B2 EZ SU THE WASHINGTON POST.WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 19 , 2022
The District was working on
sending security guards to help
manage foot traffic and distribute
coronavirus tests but because of
staff shortages had not had
enough security personnel avail-
able for every city site distributing
tests, according to an email from a
library leader that was shared
with The Washington Post.
Meanwhile, librarians are find-
ing themselves with less time to
manage checkouts, shelving and
other library duties.
One woman, who has worked
for the D.C. library for 13 years,
said the combination of the coro-
navirus test frenzy and the staffing
shortages have caused interli-
brary book exchanges to “grind
distribution to a halt.” Readers
have been asking where the books
they requested are.
“Maybe the testing is the most
important thing we can be doing
right now. But if so — maybe we
shouldn’t be trying to act like ev-
erything is normal and providing
normal service,” she said. “Nobody
wants to go back to curbside holds
pickup, but maybe that’s what we
should be doing.”
Several librarians have advo-
cated closing the library buildings
again — at the beginning of the
pandemic, D.C.’s libraries shut
their doors for several months,
allowing residents to pick up
books outside part of that time.
Others say they want to stay open
but want help avoiding the virus
or more support if they do get sick.
“It’s tough to really feel support-
ive of this when we feel like we’re notThat’s the question I hear a lot of
libraries talking about,” Huggins
said. “They’ve got their own staff
sick and in quarantine. They may
have to go back to curbside pickup
[for books] because they don’t
have enough staff to keep the
building open.”
While librarians say they are
proud to provide an in-demand
service, many also feel out of their
depth, especially when patrons
ask them medical questions. “ ‘Do
you have any kits?’ That’s the one
we can answer.... Other than
that, unfortunately, we aren’t
health-care workers,” one librari-
an east of the Anacostia said. “It
gets really repetitive and frustrat-
ing really fast.”
In D.C., library spokesman
George Williams said the library
system has moved staff members
between branches to avoid closing
branches on days that many work-
ers are out sick. “We have suspend-
ed in-person public programming
such as author talks, film show-
ings, classes. We continue to moni-
tor and make decisions about
service based on changing condi-
tions,” Williams wrote in an email.
Williams noted that D.C. Health
staff members, not librarians, dis-
tribute coronavirus tests at the
nine library branches that offer
rapid tests. (Librarians can dis-
tribute the PCR tests at other
branches.)
“DC Health is arriving daily to
verify residency and give out rapid
tests. The Library is serving as a
location for DC Health to distrib-
ute rapid tests,” he wrote.they couldn’t get [a test]. We had
run out so fast,” said Cadillic, a
longtime library worker and presi-
dent of the union that represents
much of the city’s library staff.
Cadillic said librarians have been
under pressure for months; most
library workers recount asking peo-
ple every day to please wear their
masks inside the library. “People
are yelling at staff and calling them
names, just a horrible, racist bar-
rage daily,” she said. “ ‘You’re in-
fringing on my rights’ has just be-
come a constant.”
Stressed by a recent surge in
coronavirus cases that has left
some libraries so understaffed
that they have needed to close for
parts of the day, Cadillic said, “We
had a f air amount of people after
those days who just were at their
breaking point.”
Melanie Huggins, president of
the American Library Associa-
tion ’s Public Library Association,
said library leaders have been ea-
ger to turn their buildings into
test-distribution sites: “We’re in
neighborhoods. We know these
communities. We know the people
that are walking in the doors.”
Still, she said, patrons and
workers alike are frustrated. That
day, she had sat briefly in a library
in Columbia, S.C., and heard five
patrons in a row walk in looking
for coronavirus tests after the li-
brary had run out.
“Most library workers want to
be there for their communities....
But with this new surge, we have
to balance: Do we have enough
staff to open our library safely?th at just feel overwhelming.”
“We care about our community,
but we’re tired,” said another D.C.
library staffe r, who like all six D.C.
library workers interviewed for
this article spoke on the condition
of anonymity because library rules
prohibit them from speaking to
reporters without permission.
Public libraries in D.C. started
handing out coronavirus test kits
months ago, beginning with PCR
tests that patrons had to take home
to use, then deposit in a dropbox at
the library and wait for the results to
come back from a lab.
Just before Christmas, Mayor
Muriel E. Bowser (D) announced
that select libraries would also
offer at-home antigen test kits that
patrons could use to get results in
just 15 minutes. Demand for the
at-home tests — which at times
were hard to find in pharmacies —
soared, especially as people
sought to get te sted before joining
family and friends for the holi-
days. And librarians’ workloads
soared, too.
In Boston, city libraries distrib-
uted rapid coronavirus tests for
just a few days before running out
of supplies. Elissa Cadillic de-
scribed that time as “chaos.”
“It interrupted other services.
Our staff were rightly concerned
that we were encouraging people
who needed to take a test to come
into our facilities and be in close
contact with our staff. That elevat-
ed stress levels. And once people
heard about it, they were irate if
LIBRARIES FROM B1
New duties pose tough balancing act for librarians
BY MEAGAN FLYNNSens. Chris Van Hollen (D) and
Ben Cardin (D) of Maryland intro-
duced legislation Tuesday that
would remove a white-suprema-
cist senator’s name from Chevy
Chase Circle, in the exclusive,
wealthy neighborhood he founded
more than a century ago.
The legislation would remove a
memorial to former senator Fran-
cis G. Newlands, a Democrat from
Nevada who advocated abolishing
the right of African American men
to vote and restricting immigra-
tion to White people only; he died
in 1917. His name appears on a
60-foot sandstone fountain within
Chevy Chase Circle, which strad-
dles the D.C.-Maryland line, and
bears the inscription, “His states-
manship held true regard for the
interests of all men.”
Van Hollen said Tuesday that
“we shouldn’t be memorializing
him and the deeply harmful pol-
icies he stood for — the legacies of
which are still impacting margin-
alized communities to this day.”
“Francis Newlands left a c ompli-
cated legacy — he supported wom-
en’s suffrage yet was an unabashed
white supremacist,” Cardin said in
a statement. “We can study and
learn from his life and career, but
we do not need a memorial to him
and, by extension, the racist viewshe openly espoused.”
Van Hollen and Cardin’s bill is a
companion to a House measure
introduced by Rep. Jamie B.
Raskin (D-Md.) and Del. Eleanor
Holmes Norton (D-D.C.) in 2020,
which followed a resolution from
the Chevy Chase Advisory Neigh-
borhood Commission supporting
the removal of Newlands’s name
from the fountain in a 5-to-0 vote.
Because the fountain is on feder-
al land, however, local government
couldn’t act on its own, and remov-
ing Newlands’s name requires con-
gressional action since Congress
memorialized him in the first
place. T he push to rename the
fountain has been in the works for
years, reaching its apex in 2020
amid a nationwide reckoning with
racist and Confederate statues and
memorials.Debate in previous years cen-
tered on Newlands’s patently
white-supremacist views coupled
with legislative achievements; de-
scendants acknowledged his offen-
sive racist views but asked that
Newlands not be distilled into a
one-dimensional figure.
Newlands, who purchased land
that would eventually become
Chevy Chase in the 1880s, was
known for sponsoring the 1902
Reclamation Act that funded irri-
gation in the West and for support-
ing women’s suffrage.
But in 1912, Newlands advocat-
ed the repeal of the 15th Amend-
ment, which provided the right to
vote to Black men, and unsuccess-
fully lobbied the Democratic Na-
tional Convention to include the
elimination of Black suffrage in its
platform, according to the book“Reclaiming the Arid West: The
Career of Francis G. Newlands” by
William D. Rowley.
Long after Newlands’s death,
discrimination lingered in the
Chevy Chase neighborhoods he
founded through racial covenants
that prevented Black and Jewish
people from buying homes.
“The plaque and fountain dedi-
cated to Newlands tell no story.
They are meant only to honor a
segregationist who argued that
voting rights won for African
Americans as a result of the Civil
War should be repealed,” Norton
said in a statement Tuesday. “New-
lands belongs in the dustbin of
history, not preserved on a traffic
circle that symbolizes the unity
between the nation’s capital and
the state of Maryland.”
The legislation calls for turningover the plaque and stones bearing
Newlands’s name to his descen-
dants once they are removed.
The Chevy Chase Land Compa-
ny said in a statement Tuesday that
“while we do not agree with Francis
Newlands’ past, we acknowledge it
and will continue working togeth-
er to build a more inclusive com-
munity for all.” Elissa A. Leonard,
chair of the Chevy Chase Village
Board of Managers, reiterated the
village’s support Tuesday, as well.
Randy Speck, chairman of the
Chevy Chase Advisory Neighbor-
hood Commission, said he was en-
couraged to see the legislation
finding support in the Senate. He
said plans to rename the fountain
have been put on hold until Con-
gress acts, seeing that as the first
step.
[email protected]MARYLAND
Senators seek to remove racist lawmaker’s name from Chevy Chase Circle
Francis G. Newlands had
advocated abolishing
Black men’s right to voteer in the pandemic, which Dona-
hue said Friday will allow addi-
tional paid time off for workers
who contract the virus.
The librarian who stepped way
back when a woman mentioned
her coronavirus exposure has just
six hours of sick time left. She fears
what would happen if she got sick
and had to take unpaid days of f.
That morning, she had given a
library visitor a mask. His re-
sponse, she recalls, was: “We’re all
going to get [the virus]. If you
don’t want to get it, you should
stay home.”
The librarian was hurt. “I had
just helped his child find a book
and exclaimed in delight over his
child’s coloring page,” she said. “I
don’t have the option to stay
home.... It jus t feels like this big
lack of understanding.”
[email protected]getting support back for the extra
work we’re doing, the extra risk
we’re putting ourselves through,”
said one librarian at a b ranch that is
distributing rapid tests.
Workers who get the virus and
must isolate at home for five days
or longer, or those who must stay
home when their children are
quarantined from their schools or
day cares, are using their sick leave
or vacation days. Some have used
up all of their paid time off b ecause
of the long absences.
Williams said librarians have
not received extra pay or benefits
to compensate them for distribut-
ing coronavirus tests.
City Administrator Kevin Don-
ahue told the D.C. Council that he
is working with the city’s public-
sector labor unions to bring back
the coronavirus-specific leave that
the c ity offered its employees earli-BILL O’LEARY/THE WASHINGTON POST
Security personnel hand out mail-in coronavirus tests to people
waiting outside of a library in Washington on Dec. 31.sions concerning the upbringing,
education and care of the parent’s
child.”
“I think the word ‘care’ in there
is important,” Kilgore said.
Bob McDonnell, a Republican
who was Virginia governor from
2010 to 2014 — and was state
attorney general before that —
also pointed to the statute, which
was passed during his time as
governor. Although the final deci-
sion probably will come from the
courts, McDonnell said, Young-
kin seems to be “on pretty good
footing” because of that statute.
He added that Youngkin would
be within his rights to yank fund-
ing from noncompliant districts,
because the Virginia legislature
has long used budgetary “carrots
and sticks” to drive change. How-
ever, McDonnell noted, Youngkin
will have to win the support of a
Democratic-controlled Senate to
pull that off.
As the legal, political and cul-
tural battles rage d over the mask
order, newly appointed Youngkin
officials set to work enforcing it.
Acting state health commissioner
Colin Greene wrote in an email to
regional health directors Tuesday
that they should interpret Young-
kin’s order as nullifying all
school-based mask mandates.
“I suspect there are those who
find this rule hard to hear,”
Greene wrote in the email, ob-
tained by The Washington Post.
But “compliance with the word
and intent of this Executive Order
on the part of any VDH employee
is not optional.”
[email protected]Antonio Olivo, Fenit Nirappil, Gregory
S. Schneider and Laura Vozzella
contributed to this report.and our state constitution.”
One of the co-sponsors of the
2021 state la w, Sen. Siobhan S.
Dunnavant (R-Henrico), released
a statement Monday urging peo-
ple to stop referencing her law,
known as SB 1303, in seeking to
invalidate Youngkin’s masking
order.
“SB1303 has been used against
our children and against its in-
tent this school year to advance
an agenda,” Dunnavant said in
the statement. “SB1303 does not
mandate the use of masks in
schools because the CDC does not
mandate masks.”
The Fairfax County GOP also
put out a statement in support of
Youngkin on Tuesday, with Chair-
man Steve Knotts urging the
county school board to follow the
order. Fairfax County Public
Schools is one of a handful of
mostly Northern Virginia dis-
tricts that declared over the week-
end that masking will continue
inside schools, although Fairfax
schools spokeswoman Helen
Lloyd said Tuesday that “we are
expecting an update before the
end of the week” on the school
system’s masking policy.
Former Virginia attorney gen-
eral Jerry Kilgore, a Republican
who served in that post from
2002 to 2005, said he thinks
Youngkin is on strong ground
legally with his masking order
because the CDC is only recom-
mending masks in schools now,
not requiring them. That leaves
the argument that Youngkin’s or-
der contradicts state law “in a
limbo stage,” he said.
Kilgore added that Youngkin is
supported by a section of Virginia
law that asserts “a parent has a
fundamental right to make deci-or no consideration of or respect
for CDC guidance, actions taken
by the Virginia General Assembly,
or the powers vested in school
boards,” reads the 46-page Chesa-
peake parents’ lawsuit, filed Tues-
day in the Supreme Court of
Virginia.
Democratic lawmakers chimed
in as well: “Gov. Youngkin is on
shaky ground at best, telling the
local school board what they can
and can’t do,” Del. Jeffrey M.
Bourne (D-Richmond) said Tues-
day. “Their powers and responsi-
bilities are enshrined in our lawskin’s masking rule is that it con-
tradicts the 2021 state law that
says schools have to comply to the
highest level possible with CDC
guidance. That law is in effect
until Aug. 1.
Because the CDC recommends
masks in schools, the argument
goes, school districts across Vir-
ginia are required by law to man-
date masking in their buildings
and cannot allow parents the
right to choose.
The masking order “purports
to sweep aside masking mandates
and other protections with littlethe tools available to make sure
that parents’ rights are protect-
ed,” Porter said without elaborat-
ing.
Experts were divided on the
legal viability of Youngkin’s ac-
tions so far and on what actions
he can take as governor to enforce
his masking rule. Carl Tobias, a
law professor at the University of
Richmond, said all of this is des-
tined for the courts. “I think there
are going to be a lot of suits,” he
said.
The most common argument
being advanced against Young-maintaining masking in schools.
The furor reached the White
House when press secretary Jen
Psaki, who said she is a parent in
Arlington Public Schools — one of
the districts that has vowed to
keep its mask mandate — posted
a tweet in support of the school
system. The Biden administra-
tion has already waded into con-
flicts with Republican governors
nationwide over school mask
mandates, for example opening a
civil rights investigation into Gov.
Greg Abbott’s (R) ban on school
masking in Texas.
Shortly after he announced his
mask rule, Youngkin said his ad-
ministration would “use every
resource within the governor’s
authority to explore what we can
do and will do in order to make
sure parents’ rights are protect-
ed.” And in a Fox News appear-
ance Monday, Lt. Gov. Winsome
E. Sears (R) was more specific,
saying the administration could
withhold some state funding if
school districts refuse to comply.
“There’s certain combinations
of money that we send to the local
schools and he could withhold
some of that,” Sears said, spurring
outrage from Democratic leaders
including state Sen. Jennifer L.
McClellan (D-Richmond), who on
Tuesday promised a lawsuit if the
governor goes through with
Sears’s threat.
Youngkin spokeswoman
Macaulay Porter said Tuesday
that “Democrats willfully mis-
characterized the lieutenant gov-
ernor’s comments” but did not
rule out withholding funding
from defiant districts.
The governor “will consider
MASKS FROM B1
Showdown heats up over mask policies in Virginia schools
MATT MCCLAIN/THE WASHINGTON POST
Supporters of L oudoun County Public Schools’ mask mandate rally outside the county government
center in Leesburg. Opinions differed on whether the governor’s order will withstand legal scrutiny.Subscriber ExclusivesAlmost “Tutu” Good to Be True: Discounted Tickets to Alvin Ailey American
Dance Theater February 1-6 at The Kennedy Center
Enjoy mixed repertory programs of signature Ailey classics, new works from today’s most dynamic choreographers, and the soul-stirring
masterpiece, Revelations – the most-seen modern dance piece in the world. Alvin Ailey’s irresistible dancers bring audiences to their feet
every night. “No company in the world has so intimate a relationship with a single work as Alvin Ailey does with Revelations” (The Guardian).
See details at washingtonpost.com/my-post.