# Presentation: 481009

## Slide 1

**Notes:**
[Opening screen. Advance to next screen when you’re ready to start.]

## Government Information and the Library Catalog:More Access to More Information From the Web

**Government Information and the Library Catalog:****More Access to More Information From the Web**

**Notes:**
LibraryHQ SiteSource has selected and cataloged over 40,000 Internet resources in MARC format.  We select materials with educational content for a world-wide audience at all levels.  In our 40,000, more than 8,000 of our records are to what we call United States Government information.  Now, among those 8,000 are records for some of the materials you receive in your GPO shipments.

Many of you have records for government electronic resources in your web-based catalogs, especially if you get your records from Marcive.  If you have a way of tracking it, you have probably seen an increase in the usage of your documents collection in all formats since you started adding records for your depository collection to your public catalog.  It is our experience from using other library catalogs that a subject search often turns up government documents first – and often exclusively.

## “Fugitive” Information

- Websites
- Quasi’s and Independents
- Legacy documents
- Missing documents

**Notes:**
Despite the massive initiatives of GPO and individual depository libraries, there still remains extensive government information in electronic format that apparently “falls through the cracks.”  Today I want to look at some of the things we have selected and cataloged as an indication of some of the work that needs to be done.  We’ll be looking at these four areas:

Websites
Quasi’s and independents
Legacy documents
And
Missing documents

## AGENCY WEBSITES

**Notes:**
It is the policy of the GPO not to catalog Agency Websites.  Even though the term “publishing” is commonly used for placing a website on the Internet, GPO is not now considering websites for cataloging and disseminating as electronic government publications – with the notable exception of GPO Access.
[advance – include NWS site]
Nevertheless, the agency websites often contain valuable information about the agency, as well as publications sections which link to their publications – in many cases including publications which have not been cataloged.

A keyword search on the National Weather Service homepage produced a healthy 666 hits, but only 19 of those had URLs in them. In SiteSource, we have more than 130 records for National Weather Service information. 

## National Weather Service Tucson

**Notes:**
In addition, though, the regional weather stations all have their own websites, and they are splendid resources.  The National Weather Service site for Tucson is but one excellent example and it is packed with a wide range of weather information and publications for that area.

## NHGRI

**Notes:**
Even though the main page of the National Human Genome Research Institute does not lend itself well to this presentation, it also is packed with useful information.  A general search at UVA on this agency yields only 5 hits – none of them leading to the wealth of information this agency provides.

## NINR

**Notes:**
Like many of the NIH agencies, the National Institute of Nursing Research provides reliable links to related agencies in both the public and private sectors.  A search on this agency at UVA produced 7 hits – again, none of them leading to Internet resources.

## NIND

**Notes:**
While not limited to that audience, the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke provides information of wide interest to the aging population.

## NEI

**Notes:**
We have selected individual items from the National Eye Institute to catalog, but their clinical studies database, alone, forms a significant body of valuable information.

## NCI

**Notes:**
The National Cancer Institute, like those which follow, are excellent sources of topical information which may not manifest itself in traditional documents.
[advance]
Just this much of the opening screen demonstrates the wealth of information available here in addition to their publications and reports.

## NIA

**Notes:**
The  National Institute on Aging provides current news features in addition to its more substantial publications.

## NIPC

**Notes:**
I want to mention briefly two other sites which are representative of government agencies which are more focused on information than “publications.”
[advance]
While short on what are usually considered to be government publications, the National Infrastructure Protection Center is heavy with extremely useful information.  A search on this center at the Library of Congress produced no hits in any of their catalog indexes.

In addition to its fine CyberNotes periodical, the site has extensive assessments, advisories, alerts, and warnings.

## Bureau of the Public Debt

**Notes:**
And the Bureau of the Public Debt, while having few if any items on their site which we would normally consider “government publications,” is packed with useful public information.

## Blue Angels/Thunderbirds

**Notes:**
We’ll finish up this section with a couple of my personal favorites.  The Navy’s Blue Angels squadron has a site that would be of interest to the patrons of many libraries.
[advance]
At UVA we found only 2 entries relating to the Blue Angels – both of them in the documents area, and both of them from the 80’s.
[advance]
And, yes, the Air Force Thunderbirds Unit has a fine site, too.

## INDEPENDENT AGENCIES

**Notes:**
We have found a large number of valuable publications in both independent agencies and quasi-governmental agencies which are not in the Depository Library Program.  We use the excellent lists at LSU to identify agencies to catalog and mine for specific resources, and we also use the Bernan publication.

## Federal Reserve System

**Notes:**
The Federal Reserve System presents significant problems.  I would not want to be the librarian trying to explain why some information from the Fed is in the library and some is not.
[advance]
At UVA we found Federal Reserve documents, from both the Board of Governors and from individual banks – Some in the US documents collection, some in the Virginia documents collection, and some in the general collection at the Darden Library – but very few with links to the electronic versions.  And the SiteSource staff has cataloged many Fed publications that we have not found anywhere.

Its site features many useful papers on economics and finance which do not appear to have been distributed through the Depository Library Program

## Bank Trends

**Notes:**
We felt that Bank Notes from the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston was a very useful publication.
[advance]
It has valuable information about banks and banking in New England, and the site provides full-text to issues from September 1997 on.

## OPIC

**Notes:**
The Overseas Private Investment Corporation has been a puzzle for us.  
[advance]
Their excellent website has led us to some excellent publications, and we have found OPIC publications in the documents collection at UVA.

## Climate Change: Assessing Our Actions

**Notes:**
But we have not been able to locate this excellent publication, Climate Change: Assessing Our Actions, in any of the libraries we have checked.
[advance]
This 56-page publication was published in October 2000.

## RETROSPECTIVE CONVERSION

**Notes:**
There are many records for the paper copies of older documents in depository libraries which do not contain the URL for the electronic version.

## Country Studies

**Notes:**
We  have been surprised to find very few libraries with cataloging records for the electronic versions of the Country Studies series.

## Country Studies

**Notes:**
We have made records for the entire 101 countries and areas that are covered.  As popular as these books have been, we think that providing access to the electronic versions is extremely important.

## Country Studies

**Notes:**
This is one of the more interesting items in the collection.  Belarus: A Country Study was not a book in the series; rather it was part of Belarus and Moldova: Country Studies.  We have  therefore treated the electronic versions for these two countries as separate items.

## CMH

**Notes:**
The Center of Military History has online versions of some valuable Department of the Army publications which were long ago issued in paper.
[advance]
None of our 6 reference libraries had a record for the electronic version of this title, and only half had the title at all.  It was originally published in 1953 as Department of the Army Pamphlet 20-260.  A commercial reprint of this title is currently available for $19.95.
[advance]
Just as an aside, since this would more properly go in another section, we ran across this while we working the CMH site. This page, with 20 images of paintings by the artist/illustrator Ludwig Mactarian is certainly a valuable addition to an online collection.  Very few libraries appear to have many books featuring Mactarian’s work.  It certainly appears to us to be a government publication, and we have treated it as such.

## Fact Sheets

**Notes:**
There are thousands of government publications that contain good useful information that may appear in a small brochure, pamphlet, or fact sheet.  Many of these are not separately cataloged, and many are not cataloged at all.
[advance]
NASA Facts is just a single example.  In our check at UVA, we found a number of NASA Facts sheets, but none with URLs.  And we did not find this title at UVA in any format. {Life and microgravity sciences and applications}
[advance]
And back to the Thunderbirds for a moment, we could not find United States Air Force Fact Sheets at UVA, but these are really very nice.

## ELECTRONIC FUGITIVES

**Notes:**
As I have already noted briefly, some agency websites provide access to some documents which appear not to have been distributed by GPO, but which fall within the guidelines of the Library Programs Service SOD 13 and SOD 71.  For this presentation we have tried to select some items here which are more than one year old, to try to avoid documents which are simply awaiting cataloging.

## NIH - NIAID

**Notes:**
The Library of Congress catalog lists 475 items with NIH publication in a series field.  Some other libraries have considerably more.

However, Vanderbilt, Montana State, and BYU list “Lyme disease: the facts the challenge,” but only for the 1992 version.  I did not find this title in the Library of Congress, UVA, or the New York State Library.
[advance]
This is an attractive publication with useful information.  The earlier edition made it into the Depository Library System; this one didn’t.

## FSIS

**Notes:**
Cooking for Groups from the Food Safety and Inspection Service is a fairly recent publication, but this title was not found in any of our 6 reference libraries.
[advance]
This 40-page booklet includes valuable information about food safety for anyone.

## MBDA

**Notes:**
This report from the Minority Business Development Agency represents the first attempt ever to project future purchasing power in the minority community.
[advance]
This study does not appear to have been distributed to Depository Libraries.

## DOE

**Notes:**
“Offshore Technology Roadmap for the Ultra Deepwater Gulf of Mexico” was published in November 2000.
[advance]
When we cataloged this item in April, the title did not appear in any of our reference libraries.

## NPS

**Notes:**
The National Park Service has a wide range of titles that we have not found in our reference libraries.
[advance]
This administrative history of the Klondike Gold Rush National Historical Park which was published in 1996 is a good example.  It contains history not only of the park but of the gold rush as well.

## DOL

**Notes:**
From the Department of Labor we have this report on 401K plans.
[advance]
Published in 1998, this 73-page item provides good information to both employers and employees.

## FBI/FOIA

**Notes:**
Our reference libraries had resources about the Highlander Folk School which accounted for an engrossing chapter in the social history of the sixties.
[advance]
But none of the records are for the 1107 pages of FBI documents about Highlander on their FOIA site.  And the Highlander School is just one of many fascinating areas in which the FBI has posted FOIA information on the Web.

## NIH Clinical Center

**Notes:**
This 9-page fact sheet about Vitamin B6 is not really a fugitive, but it does represent a publication which was originally disseminated to depository libraries in microfiche but which is not in electronic formats on the Web.  I did not find among the reference libraries a record for this title that included the URL.

## Government Publications / Government Information

**Notes:**
Well over two decades ago, Bruce Morton of Montana State University was making the case that we should change our focus from Government Publications to Government Information.  The distinction was perhaps more subtle back then than it is today.  The fact is that our digital environment is producing and making available to the public large amounts of useful information which is not represented in our online web-based catalogs.

## Government Information as a Library Resource

**Notes:**
The opportunities for libraries to provide government information to their patrons is greater than it has ever been.  Librarians now have the opportunity to redefine government information in terms of patron needs and to integrate bibliographic access to these information resources through their web-based catalogs.

These opportunities are accompanied by serious challenges.  At SiteSource we have embraced the idea that electronic government information should be cataloged, whether it is in a form traditionally categorized as a government document or not, and we are selecting and cataloging even more of the traditional items which have not been included in the Depository Library Program.

I suggest that the library community seriously needs to re-address the issues of bibliographic access to government information in relation to the broad wealth of information now on the Internet.

## www.libraryhq.com

**SiteSource**** **

- _[www.libraryhq.com](http://www.libraryhq.com/)_
- _[www.](http://www.sitesource.com/)__[sitesource](http://www.sitesource.com/)__[.com](http://www.sitesource.com/)_

**Notes:**
Thank you for your attention.