Call for Comments for Draft Statement on Access

ALA/SAA Joint Statement on Access Review Task Force

The American Library Association (ALA) and SAA’s Joint Task Force on Access has posted its draft document on SAA’s website and is seeking comments and suggestions from members of the archives community. The document will be open for comment until December 15. Send your comments to: access-tf [@] forums.archivists.org and indicate the section, subsection and page number regarding your suggestions. We expect to forward a final draft to the ALA and SAA governing bodies for review in early 2009.

The ALA/SAA Joint Task Force on Access is charged with reviewing, updating, and revising the 1994 ALA/SAA Joint Statement on Access to Original Research Materials. The goal is to prepare a statement for the consideration of the ALA and SAA governing bodies that addresses as comprehensively as possible the issues and policies related to researcher access to archives and manuscripts collections (commonly referred to as manuscript collections, special collections, and archives). The current draft builds on a preliminary revision of the statement by an ALA/RBMS task force. The members of the Access Task Force believe that the need for substantive changes in the ALA/RBMS version are minimal, and the edits shown are based primarily on feedback received from members of SAA. Changes are shown by strikeouts (deleted text) and bolded script (added text).

Task Force Members include:

ALA representatives

• Timothy Murray (co-chair), University of Delaware;
• Elaine Barone, Buffalo & Erie County Public Library;
• Diane Windham Shaw, Lafayette College; and

SAA representatives

• Joe Anderson (co-chair), American Institute of Physics;
• Pat Michaelis, Kansas State Historical Society; and
• Donna Webber, Simmons College.