Tarnel Abbott, SEIU Local 790 , Honored with Zoia Horn Intellectual Freedom Award

The Berkeley Daily Planet reports:
Tarnel Abbott isn’t just a staunch defender of free speech: she’s also a dedicated practitioner.
But it was her work at the Richmond Public Library that won her honors as a champion of intellectual freedom.
Her passionate devotion to the right to express unpopular views proved inspirational to the California Library Association’s (CLA) Intellectual Freedom Committee, which recently awarded her the Zoia Horn Intellectual Freedom Award for 2006.
“As one of our committee said, ‘If every library had someone on staff taking these actions, imagine what a strong voice the library community would have in the fight to defend freedom of speech!’” wrote committee chair Janis O’Driscoll in the letter announcing the award.
Among the activities cited by the CLA were:

+Abbott’s annual displays of banned books,

+Aannual film series co-sponsored by the American Civil Liberties Union’s Berkeley-Albany-Richmond-Kensington chapter,

+Ongoing work with Richmond Sister City Regla, Cuba,

+Helping to found Librarians for Intellectual Freedom

+Her role in winning a city council resolution opposing the PATRIOT Act’s provisions that allow federal investigators to snoop on the reading habits of library patrons.

The vote to bestow the honor on the Richmond librarian was unanimous.


Read the entire article.