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Senate panel restores obscenity law coverage for libraries, adds affirmative defense for staff
Summary
Committee approved Senate Bill 74 to remove a long-standing exemption that shielded libraries from a state law on harmful material for minors; the bill also adds an affirmative-defense clause for library employees who show a good-faith effort to restrict access to harmful material.
The Senate Education and Youth Committee approved a committee substitute of Senate Bill 74 after debate about how libraries classify and manage age-appropriate material.
Senator Burns, the bill author, said the measure strikes a decades-old exception that had excluded libraries from Georgia Code section 16-12-103, which prohibits selling or providing harmful material to minors. "For unknown reasons to me, librarians were exempted from following Georgia law," Burns told the committee, noting the bill preserves adult access while ensuring minors do not have access to material defined by…
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