Nice Time Update: Nifty Kid May Soon Return 'Little Free Library' To Front Yard

As we predicted, it looks like there's going to be a quick, albeit temporary resolution to the social-media-friendly story of Spencer Collins, the Kansas 9-year-old who was told he had to remove his "Little Free Library" because it violated a zoning rule on structures in front yards. Stupid bureaucrats were stupid. But since Spencer is a cute kid, and "Kansas Town Does Not Like Books" is really crappy publicity, it looks like the city of Leawood isclose to a solution that will soon allow Spencer to get the take-a-book-leave-a-book library out of the garage and back out front, and then Fox News will have to illustrate the evils of Big Government by finding stories about lemonade stands being shut down for not having a license.

The Kansas City Star reports that Leawood City Administrator Scott Lambers expects the City Council may vote on July 7 to temporarily place a moratorium on enforcing the zoning ordinance against front-yard structures. A permanent change to the code to allow some kinds of structures (little libraries) but not others (Blessed Virgin Mary shrines made out of an upturned bathtub) would need to go through the full process of public hearings and so on, but the stopgap measure would allow the little library to go back into the front yard as soon as July 8.

So hooray, Internet! Another tiny problem solved by shaming the rule-obsessed weasels of petty bureaucracy (and making a rich suburb look like the bad guys in  Farenheit 451  ).

And let us also remind Leawood's craftspeople that once that enforcement moratorium goes into effect, they'll want to get those bathtubs planted quickly.

[ KansasCity.com / Photo credit: Tammy Ljungblad, The Kansas City Star]