The August 28 Indian River School Board meeting was unusually packed.
Over 50 members of the Vero Beach Florida community sat waiting for their turn to stand before the five members who make up the Indian River School Board: Chairperson Dr. Peggy Jones (District 3), Vice Chairperson Teri L. Barenborg (District 4), Gene A. Posca, M.D. (District 1), Jacqueline Rosario (District 2) and Brian M. Barefoot (District 5). Also present was the school superintendent and a lawyer for the school board.
In recent times, attendance at school board meetings across the country has spiked, as mothers, fathers, grandparents, and clinically trained child advocates have voiced outrage, desperation, and frustration at the inaction local officials and school board members have displayed in response to school libraries stocking their shelves with pornographic material.
To be clear, regardless of whether these school boards take the matters under review or engage in some drawn-out process to determine whether the books should be removed, the books are indeed pornographic, and providing pornography to a child is a crime.