Recently Asked Questions (RAQs)

I am a Trustee on the Board of our library. I also serve as the Secretary to the Board. As such, I do the note-taking and draft the meeting minutes for every board meeting. Do I need to retain my handwritten notes, once I have transcribed them into document format? If so, how long must they be kept and where? FYI, the minutes are drafted, approved by the Board, then uploaded to the library website where they are available to the public.

Thanks for your consideration. Much appreciated.

In a local school district, multiple books have been challenged recently. This week, the School Board received an email from a community member referencing record keeping for library materials and electronic records retention. The district Superintendent wants to make sure that the district is keeping the right kind of library records, and that they are keeping them for the legal amount of time. Attached are two documents to review. In the first document titled District Records, under #15, it advised that districts should keep a list of book lists and school library reports. With this, should the district have kept a list of all books in their libraries in any given year?

I am writing to update the excellent advice on the RAQ page from November 2020 in regards to the retention of health screening records in a school district, local government, or state agency (under a separate retention schedule.)

I just called the state archives to confirm the retention period of library employee daily health screenings using LGS-1. They referred me to item 792c (positive health screening) with a 6 year retention and 792d (negative health screening) with a 1 year retention. (pg: 210-211 in the schedule.)

They have also updated their guidance on records related questions for COVID-19 http://www.archives.nysed.gov/records/documenting-government-response-to-covid-19

Thank you for answering the original question in November. I hope this update to the response is helpful.

We got a question regarding how the new rules for records retention (the "LGS-1") impacts the retention of school library borrowing records.

Under the new LGS-1, how long must school library borrowing records be retained?  How does that impact BOCES, district, and school library records purging? 

Under the executive order, the modifications to Open Meetings Law meant we (I'm asking for several libraries in our system) record our Board meetings.

How long does a library (public or association) or a cooperative public library system have to keep the recording of board or committee meetings ?  Looking at http://www.archives.nysed.gov/records/local-government-records-schedule-browse?combine=meeting+recording, it states:
 "Four months after the transcription or minutes have been created"

Transcribing could be challenging, particularly for smaller libraries, so we were relieved to read that once minutes were created, we might not have to transcribe (hopefully we are reading that correctly).

However - our question is about the placement of the word "or".  Is it:

Option 1: Once transcribed, keep for four months. Once minutes are created and accepted (which might be less than four months - in our case, it would be at the next board meeting), you can delete recording.
Option 2: Whether transcribed or minutes created, keep the recordings for four months. 

Under option 2, it seems like there is a higher standard for meetings.  Pre COVID, our board meetings would occur, open to the public but usually no public in attendance, and the only "evidence" of the meeting would be the minutes.  Now, we are required to keep the recording for at least four months - which isn't a huge hardship but curious about the rationale behind that.

Thank you!