Catreena Lopez, the Rio Rancho, NM, mother seeking to have Gilbert Hernandez’s “Palomar” pulled from the shelves of her local high school library after seeing a copy that her 14-year-old son checked out last month, is continuing her efforts despite the school board forming a review committee that voted 5-3 in favor of keeping the book in circulation.
Lopez, convinced having the book in the library is like having “Hustler” there as well, is now appealing that decision, forcing the matter to be put to a vote. That vote by the Board of Education will be held in a public meeting per the Board’s Open Meeting Policy and the Open Meetings Act, according to a statement we received last week. The school district is currently on spring break and a date for the meeting has yet to be announced, but the next regular Board of Education meeting is scheduled for April 13th.
So there’s that.
In the interest of not re-treading already worn ground, I think it’s worth noting that we now have another local TV news station covering this story. KRQE’s reporting on the new developments is much more even-handed and less inflammatory than the KOAT story that helped kick things off, almost shockingly so. They actually show you some of the disputed panels (blurred enough to avoid making that station’s Standards & Practices people go apoplectic) for context and have rebuttal video commentary by CBLDF’s Charles Brownstein. Good for them.
We will, of course, be following this story to its hopefully vindicating conclusion for “Palomar” and sanity in general. Keep your fingers crossed.
