RECORDS ADMINISTRATION PROGRAM BACKGROUND

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP72-00450R000100160006-9
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 7
• Document Creation Date: December 9, 2016
• Document Release Date: August 3, 2001
• Sequence Number: 6
• Publication Date: March 20, 1968
• Content Type: REPORT

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20 Ircb 1968
RECORDS ADMINISTRATION PROGRAM BACKGROUND
This Briefing on the Agency Records Program is focused on the fact
that the Agency Records Center is filled to capacity and that extensive
corrective actions must be initiated before December 1970. The Wednesday,
13 March 1968 Briefing of the Deputy Director for Support reviewed the
Background of the Records Program and divided the problems and recommend&
tions into two areas for action. The following Background material was
,art of that Briefing:
STATINTL
a- The Federal Records Act of 1950 requires every Agency to
have a Records Administration Program to iml.rove the efficiency and
economy of its paperwork.
b. The Headquarters Regulation adequately fulfills the
legal and administrative requirements of the Agency Records Program.
c. Congress has repeatedly and consistently demonstrated a
positive concern about records in the Executive Departments.
(i.e. The Records Disposal Act of 1943 proibibits disposal of
Government records unless approved by the Joint Committee on
Disposal of Executive Papers.)
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STATINTL
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d. The Agency records disposal system operates in accordance
with this law and with the related procedures established and
supervised by the National Archives and Records Service, OSA.
e. Current Congressional concern is reflected in the
Congressional Record of March 13, 1967 (pages H-2614 thru 2616)
introducing House Resolution 7107 -a bill to provide for better
direction and supervision of CIA and other U. S. Intelligence
activities . In his remarks Congressman Reuss of Wisconsin
recommends amendment of the 1943 Records Disposal Act and he stated:
To assure that the full record is available to historians, the
bill provides that no CIA records can be destroyed without the
apiroval of the Joint Congressional Committee on Intelligence'.
f. Agency HE
,orescribes a Records Program to include:
(1) Reports Administration
(2) Correspondence Administration
(3) Forms Administration
Records Maintenance
(5) Records Disposition
(6) Vital Records Administration
g. The size and scope of the problems currently covered by each
of the above sub programa are reflected in a small -Quiz attached
as TAB A.
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Records Program Title Slide (1)
Management Imp. Slide (2)
It is a management improve
ment technique.
b. The network of 67 Agency personnel assigned the title of
Records Management Officer and responsible for component activity
in the decentralized Program are listed in TAB B. All have other
duties and more than half of them spend only a short time on the
Total Records Program.
i. The Agency Records Administration Officer has the assistance
of 5 professionals in his Headquarters Central Staff. They establish
standards and provide advice and guidance to all components of the
Agency. The Total Records Program being attempted by this Central
Records Staff is outlined in TAB C. He has 15 people operating the
STATINTL Agency Records Center at and 2 at the Suitland Annex. (Two part-
time contract employees are supplementing the work force during the
move of some records to Suitland.)
J. Each summer the component Records Officers inventory the
Agency records holdings.
k. The following Statistical Charts were briefly reviewed:
Volume of Active Records in Agency Offices (TAB D)
Total Office Holdings in the Records Center (TAB E)
Four types of Records on Hand in the Records Center (TAB F)
Average growth of Records Center Volume (TAB G)
Volume of Records on Hand 1957-67 and est. of 1975 (TAB H)
1. The records storage policy of the Federal Government, imple-
mented through the National Archives and Records Service, is to construct
Records Centers to store the inactive records of Government Agencies.
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m. The Federal Government has 26 million cubic feet of records.
At present there are 14 Federal Records Centers in 11 states holding
some 8.5 million cubic feet of Government records. As of mid-1967
the Federal Agencies had some 17.5 million cubic feet of records.
n. The Agency now has a total of 334,000 cubic fest of record..
Of these some 102,000 are in the Record. Center and 232,000 are in the
Offices. (The Agency ratio parallels that of the Federal Government
with almost one-half an many inactive records in storage 414 there are
active records in the Offices.)
o. In 1954 the National Archive had a $25,000 Survey conduct
by Records Engineering, Inc. to make a comparison of coats between
Microfilming and the use of Federal Records Centers. A stImmary of
this Survey, which states a record may be stored ao to 60 years for
the coat of microfilming it is attached as TAB I.
p. In 1960 the General Accounting Office challenged the policy
of Records Centers versus microfilming and, if we desire that exchange
of correspondence will be made available to us at National Archives
by the Assistant Archivist for Federal Records Centers. The GAO
conclusion found that Records Centers are more economical than micro-
filming inactive records.
q. The le December 1967 memo on the Agency Records Program by the
Chief, Support Services Staff to the DDS includes a study of the probable
cost of microfilming a selected one-half of the Records Center contents.
The findings show an estimated coat of 1.2 million dollars to contract
for tae film lag of 50,000 cubic feet of records.
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STAT I NT L
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r. (The fo1lcing aside is added here in response to microfilming
questions raised after the Briefing. The Agency Printing Services
price catalog for small, exacting microfilming Jobe estimates the
costs of $76 per 2,000 pages. Their current facilities and manpower
cannot take on a large-sized continuous filming operation. In DDI/CRS
estimates filming at one cent per page. Our Staff
estimates 2,000 pages per cubic foot of paper -- ergo, $20 to film.
The Government filming service at National Archives, GSA, Mt. Valacus
calculates the cost at $30 per cubic foot. Today they find no filming
personnel available on the Civil Service roster and feel CIA security
would boost filming costa to $40 a foot among the possible Contractors.
NARS stated the high cost of filming is personnel not material and
equipment. The filming problems may be seen detailed in the attached
TAB .1 report on a DDI/CRS $13,400 filming project. This was 3 million
x 8 cards (about 544 cubic feet) by 13 summbr employees last year
and the total coat averagedlebout $24.76 per cubic foot. Recordak made
a preliminary estimate of $30,000 for the job -- $55 a foot.)
s. (This paragraph also is added in response to questions; con.
earning records storage costs. The National Archives and Records
Service estimates Federal Records Center storage costs at 29 cents per
cubic foot per year. They include in their calculations the annual
coet of apace and maintenance plus equipment costs amortized over a
ten-year period. The Offlce of Logistics informs
us the 20,000 square feet of Records Center construction and equipment
cost $245,675 in 1954 and the 30,000 square foot addition in 1957 cost
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STAT I NT L
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*416,442. We average better than two cubic feet of records per
square foot of floor space and thus have a capacity of 106,800
cubic feet in the 47,950 square feet of floor space available.
At present a Survey is being maAe of the Records Center and will include
new storage cost estimates. In the past the following records storage
cost calculations have been used:
CALCULATIONS FOR AVERAGE RECORDS CENTER STORAGE COST:
Cost of Records Center Building and Equipment WA 4662,117.
Cost Divided by Volume of Records in Storage is
($662,117 by 102,000) for a Center storage coat of 0.48 per foot.
COMPARISON OF AVERAGE OFFICE RECORDS STORAGE COST:
Congressional reported coat of Government Office space is
$3.85 per sq. ft.
0/Logistics stated cost of 4-drawer safe today is $585.00 each.
(Safe holds 8 feet of recorda or $73.12 per foot)
Cost of records storage in Office ($73.12 plus. $3.85) is
*76.97 per foot.
In the past we pro-rated the
ng cost sod safe cost over a
20-year amortization period, thereby reducing the Center versus
Office storage cost figures down to 32 cents versus * 7.50 per year.
Also we usually included the personnel costs for file and retrieval
servicing of that-records in both Office and Records Center because
the ratio issimilarly in the Centers favor. We calculate storage
and service of records at the Center to be $1.86 versus Office storage
and service costs of $61.08 per foot per year.)
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t. Not all storage space is fit for Records Storage.
A record is kept because of a future need and intended use.
It must be available, controlled, secure, and serviced.
It must not be vermin ridden, rodent soiled, or damaged.
it must not be crumbly-crisp from heat or soggy from moisture.
If it does not deserve this care it need not be saved at all.
During Fiscal Year 1967 the retirement of records from Headquarters
Offices averaged 71 cubic feet per work day (equal to 9 eafes per
day). The Records Center disposed of 29 cubic feet of old papers each
day for a net growth rate averaging 42 cubic feet per day. From the
xecordo in storage the Records Center provided a daily average of 511
reference services during Flacal Year 1967.
u. The Support Services Staff 'Program Call for 1970.1974
Includes a Records Adiinistration Branch request for $750,030 to meet
the requirements of storing Agency records after December 1970. This
figure is based on the GSA construction costs of $15 per square foot
for reinforced Vault storage space. The Office of Logistics con-
struction engineers use 420 per foot in their estimates and include
aeveral other items with which we were unfamiliar. On U. March 1968
they proposed a Feasibility Study 46,000 to establish tighter cal-
culations and corgparison costs. Attached as TAB K is the Logistics
construction cost estimate of 1.2 million dollars plus another
492,000 for necessary engineering work.
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