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July 12, 2007

Naugle notwithstanding, Fort Lauderdale to get new LGBT library

Fort Lauderdale, Fla., city commissioners Tuesday approved an LGBT archive's move into a city-owned library over the objections of gay-challenged mayor Jim Naugle, who fretted that the move might expose patrons to pornography.

Commissioners voted 3–2 to give the nonprofit Stonewall Library and Archive a new, larger home in a building the city leases to Broward County. Stonewall now occupies space in the Fort Lauderdale Gay and Lesbian Center, whose management is selling its building and constructing bigger digs nearby.

Naugle, already taking flak for recent comments that gays are "unhappy" and allegedly use city restrooms for "illegal sex," shared his shock that the Stonewall archive contains gay erotica. Before Tuesday's meeting he showed reporters adult magazines that city workers said are part of the Stonewall holdings, with titles such as 100 Percent Beef, Lesbian Bedtime Stories, and Arab Slave Boys.

"I had no idea this was what the homosexual book collection is all about," the South Florida Sun-Sentinel newspaper quoted him as saying. "It's a shame it had to come out during this whole toilet controversy. They'll think it's some antigay thing—um, antihomosexual."

Stonewall executive director Jack Rutland told Gay.com that the above-mentioned titles are in the collection's noncirculating archive, which includes 7,000 documents relevant to national and Southeastern LGBT history.

"If you are documenting gay and lesbian history, erotica is part of that," Rutland said.

There is also a circulating collection of 18,000 books and films, he said, and the new space will give patrons better access to it.

Inevitably, Tuesday's meeting was partly a referendum on Naugle's views.

"Reach into your hearts and make this gay man a happy gay man," jibed out former commissioner Dean Trantalis from the audience.

"If I've learned one thing from this," the Sun-Sentinel quoted Naugle as saying, "it's that there are a lot of happy homosexuals in Fort Lauderdale."

Naugle and commissioner Christine Teel cast the dissenting votes. (Barbara Wilcox, The Advocate)

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