Protest song stacks up reasons downtown library is vital

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This article was published 24/02/2020 (2420 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

For most of his life, Winnipeg singer-songwriter John K. Samson used to go to his favourite library, the downtown branch now known as the Millennium Library, at least once a week.

“I did a lot of writing there, especially in the 2000s,” the former Weakerthans frontman says. “That whole decade, I spent a lot of time working in a carrel there by the wall of windows.”

Then, last winter, Samson’s home away from home became a place he no longer recognized. On Feb. 25, 2019, the Millennium Library implemented airport-style security complete with metal detectors and bag searches.

“I was astonished,” he says. “I was just appalled and astonished that something so obviously exclusionary, something that would so obviously interrupt and harm the purpose of that building, would be enacted here.”

He’s not alone in that sentiment. Many Winnipeggers are critical of the library’s heightened — and, in Canada, unprecedented — security measures, saying they make people, especially vulnerable and marginalized people, feel targeted and unwelcome. Others took umbrage with the fact that the rollout of the new security measures was less than transparent, and done with no community consultation.

Since the changes were implemented one year ago, the Millennium Library has seen a sharp dropoff in visitors.

 

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And so, Samson wrote a protest song. Named for the activist group he’s been organizing with in the past year, Millennium for All features fellow Winnipeg musicians Ashley Au, Scott Nolan, Jason Tait and Samson’s partner, Christine Fellows, who also created a beautiful collage-style stop-motion music video (wfp.to/millenniumforall) to accompany the song.

“That’s all Christine,” Samson says. “I cut out some of the birds (drawn by artist Jonathan Dyck) very carefully. Otherwise, she built that from scratch.”

The song is gorgeous tribute to the Millennium Library, with all the observational poetry Samson is known for, about all the ways in which the library is so much bigger than books: “This is where we test out our replacement knees/This is where we’re knitting mitts for refugees/This is where we medicate in bathroom stalls/this is where we call home from a payphone down the hall.”

“(Libraries are) one of the last places where we can all gather freely and publicly, where we don’t have to purchase something in order to sit and work and talk,” Samson says. “It’s a real hub for real community. Librarians know this, that their calling is much more important than providing books for people. It’s about building community.”

It was when Samson and Fellows were appointed the Millennium Library’s writers-in-residence in 2016 that the library’s place as the heart of the community came into sharp relief.

“It was definitely the best job I’ve ever had. That experience really led me to recognize how diverse and important the library is. We met so many writers and artists that we would never have met anywhere else, just the most varied and fascinating and diverse stream of Winnipeg,” he says.

“I’ve come to think of the Millennium as Winnipeg’s most important intersection — that it’s not actually Portage and Main, it’s the Millennium.”

Samson has been back only once since last February. “I found it really distressing,” he says of going through security. “I just feel if some people aren’t welcome there, then I shouldn’t be there, either.”

That’s when he started working with Millennium for All, which, over the past year, has held protests, conducted research and written reports, as well as letters and op-ed pieces, and has made presentations at city hall, opposing the security measures and advocating for committed investment in Winnipeg’s libraries.

Today at 4:30 p.m., there will be a rally in the lobby of the Millennium Library to observe the anniversary of the security implementation and protest proposed cuts to libraries. The city’s proposed budget cuts last December included closing the Westwood and West Kildonan libraries in 2020, and the Fort Garry library in 2022. The city will release its preliminary budget on March 6.

As for what he’d like to see, Samson says, “I would like them to take the security down; I think that’s the first step.

“And then I think consulting with marginalized communities and providing more services for people in need and for people generally. Fundamentally, what we need to see is way more funding for libraries and way more support for librarians.

“Which leads me to the budget next month. Mayor (Brian) Bowman is threatening to cut several libraries and cut the hours of the Millennium, further weakening this already weakened institution. So, that’s what I want to see: I want to see recognition that we can’t afford not to fund this place. It’s way too important. It’s a cornerstone of building a just city that we all want to live in.”

jen.zoratti@freepress.mb.ca

Twitter: @JenZoratti