Feedback from the librarian at Stamford from whom I originally posted this thread......
-----Original Message----- From: Mr. James R. (Librarian) Jacobs <jrjac...@stanford.edu> Sent: Sunday, October 28, 2018 1:29 PM To: Joy Cytryn <jo...@earthlink.net> Cc: Cindi Katz <ck...@gc.cuny.edu>; Athanasios Koutavas <athanasios.kouta...@csi.cuny.edu> Subject: Re: Reactions to the thread: Government request for the destruction of archives, please consider writing Hi Joy, Thanks for contacting me. NARA’s official response makes it seem like it’s business as usual that there’s nothing to be alarmed about. And in some respects, I guess that’s right. However, what I’m learning as I dig into this is that: 1) many more records across the Federal govt are listed as “temporary” than I originally thought. Somewhere between 1-5% are ever actually deemed “permanent." In essence, all records are temporary. Most records are innocuous, but some, like those referencing the lawsuit Cobell v. Salazar, the largest class-action lawsuit in history against the US government over Indian trust funds, was designated under the label Energy & Minerals rather than BIA for some reason. Was this done on purpose? I don’t know, but would think that those files would be of high research value. I also talked with a former county supervisor in Mendocino, CA who thought that some of those records, if destroyed, could end up opening up much more logging and off-shore oil extraction in his area with historical precedent being erased. 2) that the scheduling process is not nearly as public and transparent as it needs to be, and that decisions seem to be more frequently based on "Adequate from the standpoint of legal rights and accountability" or "significant actions of Federal officials”, 3) that, rather than an expansive idea of research value or public policy history, agencies and NARA have a very narrow definition of research value. 4) And sadly, this seems to be a regular bureaucratic occurrence (banality of evil right?!), not necessarily some nefarious political machination to delete history — though many are seeing this within the context of the recent ICE request to destroy documents on detainee deaths and rapes and the recently leaked DoJ memo advising silence and delaying tactics on Fish & Wildlife FOIA requests. Preservation of history and precedence need to be the primary reasons for records schedules, but instead, the primary seems to be based on whether or not it is "Adequate from the standpoint of legal rights and accountability” (CYA) or covers "significant actions of Federal officials” (also CYA). Unfortunately, the way the process is set up currently, if there’s an agency(ies) records for which your work depends, it’s up to you the researcher to delve into the agency's schedules, track on the Federal Register for announcements of scheduling changes, and let the agency know when files deemed “temporary” or “having little or no research value” are actually important. My hope is that any larger response would include suggestions for making these decisions more transparent, open and public, and that there be some sort of process put in place so that records deemed temporary could, instead of being destroyed, be tranferred to libraries and archives if at all feasible. This should be seen as a teaching moment for both NARA and the academic/library/archives communities. Please feel free to forward this to any listservs you know that are currently talking about this issue. best, James Jacobs > On Oct 28, 2018, at 9:51 AM, Joy Cytryn <jo...@earthlink.net> wrote: > > Mr. Jacobs, > This has produced quite a storm on a number of listservs. This is a post > from Arian Ravanbakhsh the Supervisory Records Management Policy Analyst in > the Office of the Chief Records Officer. https://records-express.blogs.archives.gov/author/arianravanbakhsh/ People on the left have expressed concern about the current administrations stand on public access and retention of information, especially in light of the changes at the EPA. Is there concern about the material scheduled for destruction that Russ Kick has pointed to or in your opinion is this just smoke. > > I accessed your website The Digital Federal Depository Library Program > https://www.lockss.org/community/networks/digital-federal-depository-library-program/ > Has your organization seen changes with the current administration that > cause you concern? > Best, > Joy Cytryn > >
