F e d e r a l    D e p o s i t o r y    L i b r a r y    P r o g r a m

  

                             ADMINISTRATIVE NOTES

             Newsletter of the Federal Depository Library Program

                      
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                               November 15, 2001
                                Vol. 22, no. 16
                               (Vol. 22, no. 16)

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               Policies and Procedures for Withdrawing Documents
                                 from the FDLP

                            Francis J. Buckley, Jr.
                          Superintendent of Documents

In response to the concerns raised about the withdrawal of information from
the Federal Depository Library Program, I would like to restate some of my
comments at the recent Depository Library Council meeting regarding our
policies and procedures and clarify the situation regarding my recent request
to withdraw a U.S. Geological Survey CD-ROM.

The Government Printing Office is entrusted by Congress with the stewardship
of depository materials, both as tangible property and as intellectual
property, for free distribution and public access. Over the last couple
decades there have been an average of two documents a year which GPO has
asked depositories to remove from their collections for one reason or
another. Only the Public Printer, the Superintendent of Documents, or our
agent can legitimately order a library to withdraw a document from its
depository collection.

The Government Printing Office acts as an agent of the Federal publishing
agency, which makes the decision that a title should be pulled. When an
agency requests that a title be withdrawn, we:

  1. Verify that the title was distributed through the FDLP.
  2. Discuss the reasons for the recall with the agency's official contact.
     Was there an error in content? Will the publication be replaced by a
     revised edition? Was official or sensitive information released
     inadvertently? Is the publication to be embargoed until a certain date?
     We try to get as much information as we can, but sometimes agencies just
     don't give a reason and we do not have the authority to demand one.
  3. Inform the agency of recall options:

        o Request libraries destroy
        o Request libraries pull and hold until further notice
        o Request libraries return the title to GPO
        o Request libraries return the title to the publishing agency

  1. Inform the agency that GPO must receive an official request in writing.
     These procedures are for tangible publications that were distributed to
     depository libraries. We are in the process of formulating a policy and
     procedures for titles that are online only, consistent with that for
     tangible publications.

At GPO we have had one recent request to withdraw a publication from the
FDLP. The U.S. Geological Survey Associate Director for Water, following the
above procedures, requested that USGS Open File Report 99-248: Source-Area
Characteristics of Large Public Surface-Water Supplies in the Conterminous
United States: An Information Resource Source-Water Assessment, CD-ROM, be
destroyed. On October 12, 2001, I issued a notice requesting depository
libraries to withdraw and destroy this publication.

Subsequently Mary Jane Walsh from Colgate University contacted USGS and was
given contradictory advice. But recently Mr. Patterson, Hydrologist, USGS,
issued the following statement:

          We at the U.S. Geological Survey share your frustration at having
          to reverse our normal role of disseminating useful information, and
          instead restrict it. It was in this vein that I mistakenly gave
          Mary Jane Walsh the verbal advice to secure, rather than destroy
          the USGS CD-ROM report... Subsequent contact with the Government
          Printing Office and the USGS Committee that sets official policy on
          restriction of sensitive information has reconfirmed the validity
          of the original written instruction from USGS to GPO to destroy the
          report... Hopefully in the future we will be able to reissue the
          report, or issue a modified version that will still be helpful to
          those who would like to protect our water resources.