792 /Maryland Manual

of the Commissioner of the Land Office to the
Hall of Records Commission. Under the provi-
sions of Chapter 355 of the Acts of 1967, the Ar-
chivist is designated as the Commissioner of Land
Patents and assigned the responsibility of issuing
land patents and conducting court hearings. In
performing these duties, he acts independently of
the duties imposed on him as Archivist (Real
Property Art., secs. 13-101 to 13-504). The Hall
of Records Commission serves as the official de-
pository for the duplicate copies of subdivision
plats formerly sent to the Land Office as insur-
ance against the loss of the originals.

Records Management Division
Philip F. Schneider, Records Administrator

State Records Management Center
Routes 175 and U.S. 1
Waterloo 20794 Telephone: 799-1379

The Records Management Division develops
programs and policies for the efficient manage-
ment of the records of all departments and agen-
cies of the Maryland State government and pro-
vides assistance in the preparation of records
retention and disposal schedules.

The Division operates a central Records Center
located at Waterloo for the storage of inactive
State records, which must be retained for speci-
fied periods of time to meet the State's legal and
administrative needs. The Records Center opened
for operation during Fiscal Year 1981 and re-
placed four smaller centers located in Baltimore,
Annapolis, Waterloo, and Cheltenham.

Chapter 981, Acts of 1978, gave the Records
Management Division responsibility for coordi-
nating the State's Forms Management Program
and the forms management plans of each Depart-
ment or Agency to assure that the Department or
Agency uses only those forms which are neces-
sary for its effective or efficient operation. At the
close of each fiscal year, the Division prepares a
consolidated annual report on forms management
activities and submits it to the General Assem-
bly's Joint Budget and Audit Committee.

The Division also offers cost reimbursable mi-
crofilm services to all State agencies, including
both source document and computer output mi-
crofilming.

OFFICE OF ADMINISTRATIVE AND
FISCAL SERVICES

John C. White, Director

301 West Preston Street
Baltimore 21201 Telephone: 383-2497

The Office of Administrative and Fiscal Services
provides the Department with capability in the
areas of accounting, budgeting, contract awards,
agenda preparation, casualty claims, data systems,
and word processing. The Office is organized into
three operating divisions—Fiscal Services, Infor-
mation Services, and Contract Services—and two
staff elements, one for Casualty Claims and one
for Data Systems Administration.

FISCAL SERVICES DIVISION

The Fiscal Services Division maintains all ac-
counting records of the Department; formulates
accounting policies, procedures, and internal con-
trol standards; and monitors compliance with
such policies, procedures, and standards. Re-
sources of the Division are organized to process
accounting transactions of two types: 1) operating
budget transactions and capital improvement
project transactions affecting general construction
loan (GCL), and 2) other bond bills for which
the Department is responsible.

In addition to accounting services, the Division
provides a broad range of services to the operat-
ing programs of the Department. The Division
orders office materials and supplies, performs
budget analyses, provides budgetary reports to all
levels of Department management, and prepares
the Department's annual operating budget.

INFORMATION SERVICES DIVISION

The Division manages computer and word pro-
cessing operations within the Department and
works closely with the Data Systems Administra-
tion unit. The nature of hardware and software
associated with computer and word processing
systems makes security and centralized manageri-
al control over these resources essential.

The Division manages the processing of ac-
counting transactions from all programs within
the Department. These transactions are received
by the Fiscal Services Division, pre-audited, and
dispatched to the Information Services Division
for computer processing. Agenda item prepara-
tion and editing are handled in a similar manner.
Agenda items are created at the program level in
word processing media. Upon creation, the agen-
da item is captured by the word processing net-
work's central processing unit, thereby making it
electronically accessible to word processing oper-
ators in the Information Services Division for
subsequent editing.