radio. “We keep absorbing tasks that everyone else seems to drop.”
He said libraries have increasingly become places where communities turn when other resources disappear or become harder to access.
“It shouldn’t matter what zip code you were born into as to what successes you have in life,” McGraw said.
Many of those services are supported in part through state aid, which the Arkansas State Library Board says helps fund statewide resources used by public libraries.
Clay told Little Rock Public Radio that libraries serving counties with populations over 10,000 and multi-county library systems receive a base allocation of $18,000. Counties serving fewer than 10,000 residents receive $15,000, cities serving more than 5,000 residents receive $12,000 and cities serving fewer than 5,000 residents receive $5,000. Each county within a multi-county library system also receives an additional $12,000 base allocation before the remaining state aid is distributed through per-capita payments based on population served.
During the Arkansas State Library Board’s May meeting, members approved the quarterly distribution of state aid to public libraries. Board members also discussed that state funding is intended to supplement local funding rather than replace it.
State aid helps pay for the software libraries use to manage collections, the statewide courier system that transports materials between library branches and summer reading programs that draw some of the largest crowds of the year. It also supports shared digital resources through the Arkansas Digital Library Consortium, the Mockingbird Lending Network and Arkansas Traveler, giving patrons across the state access to research databases used by students, educators, businesses and job seekers.
McGraw said losing that support would affect far more than what sits on library shelves.
“Everything that we do is vital,” he said. “We need more state aid, not less.”
The discussion comes as Arkansas continues working to improve literacy and workforce readiness through initiatives such as the Arkansas LEARNS Act. Librarians across the state continue to offer kindergarten readiness programs, GED preparation, workforce development classes and other educational services that complement those efforts.
For McGraw, the debate over library collections represents only one part of a much broader conversation about what public libraries provide.
“We are not teachers. We are not parents,” he said. “We’re simply here to assist you in finding the thing you’re looking for.”
Other librarians expressed a similar view. They said while libraries provide access to information, parents and guardians ultimately decide what materials are appropriate for their own children.
Whatever their views on the state’s proposed rules, librarians return to the same point that the services their communities rely on reach far beyond library collections.
Across Perryville, Wrightsville and Conway, that means something different for every person who walks through the door.
Some visitors come looking for books. Others come to apply for jobs, use Wi-Fi, attend a children’s program, print documents, attend literacy programs, receive a free lunch, pick up groceries, learn to grow food or spend time in one of the few public spaces open to everyone.
Neeley said she hopes people look beyond the debate over books and see the broader role libraries play in communities across the state.
“Just come in and look around,” she said. “You don’t even have to talk to anyone. Just come in and you’ll see so much more than books are available.”
As the Arkansas State Library Board continues reviewing the proposed rules, librarians say the discussion extends beyond library shelves. They say state aid support services many Arkansas communities have come to rely on everyday.
The proposed rules have not been adopted. They remain under review following a public comment period and additional review by state officials.
