4456

LAWS OF MARYLAND

Ch. 820

not in current use in his office, and when so surrendered,
and accepted by the Commission, copies may be made and
certified under the seal of the Commission upon application
of any person, which certification shall have the same force
and effect as if made by the officer originally in charge of
same, and the Commission shall charge for such copies the
same fees as such office is allowed by law to charge, which
fees shall be accounted for and paid into the State
treasury.

Whenever any land records of any court have been turned
over to the Commission and deposited with it for
preservation and so accepted by it, the Commission is hereby
authorized and directed upon the written application of the
clerk of the circuit court for any county [or the clerk of
the Superior Court of Baltimore City] and with the written
approval of a judge of said court, to make photostatic or
photographic reproductions of such land records, the expense
thereof to be borne by the Commission; and such photostatic
or photographic reproductions, when so made and certified
under the seal of the Commissioner, shall be deposited by
the Commission in the office of the clerk of the court
making said application and said reproduced land records
when so deposited shall be entitled to the same legal force
and effect as the original land records from which such
reproductions were made.

8.

If the Commission declines to accept any original
papers, official books, records, documents or files offered
to it under the provisions of §7, then their custodian, with
the written approval of the Commission, may destroy them.
After the records are destroyed, their custodian shall file
with the Hall of Records a list of all papers, books,
documents and files destroyed and a certificate of
destruction. These lists shall be retained in the custody
of the Archivist and shall be available at reasonable times
to inspection by the members of the public. This section
does not authorize the destruction of (a) papers, books,
documents or files which have been designated for retention
for a period of time expressly prescribed by statute, (b)
public records expressly required by statute to be
maintained permanently, except in those cases where the
original record has been photographed, photocopied, or
microphotographed in accordance with the provisions of §11
of this article, if the copy or reproduction of the original
record is available upon request in the same manner as the
original record, (c) permanent books of account, (d) the
records of any court of record in this State, except as
provided for in §l-605(d-3) and §2-206 of the Courts Article
of the Code, (e) the land records recorded by the respective
clerks of the circuit court for the [several] counties [and
the clerk of the Superior Court of Baltimore City]. Old
records of which accurate transcriptions have been made and