One Saturday morning, a mother and father take their daughter to the public library for the first time. The young girl walks around her parents to look at the librarian at the front desk, gazing at another Black person in a public space that’s usually occupied by white people.
“Do you work here?” she asks.
“I do,” the librarian answers.
“That makes me so happy,” the girl says.
Tenecia Phillips, branch manager of the Joel D. Valdez Main Library in Tucson, tears up at the memory. It’s one of many such moments she has shared with Black families over her nine years with the Pima County Public Library.
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