National Archives Opens Electronic Records Vault in Suitland, Maryland

The following announcement was written by the U.S. National Archives and Records Administration:

Suitland, MD - The National Archives announces the opening of a new Electronic Records Vault at the Washington National Records Center (WNRC) facility in Suitland, Maryland.  The 976 square-foot, state-of-the-art vault will allow the National Archives, for the first time in its 73-year history, to store and service temporary electronic records for Federal agencies.

The Electronic Records Vault features a non-aqueous fire suppression system, strict environmental controls, and multiple levels of security to protect and preserve Federal electronic records.  Complimenting the Electronic Records Vault is the WNRC's new media disintegrator to securely destroy Federal electronic records at the end of their retention schedule.  The National Archives will also provide door-to-door pickup and delivery of electronic records for agencies in the Metropolitan Washington area.

A similar Electronic Records Vault will simultaneously come online at the National Archives new Federal Records Center in Fort Worth, Texas to service electronic records for agencies west of the Mississippi.

"The Electronic Records Vaults are an exciting project for the National Archives," said David Weinberg, Director of the National Archives Federal Records Centers Program.  "Our customer agencies expressed a need to keep their electronic records safely in Federal custody throughout their life cycle, and we built the Electronic Records Vault in response to this demand.  We are proud that we will be able to securely store all types of Federal electronic records the same way that we have safeguarded Federal paper records for decades."

The Washington National Records Center provides records management services to headquarters and field offices of Federal agencies located in the District of Columbia, Maryland, Virginia, and West Virginia.  It also serves Federal Courts located in the District of Columbia and Armed Forces worldwide.  It is the first stop for Federal records after they are no longer actively used by the agency of origin.  Agency records stay at the WNRC, where they are tracked through an automated database, until they are either destroyed or accepted by the National Archives as permanent records.

Comments

[Dino (all Dino, All the Time)]

976 square feet? Where did they ever find the space for such a huge vault? That's about 31'x31'. My local branch bank has more space for their safe deposit boxes. I sure hope that was a typo.

[Dick Eastman]

I have no idea if that is a typo or not but it is an exact quote from the National Archives' press release.

Keep in mind that this is an Electronic Records Vault facility. 976 square feet is more than enough space to store several petabytes of data, the equivalent of ten to twenty times the amount of information stored (on paper) at the Library of Congress.

- Dick Eastman

[Jason Presley]

And I imagine one would look a tad more suspicious trying to sneak out of the building with a hard drive array stuffed down one's pants.

[Happy Dae]

Living close to and researching often in the NARA in Fort Worth, Texas, I'm surprised they've mentioned nothing of this to me. The questions that come to my mind are the following:

1- Exactly what information will be stored?
2- What is meant by "temporary electronic records"?
3- Will the public have access to them?

When we have the answers to these questions, perhaps this announcement will mean more, hmmm?

Happy Dae.
http://www.ShoeStringGenealogy.com/ssg1.htm FREE

[Jack MacKeen]

I was particularly intrigued by the comment "door-to-door pickup and delivery of electronic records". Secure electronic communications capability apparently is for the future.

[Dick Kahane]

My guess is that these records will be of little if any interest to genealogists. It sounds as though NARA is providing a facility for the storage of those items (internal memos, emails, IMs, visitor logs, and the like) which Federal agencies are legally required to keep for a specified period of time before destroying them or formally relinquishing them to NARA for permanent storage. The facility might help with the, "Oops, we accidentally deleted the emails," stories occasionally emerging from Washington, but otherwise, I think this is pretty much of a non-event as far as genealogy and genealogists are concerned.

[Bernie Couming]

The "Ooops, we accidently deleted the e-mails" stories out of Washington is still the most scary part of this. Now the managers can accidently allocate certain material into the fast track of automaticity. For a Washington which never wants to be held accountable this sounds like a godsend. And the Director is happily touting his (commercial?) offer of this to client agencies as the safe way to manage their records for their "retention scheduled lifetime", followed by the press the DELETE button, built in automaticity to records destruction. The devil will certainly be in the details.

[George L. Trigg]

I am curious as to how a "media disintegrator" can compliment anything. ComplEment, yes, but not ComplIment. The words are truly different.

[Roxie]

George wrote: "I am curious as to how a "media disintegrator" can compliment anything. ComplEment, yes, but not ComplIment. The words are truly different."

Well, George, I agree with you. In fact, I commented on that a few days before you did, but Dick gave my comment the axe.

[Dick Eastman]

I don't believe I "gave that the axe." It never appeared in the list of new comments.

I have made every submitted comment visible in the past week or so with the following exceptions:

Perhaps a dozen comments were advertisements for porno sites

Two comments were duplicates. Apparently people posted a comment, did not see it appear immediately, so they would post it again. In each case, I made one comment visible and deleted the duplicates.

One comment was a personal message to me from a subscriber asking about her subscription. Making it visible to everyone didn't seem to serve any purpose.

All other comments submitted have been made public.

- Dick Eastman