Annual Meeting 2002
Forty-one people attended the annual section meeting in Birmingham, Alabama. For more detail on the section’s annual
meeting, including information on general announcements and detail of discussions, see the minutes of the meeting at
http://www.archivists.org/saagroups/ers/2002mtg.asp.
Election: The section held its election and voted in Rosemary Pleva Flynn as Vice-Chair/Chair-Elect and
Kate Theimer as the new Steering Committee member.
Digital Millennium Copyright Act: The section discussed the possibility of putting together a white paper or
some other type of document on the preservation concerns related to the Digital Millennium Copyright Act.
Online Membership Directory: The Electronic Records Section decided to convey its interest in supporting SAA
Council to develop an SAA online member directory, to include not only information from the existing paper directory
but also data elements and functionality that can better support online collaboration, communication and data sharing.
Electoral procedures: The section decided to examine the option of having an absentee ballot, so that section
members could vote even if they could not make the annual meeting.
Activities
Comments on NARA’s "Proposal for a Redesign of Federal Records Management": In September 2002, the Electronic Records
Section prepared comments on NARA’s proposed program for redesigning records management at the federal government
level, and the Government Records Section and SAA Council endorsed these comments. In general, the section lauded
NARA’s continuing efforts to redesign its approach to federal recordkeeping, while encouraging further clarification
on several issues raised in the document.
Response to NARA's Call for Comments: In October of 2001, the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA)
sent out a call for comments on a Public Citizen Petition related to portions of 36 Code of Federal Regulations 1234,
"Electronic Records Management." The Electronic Records Section, headed up by Cal Lee, prepared a detailed
response,along with the Government Records section. SAA Council endorsed this response in January of 2002, sent a
copy to NARA, and posted it on the SAA website:
http://www.archivists.org/statements/ers_grs_response_4_January.pdf.
Press Kit: The section has started work on an online press kit to promote its activities, teach the press and others
about archives and electronic records, and introduce our section to the world. The webmaster has added a page to the
ERS website for the press kit, which will include contact information, ERS’ mission and purpose, press releases,
and bios of members, as well as other information.
Session Endorsements: The Electronic Records Section endorsed six session proposals for the SAA annual meeting in
Los Angeles, and the Program Committee accepted five of those proposals.
Listserv: By 2002, users of the ERECS-L mailing list had grown increasingly concerned, that the list did not
receive much traffic because its moderated status stifled dialog. Also, since a moderator had to review each message
before posting it, postings took longer, and every message in the listserv archive showed up as originating from
the same user (the moderator). This year, we began a year-long experiment with “self-moderation” feature of
the Listserv software, which allows all subscribed members to post freely but requires a moderator to approve
any messages from those not subscribed to the list. So far this has proved to be a much more useful way to run
the listserv. We will be discussing how the experiment worked at the Los Angeles meeting and will decide if
further changes need to be made.
Website: Our webmaster has updated the website, adding the annual report, the list of new steering committee
members, and other information.
Newsletter: We have prepared the text for the spring issue of the newsletter, and that will be out soon.
We will also release a summer issue later in the year.
