Bill giving Texas parents, school boards more control over library books heads to Gov. Greg Abbott

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Legislators on Saturday gave final approval to a bill giving Texas parents and school boards a bigger role over what books students can access in public school libraries and creating new advisory councils to oversee the removal process.

Senate Bill 13 would give school boards, not school librarians, the final say over what materials are allowed in their schools’ libraries by creating a framework for them to remove books based on complaints they receive. The final version of the bill agreed upon by lawmakers from both chambers would allow school boards to oversee book approvals and removals, or delegate the responsibility to local school advisory councils if parents in a district sign a petition allowing their creation. The House version of SB 13 required 20% of parents to sign the petition, but the version agreed upon between chambers requires only 50 parents or 10% of parents in the district, whichever is less.

The 50-person threshold for the petitions was initially proposed by Rep. Brent Money, R-Greenville, as an amendment during House discussion. Money’s amendment also mandated the councils only be composed of parents who signed the petition, but failed 42-101. The Senate’s version of the bill, which passed in March, mandated advisory councils rather than require a petition to form one.

SB 13 was ultimately approved by the House 81-48 and in the Senate 23-8. The bill includes definitions for what constitutes harmful material and indecent content, which led Democratic House representatives to express concerns about overzealous bans on books.

During the discussion on the House floor Monday, Rep. James Talarico, D-Austin, pointed specifically to bill language requiring approved books to adhere to “local community values,” which he said could lead small, vocal groups of people to limit students’ book access. Talarico said titles often taught in public schools — like “Catcher in the Rye”, “Lonesome Dove” and the Bible — could end up banned under some of the bill’s vague and subjective interpretations.

“If your answer to ‘could “Romeo and Juliet” be banned,’ if it is anything other than ‘of course not,’ then that is a serious problem,” Talarico said.

Rep. Erin Zwiener, D-Driftwood, also worried that the bill could lead to overly broad book bans.

“What is indecent for a 17 year old is not the same as what is indecent for a 5 year old,” she said.

Rep. Brad Buckley, the bill’s House sponsor, called community values the “bedrock” of public policy, and the Salado Republican dismissed potential removal of classics as a “red herring” argument. The bill also creates an exception for instructional material required for class lessons.

“A speaker before me said we should cherish the value of books. Well, maybe so, but I would argue we should cherish and value our kids more, and Senate Bill 13 will do exactly that,” Buckley said.

Representatives supportive of the bill said SB 13 would give parents better control over what materials their children can access.” About 16% of complaints about school library books last year were initiated by parents, according to a report from the American Libraries Association, while 72% came from elected officials, pressure groups and board members and administrators.

The bill would also extend regulation introduced by a law passed in 2023 aimed at keeping “sexually explicit” material out of school libraries. House Bill 900 was partially blocked from implementing a book rating system by a federal appeals court. While the House version of SB 13 contained an explicit prohibition on “sexually explicit” content, that provision is no longer in the final version.

Opponents of the bill have worried not only about restricting book access, but also about the administrative backlog that having to approve each new library book could create. School boards will have 90 days after complaints on each book are filed to reach a decision on whether to add, keep or remove material from school bookshelves. The proposed advisory councils are only required to meet twice per school year, and Zweiner said the small meeting times could result in books being off the shelves for most of a school year.

“I just think the challenge is one person with a bee in their bonnet can disrupt that entire local process [by] challenging a massive number of books, and then those books won't be available while they're being reviewed,” Zweiner said on Saturday during the House’s final approval for the bill.

Roughly 540 books were banned in Texas schools during the 2023-24 school year, according to PEN America, an organization that has tracked book bans throughout the country.

In addition to the book removal proposal, SB 13 also allows parents to submit a list of books their child specifically is not allowed to check out from their school’s library. The bill, one of Senate leader Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick’s listed legislative priorities, now moves to Gov. Greg Abbott for signing.

Sofia Sorochinskaia contributed to this story.

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