The Liberty Lake City Council on December 17 confirmed two mayoral appointees to the city’s Library Board of Trustees — though not before a brief but bitter dispute about waiting to make the decision.
Council Member Jed Spencer motioned to wait until after the council had a chance to debate the process by which the council confirms trustees, citing rifts in the city after two years of impassioned policy-making-process debates between the board and the council.
“There’s been some trust broken between the council and the Library Board,” Spencer said. “Frankly, there’s been some trust broken between the council and the mayor.”
Still, Anna Voloshin, originally from Ukraine, and Michael Bota, originally from Romania, were confirmed, each on a 6-1 margin, with Spencer voting against Bota and Council Member Mike Kennedy voting against Voloshin. Both members are part of the seven-member council’s conservative majority, which recently ousted a popular trustee who advocated for board autonomy.
By “broken trust,” Spencer said he was referring to Mayor Cris Kaminskas’ statement to the Spokesman, after the council voted out trustee Kim Girard in a move that shocked the city and the liberal minority. Girard had been up for a second term and was recommended by Kaminskas. Kaminskas worried in the Spokesman that the conservative members wanted trustees who they think would be open to book bans.
“If they come up with a reason not to appoint them, what’s left?” Kaminskas had told the newspaper. “They’re not going to force me into appointing someone who’s going to ban books.”
Kaminskas was talking about turmoil on the council regarding the library board that started when a Liberty Lake resident tried to have the book Gender Queer from the library in 2021.
The conservative majority has been adamant since the beginning of the controversy that the whole saga was about lines of accountability to the public, not about banning books. Spencer said he has not heard any council “publicly say they want to ban books.”
“This is inflammatory language being used by the leader of our city,” Spencer said. “None of us have ever proposed to ban books.”
Cargill and Van Orman voted in 2021 to ban Gender Queer, though that vote failed 5-2. The board currently has three open positions — Girard’s seat and the seats Teresa Tapao-Hunt and Robert Skattum, who vacated their seats earlier this year for personal reasons.
“If we are going to address the appointment process … schedule it for later,” Kaminskas shot back at Spencer. “We have two — well, now, three — open board positions starting in January for the library board of trustees. We have very well-qualified appointees here tonight ready to speak to you. … Putting the library board in a position where they can’t function because they are down three trustees is a disservice to our residents.”
Council Member Annie Kurtz agreed with Kaminskas.
“I don’t feel like holding back appointments because we’re concerned about perspective issues is the way this city should operate,” Kurtz said.
Spencer’s motion to table the appointee vote failed 6-1.
