TWENTY-THIRD ANNUAL REPORT

Office Buildings in Annapolis and Baltimore become available, microfilming
for this purpose will undoubtedly decrease. During the past five years, how-
ever, 6,783,512 exposures were made of the records of twenty State agencies.
These exposures are contained on 2,119 rolls of 16 mm. and twenty-two rolls
of 35 mm. microfilm. The records thus retired, as well as those destroyed
without filming, have been sold to various waste paper companies on a con-
tractual basis. The State has realized $8,833.91 from these sales, of which
$6,208.82 has been returned to the General Funds of the State.

The lack of central storage depositories for records which must be main-
tained for a given period but which have little current usage has been a major
weakness of our records retirement program. Although make-shift storage
was provided in the Department of Budget and Procurement warehouse in
a few critical cases, most State agencies have been required to retain non-cur-
rent records in their offices. As noted above, this deficiency will be remedied
during the coming year with the acquisition of record centers in the two
office buildings now under construction. We expect to begin receiving records
in the Center in Annapolis in August 1958. This Center occupies an area of
5,700 square feet in the basement of the building and includes an office, micro-
film room, search room, and stack area. Air conditioning, asphalt tile floors,
fluorescent and pendant lights, and a smoke detector and fire warning system
add to the utility and convenience of this fire resistant area. A second Center
of similar design will occupy an area of 7,100 square feet in the new State
Office Building in Baltimore which should be ready for occupancy in the
Spring of 1959. Together the Centers will contain sufficient shelving to house
approximately 24,000 cubic feet of records which should be adequate for the
needs of the State in the future.

Although emphasis in our program for better records management has
been placed on the control of records after they were created, some attention
has been given to the problems of reducing the quantity of records made and
improving their handling while in current use. No broad-scale program to
control the creation of records has been developed, but in the work incident
to establishing control schedules some progress was made in this area. A re-
duction of almost seventy per cent was made in the size of the printed copies
of the executed contracts of the State Roads Commission by eliminating from
them the standard specifications which may be secured as a separate document,
if needed. In the course of an extensive survey of the records and office pro-
cedures of the Workmen's Compensation Commission, recommendations were
made which will stop the creation of certain records which serve no useful pur-
pose. We are also cooperating with the State Department of Health in an effort
to prevent the unnecessary duplication of information in reports required of
the local departments.

Whenever poor filing practices, improper use of equipment, or inade-
quate labeling of files were observed, suggested improvements were made. In
some instances, advantage has been taken of new mechanical developments
to facilitate the handling of records while in current use. In others, such as the
Traffic Records Section of the Department of Motor Vehicles, the substitution