Individual– Involve a single local government. Applicants may request up to $75,000 and may apply under disaster management, inactive records, historical records, files management, and document conversion and access. Individual grant projects will be funded with the money remaining after disbursements to the City of New York, demonstration projects, shared services projects, and disaster recovery projects.
Shared Services– Involve two or more local governments working together, with one government acting as the lead. Shared Services projects are again a priority for funding. Applicants proposing a Shared Services project may request up to $150,000. To be eligible for funding, a Shared Services application must demonstrate how the grant project will establish a permanent cooperative relationship between governments that results in sustainable programmatic change.
Demonstration– The State Archives will set aside up to $1.5 million this year to fund Demonstration grant projects. The goals of the LGRMIF demonstration grants program are: To initiate large-scale projects that will serve as models for improving electronic archives and records management practices in local government. AND to develop replicable program models that will dramatically transform the management of digital records and archives in local government.
Disaster Management supports projects to develop, test, and implement disaster and business recovery plans and systems to protect local government archival and vital records. Projects under this category must address both hardcopy and electronic records systems. Local governments may apply for two grants only if the second application is for Disaster Management planning.
- The maximum award is $10,000 when an applicant applies for this as a second application. If an applicant is submitting only one application the applicant may request up to $75,000 for that Disaster Management project. If proposing the creation of a disaster plan, you must also include a detailed accounting of the specific risks faced by your government and its facilities.
- Any proposed disaster plan must include a section that addresses the specific risks faced by the applicant and its facilities and the government’s plan to eliminate, avoid, or mitigate those risks.
Inactive Records: Projects to plan, develop, or improve the management of records during the inactive phase of their life cycle. Inactive records are records that are used infrequently but must be retained because their retention periods have not yet expired. This category also includes projects for governments to conduct records inventories and surveys to determine what records they have, identify obsolete records, improve how they organize and control records, and, generally, chart a course for the future of their records management programs. Inventory and Planning projects frequently focus on a backlog of inactive records, although they may also include active records.
Projects Include:
- A comprehensive inventory of all government records (active and inactive), or an inventory focused on the records of a specific department or departments. An inventory focused on a specific record format (maps and plans, email, or electronic records).
- Projects to inventory, organize, and enhance the accessibility of inactive records. These include identifying and consolidating all inactive records, integrating records into an inactive storage area, purging obsolete records, developing retrieval methods, and formulating policies for managing inactive records.
- Inactive Records projects may also involve hiring a consultant to develop a strategy, help formalize policies and procedures, and map the required technology infrastructure for managing inactive electronic records.
- Projects to improve an inactive records storage facility. Funding is available to purchase and install intruder alarm systems, fire-detection systems, fire-suppression systems, water detectors, environmental monitoring equipment, and stationary or mobile shelving for inactive records storage facilities.
- Minor renovations and improvements to storage facilities are also eligible. This may include the services of architects or engineers to develop plans and specifications for a proposed facility to store hardcopy records.
- A records survey, which collects information on records stored in a local government but in a way less labor-intensive than an inventory.
Historical records, also known as archival records, are those records worthy of permanent preservation and special care because of the continuing importance of the information they contain. These records are frequently identified on records retention and disposition schedules as having permanent retention periods or potential historical importance. Historical records may exist in a variety of formats, including paper files, maps, photographs, videotapes, or computer files. Funds cannot be used to care for published materials, which include newspapers (including clippings), books, magazines, and published maps. Applicants under this project category are strongly encouraged to work with the State Archives when planning to create series descriptions, catalog records, and collection guides in electronic format for use on a local website or through the Historic Documents Inventory (HDI).
Types of activities
- Assessing the current status of archival activities in order to identify needs, develop plans, write policies and procedures, and recommend future activities for a formal historical records program. When developing an archival needs assessment project, refer to State Archives Publication #59, Archival Needs Assessment Guidelines and Template.
- Improving access by arranging, rehousing, and describing historical records, or by reproducing and distributing guides and other finding aids in paper or electronic format. These activities may involve hiring a professional archivist as a consultant or purchasing pH-neutral or alkaline (pH not less than 7.5), lignin-free storage supplies, including folders, boxes, records cartons, and paper to wrap volumes.
- Hiring a professional conservator to survey the preservation needs of historical records and to develop a plan to address those needs, or to apply conservation methods directly to deteriorated or damaged items to return them to stable and usable condition.
- Developing websites, brochures, exhibits, walking tours, or other products that use local government records to educate the public and students about community history, the value of records, or other subjects.
- Preparing document-based instructional materials for classroom use, including a collection of documents relating to a particular topic, historical background information about the topic and learning activities that incorporate the documents into classroom instruction.
- Developing programs to train teachers to use local government records as teaching tools in the classroom.
- Developing and/or implementing systems to ingest electronic records into the archival records management system, standards for digital file conversions, standards for descriptive metadata, verify the accuracy of document conversions and of metadata, manage security, to make archival electronic records accessible, and to back up these records.
