§29-1-8c. State Library Section.

(a) There is hereby created a West Virginia State Library Section under the Department of Arts, Culture, and History.

(b) The State Library Commission is continued as an advisory council to support the West Virginia State Library Section, and shall consist of the Curator of the Department of Arts, Culture, and History as an ex officio voting member and six voting members.

(1) The Governor shall appoint, by and with the advice and consent of the Senate, the voting members of the commission each for a term of four years:

(A) No more than three appointed members may reside in the same congressional district;

(B) The Governor shall make the initial appointment of State Library Commission members for staggered terms as follows: Two members, one from each congressional district, for a term of two years; two members, one from each congressional district, for a term of three years; and two members, one from each congressional district, for a term of four years; and

(C) Three appointed members of the commission shall be women and three appointed members shall be men.

(2) No member of the State Library Commission may receive compensation for services rendered, nor be engaged or interested in the publishing business.

(3) On or before the expiration of the terms for which the members are appointed, the Governor shall appoint their successors.

(b) The Curator of the Department of Arts, Culture, and History shall appoint a library section director, with the advice and consent of the State Library Commission, to carry out the duties and functions of the State Library Section outlined in this section through the Department of Arts, Culture, and History library section. The library section director shall have at least the following qualifications: A master’s degree from an American Library Association-accredited program in a library-related discipline and three years of management or administrative work experience in a library. The library section director shall also serve as the Secretary of the State Library Commission for the purpose of board meetings.

(c) The State Library Commission shall advise the curator and the library section director on carrying out certain duties and functions of the State Library Section, as provided in this section.

(d) General authority of the State Library Section. —

(1) The State Library Section shall provide assistance, advice, and counsel to all school, state-institutional, free and public libraries, and to all communities in the state which may propose to establish libraries, as to the best means of establishing and administering them, selecting and cataloging books, and other details of library management, and may send any of its members to aid in organizing such libraries or assist in the improvement of those already established.

(2) The State Library Section may:

(A) Receive gifts of money, books, or other property which may be used or held for the purpose or purposes given; and may purchase and operate traveling libraries under such conditions and rules as the commission deems necessary to protect the interests of the state and best increase the efficiency of the service it is expected to render the public.

(B) Purchase suitable books for traveling libraries and distribute them as needed to those persons and places in the state without adequate public library service.

(C) Collect books and other suitable library matter and distribute the same among state institutions desiring the same.

(D) Issue and offer for sale printed material, such as lists and circulars of information, and in the publication thereof may cooperate with other state library commissions and libraries, in order to secure the more economical administration of the work for which it was formed.

(E) Conduct courses of library instruction and hold librarians’ institutes in various parts of the state.

(F) Perform such other services on behalf of public libraries as it may consider to be in the best interest of the state.

(e) West Virginia Program for Open Education Resources; material description. —

(1) The State Library Section shall establish and maintain the West Virginia Program for Open Education Resources to encourage and facilitate the use of open education resource materials in both higher education and kindergarten through grade 12 in West Virginia schools.

(2) “Open education resource materials” means teaching, learning, and resource materials in any medium, digital or otherwise, that reside in the public domain or have been released under an open license that permits low-cost access, use, adaptation, and redistribution by others with no or limited restrictions.

(3) The State Library Commission may consult with the Higher Education Policy Commission, the West Virginia Council for Community and Technical College Education, and the State Superintendent of Schools, or his or her designee, to:

(A) Ascertain what institutions or faculty are currently using open education resource material;

(B) Identify material currently associated with core general education courses and readily available for use by faculty and institutions;

(C) Identify any statutory or other impediments which interfere with selection and use of open education resource materials by administrators or teachers at all levels of instruction in West Virginia schools;

(D) Identify sources of potential grants for funding for teachers and institutions to use open education resource materials for classes and courses, and propose a competitive application system to award grant funding for those faculty and institutions seeking to use the open education resource materials;

(E) Establish a digital clearinghouse that will function as a publicly accessible database for open education resource material;

(F) Develop strategies to leverage further open education resource material to benefit higher education institutions and school systems, as well as private and foundation support for the project; and

(G) Report no later than July 1 of each year the program’s findings, progress, and recommendations to the State Library Section, the Governor, and the chairs of the Legislature’s House and Senate Committees on Education.

(f) State Library Section—disposition of monetary gifts. —

(1) If any sums of money are received by the State Library Section as gifts, they shall be paid into the State Treasury and used exclusively for carrying out the provisions of this section, and paying expenses of the State Library Section and the State Library Commission.

(2) The State Library Section shall expend no sums unless they are available by gift, appropriation, or otherwise.

(g) Regional libraries and library areas — establishment and location. —

(1) The State Library Commission is hereby authorized to develop a plan for the establishment and location of regional libraries, and library areas throughout the state, based on a detailed survey to be made by the State Library Commission of the needs of the various localities of the state. A region shall include two or more counties.

(2) On completion of such survey of any proposed region, the State Library Commission shall report their findings to the State Library Section and the state library director, who may refer the proposal to the county commissions or councils of all the counties included in such proposed region. The county commissions or councils may act upon such proposal by resolution, and the votes of a majority of each of the county commissions or councils of the counties included in the proposed region shall be necessary for the adoption of such proposal. The proposal may be amended and resubmitted as necessary.

(3) The State Library Section may, with advice and input from the State Library Commission, and as the state library director may consider necessary or beneficial:

(A) Establish, maintain, and operate a public library for the region;

(B) Appoint a librarian and the necessary assistants, and fix their compensation, such appointments to be based upon merit and efficiency as determined by the state library section director. The librarian shall hold a certificate from an approved school of library science and shall have had not less than three years of practical experience in library work. The state library section director may also remove said librarian and other assistants;

(C) Purchase books, periodicals, equipment, and supplies;

(D) Purchase sites and erect buildings, or lease suitable quarters, and have supervision and control of that property;

(E) Borrow books from and lend books to other libraries;

(F) Enter into contracts to receive service from, or give service to, libraries within or without the region and give service to municipalities without the region that have no libraries, or cooperate with and aid generally, without such contracts, public school, institutional, and other libraries;

(G) Make such bylaws, rules, and regulations not inconsistent with this article as may be expedient for the government of regional library areas and the regional libraries therein, and for the purpose of carrying out the provisions of this article; and

(H) Accept for the State of West Virginia any appropriations of money that may hereafter be made out of the federal treasury by an act or acts of Congress and to disburse such funds for the purpose of carrying out the provisions of this article, in accordance with §18-10-11 and §18-10-12 of this code.

(h) Aid to libraries by State Library Section.—

(1) The State Library Section may render such aid and assistance, financial, advisory or otherwise, to public, school, county, or regional libraries, whether established or maintained by the State Library Section or not, under such conditions and rules and regulations as the State Library Section may determine necessary to further the interests of the state and best increase the efficiency of the service it is expected to render the public.

(2) The State Library Commission may review and analyze the status of libraries across the state and advise the State Library Section on projects and libraries for which it has determined the development and support of will further the education of the people of the state as a whole and will thereby aid in the discharge of the responsibility of the state to encourage and foster education. The West Virginia Library Section may pay over and contribute to any board of library directors created and maintained pursuant to the provisions of this section or any special act of the Legislature such sum or sums of money as may be available from funds included in appropriations made for the State Library Section for that purpose.

(i) Collection and preservation of library data; surveys; employment of personnel; use of data.

(1) The State Library Section may collect and preserve statistics and other data, concerning libraries of any sort located within this state; to make surveys relating to the needs or conditions of such libraries or the library conditions of any city, town, county, regional library area, or other subdivision of this state; and to publish the results and findings thereof in accordance with the provisions of this section.

(2) The State Library Section may employ necessary personnel for any of these purposes.

(3) Such data, surveys, and findings of the State Library Section shall be available to all school, public, institutional, regional, and other libraries within this state, whether proposed or established.

(j) Confidential nature of certain library records.—

(1) Circulation and similar records of any public library in this state which identify the user of library materials are not public records but shall be confidential and may not be disclosed except:

(A) To members of the library staff in the ordinary course of business, including paid employees and unpaid volunteers upon completing a written confidentiality agreement which shall prevent disclosure of circulation records, personal information, and similar records of any public library except to the extent allowed under this subsection and obtaining written permission from the library director of the library system wherein he or she will be working;

(B) Upon written consent of the user of the library materials or the user’s parents or guardian if the user is a minor or ward; or

(C) Upon appropriate court order or subpoena.

(2) Any disclosure authorized by subdivision (1) of this subsection, or any unauthorized disclosure of materials made confidential by subdivision (1), does not in any way destroy the confidential nature of that material, except for the purpose for which an authorized disclosure is made. A person disclosing material as authorized by subdivision (1) of this subsection is not liable therefor.

(k) Library Facilities Improvement Fund.—

(1) There is continued in the State Treasury a special fund known as the Library Facilities Fund. Expenditures from the fund shall be for the purposes set forth in this section. The fund shall be administered by the State Library Section.

(2) The fund shall consist of moneys received from the following sources:

(A) All appropriations made by the Legislature to the fund;

(B) Any moneys available from sources outside the State Library Section;

(C) Repayment of loans made by the State Library Section pursuant to this section; and

(D) All interest and other income earned from investment of moneys in the fund.

(3) The State Library Section shall utilize moneys in the fund to support public library facilities construction, renovation, maintenance, and improvement projects. The State Library Section shall evaluate potential recipient projects of funds from the fund on a competitive basis.

(A) The State Library Section may provide loans to public libraries to support energy savings and critical maintenance projects with moneys in the fund.

(B) With the exception of loans made under this section, the State Library Section may not expend any money from the fund toward a particular project unless the proposed expenditure is matched on a dollar-for-dollar basis by other sources.

(4) The State Library Section shall propose a rule for legislative approval in accordance with §29A-3-1 et seq. of this code to implement the provisions of this section. The rule shall contain at least the following:

(A) A process for submitting and reviewing proposals;

(B) The content of proposals;

(C) Criteria for evaluating proposals; and

(D) Other provisions the State Library Section considers necessary to administer the program in accordance with this section.

(5) Any balance, including accrued interest and any other returns, in the fund at the end of each fiscal year will not expire to the General Revenue Fund but remain in the fund and be expended for the purposes provided by this section.

(6) In any calendar year, the State Library Section may not allocate an amount in excess of four percent of the balance of the fund on December 31 of the immediately preceding calendar year for administrative expenses.

(7) The State Library Section may invest any or all of the balance of the fund with the state’s Consolidated Investment Fund.

(l) Any rules promulgated by the Library Commission will remain in full force and effect until amended, repealed, or superseded by another rule promulgated by the Library Commission or State Library Section.