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By now many of you have heard about inappropriate books being shelved in public school libraries across Iowa. If for some reason you haven’t, you can catch up here and here.

The Iowa Standard reached out to the Waukee Community School District shortly after the issue came to light. We asked the district for public records involving the ordering of the books “Gender Queer,” “Lawn Boy,” and “All Boys Aren’t Blue.”

We told the district we were specifically looking for the name of the individual who placed the order for these books as well as the date the books were ordered.

We received a copy of the purchase order and a copy of the full pricing breakdown.

The purchase order was signed by Sarah Kautz, the district’s Chief Financial Officer. Lori Lyon, the school board president, signed off on the other document.

Lyon’s signature is on an order form for 7,052 titles. It was an order that cost the district $103,062.65.

We asked Lyon about the purchasing of the three books and noted her signature was the signature provided on one of the forms approving the purchase.

Lyon said the entire board approves all purchases and, by law, the president signs all contracts which the board has approved.

“We purchased over 10,000 books for Northwest High School,” she said.

Lyon pointed to district policy that states the board delegates its authority to determine which instructional materials will be utilized and purchased by the school district to licensed employees.

We asked Lyon which licensed employees was this authority delegated to.

We will provide an update when we hear from Lyon.

Author: Jacob Hall

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