SAN ANTONIO — Saturday afternoon, activists with ACT4SA held a "read-in," in the San Antonio Central Library to protest a six-month pilot program, putting SAPD officers at the library.
"In the period leading up to the pilot, over the last two years or so, we had 18 assaults. Assaults of patrons to one another, to our in-house security, and to our employees., said Haley Holmes, Interim Assistant to Director, San Antonio Central Library.
After the recent surge of assaults, they decide to try a few tactics, including the pilot program.
"Which is to have the SAPD on site a few hours, a couple to three days each week, so very minimal amount of time to see if that might make a difference," said Holmes.
Activists say they want the program to end.
"We're her to say that we want an end to this program, because this is not good for our community, and police in the library is a reliance on intimidation. We should be a space of knowledge and resources that anyone can connect to. And in this country, we're losing that, like free spaces for us to just be in community with each other," said Jade Pacheco, Community Builder, ACT4SA.
The organization says they realize there needs to be a response to the assaults, but is calling for other solutions.
Officials with the library say they realize having officers at the library is not a perfect solution.
"So we are planning a variety of different things, like having more training for staff on de-escalation, as well as working with UTSA on a needs assessment to see are there other things we could do, like maybe social workers in the library," said Holmes.
After the program ends in mid-May, library officials say they will look at the impacts. Holmes says two thirds of the staff at the library want the police presence to continue.
"We'll be looking at that as a whole. But so far, anecdotally, our staff have said that the same number of our regulars still come to the library. We've had a lot of public input about the police pilot, but our patrons really haven't said anything negative about it," said Holmes.
After the pilot program ends, library officials will also be looking to see if there were fewer assaults. In the past six months, they say there have only been 2 assaults.
ACT4SA is also calling on library officials to have more conversations with organizations that represent patrons of the library. Library officials say they welcome feedback from the community.