Administrative Notes 

Newsletter of the Federal Depository Library Program

Vol. 25, no. 01 GP 3.16/3-2:25/01 January 15, 2004 

HIGHLIGHTS

Apply for 2004 

Library of Year 

Award 1

SuDocs 

Speech, ALA 2 

GPO Update 8 

Readers 

Exchange: 

Passports 14 

Readers 

Exchange: 

CSU 

Centennial 17 

Applications Sought for the 2004 

Library of the Year Award 

Do you know a depository library that is providing outstanding 

government information service? Do you know a depository staff that has 

shown creativity, innovation, and leadership in developing community 

programs for use of Federal Government information?

Write up the details and send them to GPO for a chance to be honored as 

the 2004 Federal Depository Library of the Year. GPO will provide travel 

and lodging to the Conference for the depository coordinator and the 

library director from the winning library. 

The Federal Depository Library of the Year award provides special 

recognition for a library that furthers the goal of the Federal Depository 

Library Program; by ensuring that the American public has free access to 

its Government's information through: 

Outstanding service to meet the Federal Government information 

needs in the library’s service area 

• 

• 

• 

Creativity and innovation in developing specific community programs 

for use of Federal Government information or a dramatic increase in 

their community’s usage of Federal Government information 

Leadership in creating public service programs that can be emulated 

by other Federal Depository Libraries 

You are invited to nominate your library, or any other Federal Depository 

Library, regardless of its size or type. (Past winners, libraries of current 

Depository Library Council members, and libraries on probation are 

ineligible for consideration.) 

Please submit your entry by May 1, 2004. Applications may be submitted 

online at <http://www.access.gpo.gov/su_docs/fdlp/04dlofyear.html>. 
AN-v25-#01-1/15/04

Presentation by Superintendent of Documents 

Judith C. Russell 

American Library Association Midwinter Meeting 

San Diego, CA 

Saturday, January 10, 2004 

We are coming to the end of a long morning 

during which you have already been given 

many interesting things to think about and I 

am about to add some more, without apology 

since I think the things that are happening 

right now at GPO and in the community are 

so exciting that you will all be sitting on the 

edges of your chairs (and not because you are 

ready for lunch or a bathroom break). 

I will try to keep this brief so we can have as 

much time as possible for questions from the 

audience. We have brought a handout, which 

should anticipate many of the “frequently 

asked” factual questions, so you may want to 

pick one up if you do not already have it. 

I very much appreciate Howard [Lowell]’s 

presentation on the National Archive’s 

strategy for electronic records, including the 

partnership between GPO and NARA. We

value that relationship highly and see the 

partnership as a critical part of fulfilling the 

goal of permanent public access that our two 

agencies share with the depository 

community. 

I was also very struck by Janet [Coles’] 

comments, which Jill [Vassilakos-Long] 

presented on her behalf, about the problems 

facing the California state depository 

program. The issues are certainly very 

similar to ones we face at the Federal level. 

That is a very good background from which 

to turn to a discussion about what is 

happening currently at GPO and in the 

Federal Depository Library Program (FDLP) 

and the effort that we are making to plan for a 

long and stable partnership for public access 

to government information. 

GPO Reorganization 

When Bruce came to GPO as Public Printer 

just over one year ago, he immediately began 

discussions with the middle and senior 

managers at GPO about how to reorganize to 

accomplish our short terms goals and position

GPO for the future. From the beginning he 

said that he was seeking an interim

organization and that he expected that the 

planning process, which we were beginning 

at that time, would result in another 

reorganization within a few years. The 

interim organization that he announced 

several months later continued the three main 

operating areas, establishing managing 

directors of the printing plant, a consolidated 

customer service/printing procurement area, 

and the Superintendent of Documents 

organization, identified functionally as 

information dissemination. He also created 

for the first time a Chief Information Officer 

and a Chief Human Capital Officer and 

restructured the position of Chief Financial 

Officer. Of those six senior management 

positions, I was the only one already in place. 

The other five positions have now been 

competed and filled, so we now have a full 

management council to work with Bruce and 

the Deputy Public Printer, Bill Turri, on dayto-day operations and planning for the future. 

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Bruce also created an Innovation and New 

Technology group to help GPO reach out to 

other organizations to learn about new 

technology that is on or over the horizon, so 

we can incorporate that knowledge into our 

planning. INT, as we call it, has kept us busy 

with opportunities to talk to a wide variety of 

companies, universities and other 

organizations with an emphasis on future 

applications in one or more of the three major 

areas that Bruce has asked them to 

emphasize: Authentication, Version Control 

and Preservation/Permanent Public Access. 

SuDocs/Information Dissemination

Reorganization 

Bruce asked each of the six managing 

directors/officers to follow a similar process 

for reorganization of our own areas of 

responsibility, and as you know, we 

announced the reorganization for the 

SuDocs/information dissemination staff last 

June at ALA. We have spent a number of 

months planning the lower levels of the 

organization and developing the necessary 

job descriptions. We have now filled two of

the four senior management positions. I am

delighted to announce that Ric Davis has 

accepted the position as director of Program

Development and Sheila McGarr has 

accepted the position as director of Collection 

Management. Offers are pending for the 

directors of Program Planning and 

Coordination and Library and Customer 

Relations and should be announced shortly. 

Perhaps as early as the end of next week, but 

certainly by the end of the month, we will 

post the next tier of managerial positions. 

There are 12 positions: 2 under program

development, 3 under program planning and 

coordination, 3 under library and customer 

relations, and 4 under collection 

management. As the handout indicates, these 

will be posted so that the positions are open 

to applications from "all sources," not just 

current GPO employees or current and former 

Federal Government employees, which are 

the other two common options in Federal 

recruitment. I will post the announcements to 

a number of lists as I did with the senior 

management positions–and I hope you will 

forward them on to other lists or individuals 

who may find the positions of interest. We

are hoping to attract a wide range of excellent 

candidates. Once those positions are filled, 

we believe that the other positions will move 

very quickly. We are not likely to meet our 

goal of completing the reorganization by 

April 1, but we are working to complete it as 

quickly as we can. 

Fact Gathering and Planning 

GPO has been working hard this year to get 

our costs under control and put an 

organization in place that can both manage 

the current operations and prepare the agency 

for the future. The agency was "in the black" 

with a small, positive cash flow in October 

and November (I haven't seen the December 

numbers yet). That is a major achievement, 

since GPO lost about $38 million in FY 2002 

and $32 million in FY 2003. My staff has 

been doing its part to bring losses from the 

Sales Program under control by such actions 

as closing the bookstores, consolidating the 

two Laurel warehouses into one, and using 

retirement incentives to reduce staff. 

At the same time, Bruce and I (among others) 

have spent a great deal of our time out talking 

to agency publishers, libraries, and others to 

gather input for our planning process. We

have also been discussing the future with our 

employees and unions and working with the 

General Accounting Office (GAO) on the 

report that Congress requested on our behalf. 

Bruce has labeled this our “fact gathering” 

stage and it should be completed by early 

March when we receive the GAO report. 

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Meanwhile, we are continuing to gather facts 

from the Depository Library Council (DLC), 

the regional depository libraries, the major 

library associations, and anyone else who 

wishes to contribute. We are expecting 

reports from the DLC and from the regional 

libraries shortly, based on the meetings that 

were held last fall. We hope that ALA and 

GODORT will be submitting something and 

we will certainly carry back ideas gathered in 

our conversations here, as we have done from

all of our meetings over the past year. 

GPO will compile all this information and 

release a document sometime in the spring 

for review and comment. Bruce and I and 

others will then be out talking about that 

document and seeking reactions and

revisions. What Bruce is seeking, before 

beginning the planning process, is agreement 

on the facts–facts about GPO's current status, 

assets and liabilities; facts about the current 

status and expected changes in the library 

community and in agency publishing 

practices; facts about opportunities and 

constraints from new technology, facts about 

what the future is likely to offer as challenges 

and opportunities. Once we have agreement 

about the most important facts, we can begin 

the planning process with a solid footing. 

Hopefully by the time we meet again in 

Orlando in late June, we will have completed 

the validation of the facts and be ready to 

discuss where those facts lead us and the 

logical actions to take based on those facts. 

Ideally, by the end of the year, we will have 

at least the outline of a plan. Perhaps some

segments of the plan will be substantially 

complete–especially where there is 

significant agreement among the wide variety 

of stakeholders. Remember, we have to 

involve not just the library community, but 

also the printing and information industries, 

agency publishers, the Congress, OMB and 

other policymakers, our labor unions and 

employees and others with an interest in, or 

concern about, the changes that are being 

considered. 

Once we have developed the plan, we have to 

seek agreement on the plan, much as we will 

seek agreement on the facts. Once we have 

that agreement, the plan will have to go to the 

Congress and Congress will have to enact any 

legislative changes that are required to 

implement the plan. Then–at the end of this 

long process–GPO can begin to implement 

the plan. 

Does that mean that GPO is standing still 

while all of this discovery of facts, agreement 

on facts, planning, and agreement on plans 

takes place? Of course not. There are many 

short-term changes that we can make, and in 

some instances have already begun to make. 

Even as I talk to the library community about 

the future of GPO and the FDLP, I continue 

to ask what can we do NOW or in the near 

future–without waiting for complete formal 

plans or legislative changes–to make things 

work better. As with the OMB Compact for 

procurement of agency printing and many of 

our pilot projects, there are many things that 

we can do within the framework of the 

existing laws and policies to begin to test 

ideas that we may wish to implement more 

fully in the ultimate plan. 

A New Economic Model for the Sales 

Program 

At the fall Depository Library Council 

meeting and conference, Bruce spoke of the 

need to develop a new economic model for 

the Sales Program. For many years the Sales 

Program and the FDLP co-existed and were 

complimentary. Then GPO Access was 

launched, and shortly thereafter the paid 

subscriptions to the online service were 

dropped and GPO began to provide free 

public access, not just to Federal Depository 

libraries, but also to the general public. It has 

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5 

been wildly successful. As the handout 

indicates, we are averaging over 33 million 

downloads per month–the equivalent of 808 

million typeset pages. 

However, the results of that action–and the 

simultaneous changes in agency 

dissemination from paper publications to 

posting on Web sites–have been devastating 

for the Sales Program. We have dropped 

from revenues of over $80 million to 

revenues of approximately $30 million in 10 

years. At one time we sold over 30,000 paid 

subscription to the Federal Register; now we 

sell fewer than 2700 copies, while customers 

download in excess of 4 million free Federal 

Register documents per month. We have 

improved public access, but destabilized the 

Sales Program, which, in the past, was an 

important part of the overall revenue and 

income for GPO, making significant 

contributions to GPO's overhead and its 

economic well being. 

As Bruce stated at the conference, this change 

was not planned. GPO didn’t develop a new 

model for the Sales Program in response to 

the vast amounts of information offered for 

free public access on GPO Access and the 

World Wide Web. The Sales Program 

declined rapidly, to the point where it was 

losing over $1 million a month, and draining 

the capital the GPO needs to invest in its 

future. 

What Bruce asked of the library community 

is that you help us determine the appropriate 

boundaries for free public access, outside of 

which we can try to develop a new economic 

model for the Sales Program that will 

generate $30 to $50 million in additional 

revenue for GPO annually. We are having a 

similar dialog with the information industry 

about the boundaries from their perspective, 

so that GPO does not compete 

inappropriately with commercial publishing. 

I have begun to describe this using the story 

of Odysseus seeking to make a safe passage 

between Scylla and Charybdis. For those of 

you who don’t remember Greek mythology, 

Scylla and Charybdis were two sea monsters 

dwelling on the opposite sides of a narrow 

strait, the personification of the dangers of 

navigation near the rocks and eddies.1

 I am 

not implying that either the library 

community or the information industry are 

monsters to be avoided, but rather that this is 

a difficult voyage that requires careful 

planning and for which there may be no 

successful outcome. 

At a meeting with the representatives of the 

library community after the fall conference, 

Bruce said that, as a business man and as a 

Republican, he could not go to Congress and 

ask for a change in policy and funding for 

GPO to offset the revenue losses from the 

Sales Program until he had made a good faith 

effort to determine if it was possible in the 

current environment to create a sustainable 

economic model–acceptable to both the 

library community and the information 

industry. He and I are both prepared for the 

fact that the answer may be that there is no 

viable economic model and that GPO will 

have a very small Sales Program with limited 

revenues, or none at all. We hope that GPO 

can find a safe passage between the 

requirements of the library community and 

those of the information industry, but we both 

acknowledge that it may be a very narrow 

strait and one that will require careful 

navigation. I personally believe that there is 

a both a genuine need and an opportunity for 

a healthy Sales Program, but we have to 

structure it correctly. 

To move this dialog forward, I am planning a 

meeting in Washington of representatives 

 

1

 For a quick synopsis of the story, go to 

http://www.ketherian.org/paxtharda/thardex/questions.

htm#15. 
AN-v25-#01-1/15/04

from agency publishers (who have also 

expressed great interest in and concern about 

this issue), the library community, the 

information industry and perhaps some

academics with good credentials in issues 

related to economics models in information. 

This meeting will probably take place in early 

March. My hope is that by having a 

discussion with a small group of "experts" we 

can develop a document which can be shared 

more broadly to seek consensus. Those of 

you who were at the Council meeting this fall 

will recognize how difficult it is to have that 

type of dialog with 500-600 people. I think it 

will help everyone to have a few concrete 

proposals to respond to, instead of the 

generalized anxiety and uncertainty that 

currently exists. We are hoping to have a 

panel present the results at the Spring DLC 

meeting in St. Louis and have a discussion 

about it there, and will also circulate it and 

obtain comments in other ways. 

Legacy Collections 

Before I close and take your comments and 

questions, I want to address one other 

important issue that was discussed 

extensively at the fall conference, managing 

legacy collections. 

One of the most exciting and encouraging 

things that is happening is the progress that 

has been made on the issue of managing our 

legacy collections. There are three related 

initiatives that are underway simultaneously. 

First is a movement toward shared 

repositories, or shared housing agreements, 

that would allow two or more libraries to 

eliminate some of the redundancy between or 

among their collections. These initiatives are 

still in the early stages, but they are very 

important since they will help us move 

toward a smaller number of comprehensive 

sets that can be more readily preserved. As I 

said at the fall meeting, we are not going to 

preserve 1280 sets of most government 

documents. We are not going to preserve 53 

sets of most documents. But we do need to 

decide as a community how many sets of 

tangible Federal documents should be 

preserved and take the necessary steps to 

establish consolidated collections that are as 

comprehensive as possible, so we can 

actively preserve the materials. The Center 

for Research Libraries (CRL) will help us 

evaluate the options and opportunities, and 

we will share the resulting report with the 

community. 

Second is the decision by GPO to establish a 

collection of last resort. At a minimum this 

will become, over time, a comprehensive 

collection of tangible and electronic titles that 

will backstop the regional collections or 

repositories as they are established. We will 

receive reports from the regional depository 

librarians and the Council within the next few 

weeks. We will incorporate their 

recommendations and comments into a plan, 

which will be circulated for review and 

scheduled for further discussion at the 

Depository Library Council meeting in April 

in St. Louis. 

Third, and essential to the other two, is the 

decision by the Association of Research 

Libraries to collaborate with GPO, and 

ultimately with the entire library community, 

on a national digitization plan, so that we can 

coordinate our efforts to digitize a complete 

legacy collection of U.S. Government 

documents and make sure that the documents 

are available, in the public domain, for 

permanent public access. The ARL proposal 

is one of a significant number of related 

efforts that, together, will make it possible to 

accomplish this goal within the next few 

years. We have one regional depository 

library that is willing to allow its collection to 

be used for a comprehensive digitization 

initiative and willing to provide space for 

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7 

scanners and personnel in its facility. The 

National Agricultural Library is interested in 

working with GPO and the land grant 

universities that are also depository libraries 

to digitize the entire legacy collection of 

USDA publications. We are having 

discussions with Congress and other agencies 

about their desire to have accessible online 

collections of their legacy publications. 

There are many exciting opportunities that 

will contribute to this effort. 

This will be a collaborative effort. As I see it, 

a number of libraries will actively digitize 

materials, based on established priorities or 

local needs, while other libraries will 

collaborate to support the digitization specific 

materials. A variety of government and 

foundation grants and private sector partners 

will facilitate this effort. 

GPO’s roles will be to coordinate the effort, 

assist in the establishment and coordination 

of standards, serve as a trusted repository for 

preservation and access (in addition to any 

other places that the materials might be held), 

certify and authenticate the electronic files, 

and ensure that there is appropriate cataloging 

and metadata for the items in the collection. 

As I said before, GPO will seek funding in 

FY 2005 to perform OCR on digitized files 

and output XML tagged data that can be used 

for access and for print-on-demand. Thus, 

whatever OCR scanning is done by individual 

libraries, we can ensure that the preservation 

and access collection maintained by GPO is 

consistently tagged, making it a true 

collection, not just a random assortment of 

electronic files. We will also continue to 

work with Congress, the Judiciary and 

Federal agencies to get them to participate 

and, where appropriate, to certify the files as 

official copies. 

This is an extremely shorthand description of 

a complex set of actions which together will 

help us preserve a reasonable number of 

copies of the tangible artifacts as well as to 

create and maintain a comprehensive, digital, 

public domain collection for preservation and 

access. The availability of these tangible and 

electronic collections will allow all 

depository libraries, including regional 

libraries, to manage their collections more 

effectively, substituting electronic copies for 

tangible copies–if they wish to do so. And it 

will ensure that the legacy collections now 

available only in print and microform are 

fully a part of the electronic library collection 

of the future. 

One immediate, and extremely useful, thing 

that each of you can do is help us develop the 

priority list of titles for digitization for the 

various sizes and types of libraries. We 

began this process at the fall depository 

conference, but we need to expand and 

accelerate it. Not surprisingly, the 

preliminary lists from the fall meeting 

indicate that the priorities are quite different 

among the different sizes and types of 

libraries. These lists are a good starting point 

for further discussion among representatives 

of each type of library–public libraries, state 

libraries, small academic libraries, Federal 

libraries, etc. Law libraries are actively 

working on a priority list, as are the ARL 

libraries. If you are willing to work with me 

and the Council to establish the priorities for 

another specific category of libraries, please 

let me know. The best way would be via email. As you know, you can reach me on this 

and other issues at jrussell@gpo.gov. 

Now, I would be happy to take your 

questions and comments. 
AN-v25-#01-1/15/04

U.S. Government Printing Office 

ALA Update 

January 2004 

Information Dissemination/Superintendent 

of Documents Reorganization 

Two appointments have been made in the 

new Information Dissemination/ 

Superintendent of Documents organization: 

Ric Davis as Director of the Program

Development Service and Sheila McGarr as 

Director of the Collections Management 

Service. Offers are pending for the directors 

of Program Planning and Coordination and 

Library and Customer Relations and should 

be announced shortly. Postings for vacancies 

in the next tier of positions will be available 

before the end of January and notice will be 

sent to a number of lists as well as posted on 

the USAJobs and Monster.com Web sites. 

Browse Topics Redesign 

Browse Topics is an important tool that 

provides users with topical pathfinders to 

U.S. Government information. Recently, 

GPO and its partner, Oklahoma State 

University, have teamed up to examine and 

enhance the Browse Topics application. A 

prototype is being demonstrated at the GPO 

booth (#251). GPO is currently gathering 

feedback from the library community on 

ways we can improve the service. Please 

take some time to stop by the GPO booth to 

view the proposal and provide feedback. 

Depository Library Council 

The spring meeting of the Depository Library 

Council to the Public Printer will be held in 

St. Louis, MO, from April 18-21. Discussion 

will focus on "the facts" from GPO's data 

gathering, input from the Depository Library 

Council and the community, GAO report, etc. 

GPO is seeking concurrence on the facts from

all constituencies before beginning to develop 

the strategic plan for the future of GPO and 

FDLP. The main issues include: 

authentication of government information, 

preservation of information for future 

generations, version control, and the training 

of depository library staff to deal with new 

technologies. 

Nominations for five new Council members 

for the fall meeting are now being accepted. 

GPO invites library organizations to submit 

nominations and also encourages nominations 

from interested individuals. To submit a 

nomination, contact Judith C. Russell, 

Superintendent of Documents, at 

jrussell@gpo.gov, or fax nominations to 

(202) 512-1434. 

Interagency Depository Seminar 

The 17th Annual Interagency Depository 

Seminar will be held in Washington, DC 

from June 2-9, 2004. The weeklong seminar, 

which is considered invaluable by new 

depository staff who have attended, presents 

an overview of various agencies' information 

products and activities as they relate to 

Federal depository libraries. Register online 

by March 29 at <http://www.access.gpo.gov/ 

su_docs/fdlp/tools/04interagency_reg.html>. 

Space is limited so be sure to sign up early. 

2004 Library of the Year Award 

Applications for the 2004 Federal Depository 

Library of the Year Award may be submitted 

at <http://www.access.gpo.gov/su_docs/ 

fdlp/04dlofyear.html>. The award provides 

recognition for a library that furthers the 

goals of the Federal Depository Library 

Program by ensuring that the American 

public has free access to its Government's

information. Service, community programs, 

and leadership in areas affecting Federal 

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Government information are the primary 

criteria. 

2003 Biennial Survey 

The 2003 Biennial Survey of Depository 

Libraries was conducted from November 5 

through December 5, 2003. 1,243 of the 

1,279 depositories responded by the closing 

date. By law, the GPO must conduct the 

survey every two years to ascertain 

conditions in the libraries and each library is 

required to submit a response to the survey. 

Libraries that have not submitted their survey 

must do so by contacting staff in Depository 

Services at (202) 512-1119, or by e-mailing 

Robin Haun-Mohamed at rhaunmohamed@gpo.gov. 

Collection of Last Resort 

GPO will circulate a draft plan for the 

collection of last resort prior to the spring 

Council meeting. GPO is waiting for 

additional input from Council and the 

regional libraries before issuing the draft 

plan. 

GPO has acquired the Official Records of the 

War of the Rebellion for the collection. An 

acquisitions team has also found a treasure 

trove of old documents for the collection in 

GPO's basement storage areas. GPO 

continues to explore the possibility of

acquiring other materials, including the Serial 

Set. 

Authentication/Public Key Infrastructure 

(PKI) 

GPO is well underway in its efforts to 

implement Public Key Infrastructure (PKI) 

technology that will include the use of digital 

signatures for Congressional and other 

information made available through GPO 

Access. This will help ensure the protection 

of data against unauthorized modification or 

substitution of information. It will also 

enable GPO customers to verify the 

authenticity and integrity of the information 

they are using from GPO Access, now and in 

the future. Customers will be able to confirm

that information was approved for submission 

to GPO by the appropriate Federal agency 

and that it has not been altered since it was 

signed. 

Work has recently been completed on a 

Certificate Policy, PKI Architecture 

document, and Certification Practices 

Statement. GPO has procured hardware/ 

software and PKI professional services to 

assist staff in the Chief Information Officer's 

(CIO's) organization on a PKI 

implementation. 

Once this work has been completed and an 

audit is conducted, GPO will begin to

digitally sign GPO Access files. This signing 

process is expected to begin in April 2004. In 

conjunction with this, GPO is taking steps to 

cross-certify its PKI with the U.S. Federal 

Bridge Certification Authority. 

WAIS Replacement/Mirror Site 

GPO continues to work on procuring a new 

platform to replace the WAIS search and 

retrieval software for GPO Access databases. 

Based on research conducted by GPO staff, 

software alternatives have been identified that 

meet customer functionality requirements and 

can provide for a transition from WAIS to 

XML encoded documents. Currently, staff is 

in the process of evaluating all of the features 

and advantages of the various solutions. 

Once a solution is selected and procured, 

GPO plans to migrate all WAIS databases on 

GPO Access to the new platform. This will 

help ensure continuity and ease of use 

throughout the site and provide greater 

functionality and inter-linking of data. In 

conjunction with our WAIS replacement 

efforts, GPO is planning to have network 

attached storage (NAS) at an Alternative 

Congressional Facility (ACF). This will also 

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allow for the completion of a mirror site 

which will be set up based on the new 

platform. 

Integrated Library System 

The Superintendent of Documents has made a 

recommendation to the Office of the Chief 

Information Officer (CIO) regarding the 

procurement of a new ILS system, and that 

office will operate the ILS system on behalf

of the Superintendent of Documents. The 

CIO organization is currently taking steps 

towards the acquisition of the system. 

New GPO Customer Service Tool 

As part of ongoing efforts to provide users 

with the highest quality service, GPO 

recently launched a new customer service 

tool, which can be found on the "help" page 

at <http://www.gpoaccess.gov/help>. This 

tool consists of a knowledge base that 

contains answers to frequently asked 

questions related to GPO Access, the U.S. 

Government Online Bookstore, and the 

Federal Depository Library Program. The 

customer service tool also replaces the 

LostDocs and askLPS services. The added 

functionality of Web chat may be 

implemented in the near future. 

Phone assistance is also available Monday 

through Friday, 7:00 a.m. to 9:00 p.m. eastern 

standard time at 888-293-6498 (toll-free) and 

202-512-1530 (DC Metro area). Since 

October 1, 2003, there have been more than 

63,000 hits on the help page, and customers 

have retrieved almost 11,000 answers. 

Additionally, nearly 12,000 customer 

inquiries have been submitted and answered 

through this service. 

Domain List 

There is a new page at the FDLP Desktop: 

"Main publisher domains within the Catalog 

of United States Government Publications." 

It identifies and provides online access to 

approximately 1,500 main publisher domains 

associated with more than 40,000 online titles 

cataloged by GPO. 

This application, available at <http://www. 

access.gpo.gov/su_docs/fdlp/tools/domains. 

html>, will be updated on the first Friday of 

each month. It provides access via two 

listings, by publisher and by URL. Access is 

to main publisher domains only. Those who 

wish to identify and access individual online 

titles should see the "Catalog of United States 

Government Publications" at 

<http://www.gpoaccess.gov/cgp>. 

Essential Titles 

GPO conducted a survey of Essential Titles 

for Public Use in Paper Format, seeking 

suggestions for additional titles to include in 

the list. By the end of the survey in October, 

2003, 108 libraries had nominated a total of 

324 titles. 

All titles with three or more requests were 

collated for review. 43 titles had three or 

more requests across all categories of

libraries; two of the titles were no longer 

active and six were already on the Essential 

Titles list. Law libraries requested 15

additional titles; Medium and Small 

Academic libraries requested six titles; Large 

Academic libraries requested four titles; 

Large Public libraries requested four titles; 

Small Public libraries requested one title to 

be added to the list. State and Other libraries 

and Federal libraries did not have any titles 

that had at least three requests. 

As the number of respondents is limited, 

additional consultation must be done with 

Council before any of the recommendations 

will be implemented. The list of titles 

submitted will be made available on the 

Council Web page at <http://www.access. 

10 
AN-v25-#01-1/15/04

gpo.gov/su_docs/fdlp/council/index.html> in OMB/GPO Agreement 

the near future as we continue to work on this 

important project. 

In June 2003, GPO and the Office of 

Management and Budget (OMB) announced 

a compact that will allow Federal agencies to 

select their own commercial printers using 

standard contracts issued by GPO. GPO will 

register and qualify printers for participation 

in the contract and offer twenty-four hour 

customer and printer support, while the 

agencies will have authority to address 

performance issues directly with the printers 

they select. Payments will be routed through 

GPO to private printers, with agencies

approving them before they are made, and 

GPO will offer additional printing 

procurement services on a cost recovery 

basis. 

Electronic Collection 

Training of key cataloging and 

acquisitions/classification staff has begun in 

the use of the tool set built by OCLC as part 

of their Digital Archive. The new tools 

streamline and enhance the processing of 

electronic publications into the Electronic 

Collection Archive and will greatly expand 

the production of metadata for preservation, 

integrating that process with other cataloging 

and classification activities. GPO was a 

principal participant in the design and testing 

phases of the Digital Archive service. 

Consultants Under the terms of the agreement, GPO will 

receive an electronic copy of every 

publication directly from the printer for 

dissemination to the public. This contract 

condition should help eliminate the fugitive 

document problem and bring many more 

titles into the FDLP. In addition, GPO will 

receive two printed copies of these 

publications, from which GPO can create a 

new digital copy if future format or other 

usability issues occur with the original 

electronic copy. GPO will also have the 

option to create a version of the file for printon-demand publishing. 

GPO is accepting proposals from regional 

depository libraries for a pilot project to test

the concept of establishing locally based 

"consultants," who would be assigned 

responsibility for approximately 40 to 60 

depository libraries in a geographic area. 

They would visit each of those libraries at 

least once per quarter, with the duration of 

the visit depending on the need. They would 

offer training and attend local, state and 

regional documents meetings to speak and 

answer questions. 

The idea is to recruit from within the

community people who would serve as a 

consultant for one to two years and then 

return to work in a depository library. GPO 

has received proposals from Michigan, North 

Carolina/South Carolina/Georgia, and 

Minnesota. Regional coordinators in 

California, Massachusetts, and New York 

have also made inquiries to host a consultant 

in their areas. If you wish to submit a 

proposal, please contact Robin HaunMohamed for further information at rhaunmohamed@gpo.gov. 

This agreement currently is being tested 

through a pilot project with the Department 

of Labor. Since the inception of the compact, 

there have been 84 offers made through the 

compact. Twenty-six publications were 

selected from among the print orders 

submitted for inclusion in the FDLP. Those 

not selected were not within the scope of the 

FDLP. 

11 
AN-v25-#01-1/15/04

What's New on GPO Access 

• The Regulatory Plan and the Unified 

Agenda of Federal Regulatory and 

Deregulatory Actions is now available 

on GPO Access at 

<http://www.gpoaccess.gov/ua>. 

• The GPO Annual Report Fiscal Year 

2003 is now available online at 

<http://www.gpo.gov/aboutgpo/ 

03annrep/Welcome.html>. 

• The Congressional Directory for the 

108th Congress is now available on 

GPO Access at <http://www. 

gpoaccess.gov/cdirectory>. 

Search Engine Report 

The tenth iteration of GPO's Search Engine 

Evaluation Project has been completed. 

Based on the results, the 20 search engines 

studied returned GPO Access pages for 

targeted keywords in the top five search 

results 29% of the time, which is an increase 

of nearly 4% since the previous evaluation. 

This overall increase is an encouraging sign 

that the visibility of GPO Access in the major 

search engines is continuing to increase. 

However, further analysis of the results of 

this evaluation and current industry trends 

reveals several areas in need of more 

consideration. The full report of the Search 

Engine Evaluation Project can be found on 

the Federal Bulletin Board (FBB) at 

<http://fedbbs.access.gpo.gov/access.htm>. 

GPO Sales Program 

The GPO Sales Program continues to 

streamline its operations by reducing 

overhead, most recently through the ongoing 

consolidation of its warehouse facility in 

Laurel, MD. It has begun using print on 

demand technology to increase the long-term

availability of publications and testing the 

capabilities of a number of vendors. Sales is 

also engaged in bringing its bibliographic 

practices more in line with those of the 

commercial publishing sector by exploring 

ONIX (Online Information Exchange), the 

publishing industry's standard electronic 

format for sharing product data with 

wholesale and retail booksellers, other 

publishers, and anyone else involved in the 

sale of books. ONIX will enable GPO to 

have Government publications listed, 

promoted, and sold by commercial book 

dealers worldwide. 

Opportunities are also being explored to 

initiate e-commerce consulting services, for 

the purpose of defining alternative solutions 

that will enable the U.S. Government Online 

Bookstore to offer the "next generation" of 

enhancements aimed at improving customer 

functionality and order processing. The 

Superintendent of Documents has provided a 

list of functionality requirements to the Office 

of the Chief Information Officer (CIO) and 

asked that consulting services be procured. 

GPO Access Statistical Measures 

• Since 1994, GPO Access retrievals have 

exceeded 1.8 billion, and in October of 

2003, reached a monthly high of more 

than 38 million retrievals. 

• The average number of monthly 

retrievals from GPO Access is 33 

million, or over 1 million retrievals a 

day. The average number of monthly 

retrievals from GPO Access measures 

over 1.6 terabytes in size and is 

equivalent to over 808 million 

typewritten pages. 

• GPO Access contains over 156,000 

electronic titles and points to over 

103,000 others for a total of over 

259,000 titles. 

• GPO Access provides use of almost 

2,900 databases through more than 100 

applications.

12 
AN-v25-#01-1/15/04

Upcoming Outreach 

GPO Staff will be attending and displaying 

the GPO booth and/or conducting training at 

the following venues: 

January 22 – 24 Florida Educational Technology Conference Orlando, Florida 

February 2 – 4 Legal Tech New York, New York

February 24 – 28 Public Library Association Seattle, Washington

March 17 – 20 Texas Library Association San Antonio, Texas 

April 18 – 21 Depository Library Council Spring Meeting St. Louis, Missouri

June 5 – 10 Special Libraries Association Nashville, Tennessee 

June 24 – 30 ALA Annual Conference Orlando, Florida 

13 
AN-v25-#01-1/15/04

Readers Exchange 

Notes on Becoming a 

Passport Acceptance Facility 

John Milton Hendricks

Public Library of Cincinnati and Hamilton County 

Cincinnati, Ohio 

This article is based on a brief presentation 

delivered at the fall 2003 meeting of Ohio 

GODORT at Wright State University in 

Dayton. The Public Library of Cincinnati 

and Hamilton County (PLCH), thanks to the 

initiative of its Public Documents and Patents 

Department (PDs), decided in 2002 to 

become a passport acceptance facility. 

Highlighted here are our experiences and 

success with the service, but of more 

relevance to you is deciding whether your 

library might want to offer the service itself.

Why do it? 

PLCH unveiled its passport service in 

January 2003, and by the end of October had 

processed 644 applications. Each new 

application handled by an acceptance agent 

demands, by law, a $30 agent fee separate 

from the standard $55 ($40 if applicant under 

sixteen) passport application fee sent to the 

Department of State (DOS). Thus, the library 

earned $19,320 in ten months. 

While this revenue clearly is the incentive for 

taking on an additional task, more subtle but 

equally important are the related benefits. 

With evening and weekend hours, and 

perhaps a more accommodating staff (many 

patrons noted how happy they were to bypass 

the post office!), PLCH better serves the 

public and business community. In turn, the 

service has lured non- or untraditional users 

to the library and into a Federal depository to 

boot—every application becomes an 

opportunity to expose the patron to our 

services and the world of government 

information. 

Should you do it? 

Ask yourself and your institution these 

questions before you commit. "How do you 

do it?" will be outlined further below in case 

you're still curious. 

Do you have adequate full-time staff? 

Only permanent full-time staff directly 

employed by the institution may serve as 

acceptance agents. In PDs, which fully 

handles the service, we currently have 7 

acceptance agents, and that makes a 

difference. If we average 20 minutes of oneon-one service time per application, our 

workload might look like this: 

• April (peak): 94 applications processed 

= 30 hours staff time 

• July (valley): 32 applications processed 

= 10 hours staff time 

You one-person depositories will be laughing 

at this point, but consider the following. You 

can offer the service on an appointment-only 

basis (as we do on nights and weekends), and 

could centralize the service in your 

circulation or reference department so that 

full-time staff from throughout the system

14 
AN-v25-#01-1/15/04

could participate. Or think of it this way: 

you'd be making $90 an hour. 

How would your service be different from or 

better than the traditional routes? 

If you're no more convenient (nor pleasant!) 

in terms of location, hours, staffing, and 

speed of service than your local post office, 

then this might not be a service worth 

providing. But as one college librarian noted, 

you may have untapped customers right 

under your nose, e.g., students studying 

abroad, the children of local immigrants, or 

traveling businesspeople whose offices are 

only footsteps away. 

Can your organization handle a degree of 

responsibility re: 

1) Daily mailings? You should mail 

applications to the passport agency within a 

day of receiving them from the patrons, and 

ideally not by means of any convoluted 

institutional procedure. 

2) Securing of materials? As you would be 

taking the official citizenship evidence from

the patrons, you will need to be sure of the 

documents' protection, especially if you hold 

them overnight before mailing. 

3) I.D. judgment and application inspection? 

Your key function as an agent is deciding that 

the person before you is the person pictured

on the official identification presented, so this 

sort of assessment is something that you must 

be comfortable with. Your other primary 

tasks are to review the application in front of 

the patron, making sure that it has been 

adequately completed; cross-checking that 

information with the ID and citizenship 

evidence supplied; and verifying that the 

evidence is, at least, not a photocopy (the 

DOS will analyze it after that). 

4) Accepting payment? Some public 

institutions may feel awkward about the 

"profit-making" aspect of the passport 

service. But don't forget that the $30 is 

legally mandated to be paid to any and all 

acceptance facilities, including the post 

office. And to be sure, many patrons would 

rather that your library got the dough. 

5) Basic record-keeping? (Please–we're 

librarians.) 

How do you do it? 

1) After meeting with colleagues and 

administrators at your library to see if 

applying for acceptance facility status is a 

viable possibility, have your director fax a 

letter expressing your interest to: 

Chrystal Watkins 

Passport Services 

CA/PPT/FO/CS 

2100 Pennsylvania Avenue NW 3rd Floor 

Washington, DC 20037 

(202) 663-3977 

Upon approval, you will be assigned a 

regional customer service manager–your 

direct contact for all the questions you'll have 

as you launch the service. All designated 

staff will sign papers attesting to their

qualifications, and the DOS must in future be 

made aware of any changes in staff status or 

involvement. 

2) You will be notified of one-day training

seminars scheduled regularly in your region. 

Not all of our staff could attend due to timing 

and distance and, though useful, the seminar I 

attended was less of an orientation than a 

Q&A for seasoned agents. So we relied on 

our own in-house training, based entirely on 

the Passport Agent's Reference Guide

(PARG) now issued on CD-ROM to every 

facility. The PARG is an exhaustive step-bystep explanation of how to review an 

application (not to mention the patron), with 

every what-if scenario accounted for in detail. 

15 
AN-v25-#01-1/15/04

5) And finally–tell it to the world! To aid 

public awareness, PLCH had the means to 

create: 

We required all of our agents to read the 

PARG, answer quizzes we devised, and roleplay in numerous situations. While the 

majority of our patrons supply the standard, 

simple documentation, we still consult the 

PARG when we're pitched a curve ball. 

• a web page added to our library site 

(http://passports.cincinnatilibrary.org/)

• a brochure and in-house signage 

3) You should consider establishing a space, 

however small, for accepting applications; we 

have an extra office desk in our department 

where we can sit with the patrons and store 

materials. If you can only serve an applicant 

over a public desk, you should still make 

room for the following: 

• a separate phone number (513-369-

6976) with informative message options 

• an email address 

(passports@cincinnatilibrary.org) for

questions and appointments 

In publicizing our new service, we not only 

used our standard press outlets, but contacted 

sources of likely customers (passport 

photographers, study-abroad offices, large 

international businesses) and even our 

"competitors," who have been glad to tell 

patrons that they have another option. 

• DOS forms (various and supplied in 

bulk by the Passport Office) 

• the PARG 

• your library seal and date stamp 

• mailers 

• black pens (for you) and crayons (for 

the kids!) How are we doing? 

In conclusion, I am happy to report that the 

service has been running very smoothly. 

While training ourselves and publicizing the 

service initially took some time, the 

acceptance of applications has become an 

almost invisible part of PDs' routine. We've 

had an extremely low problem rate, with 

fewer than 10 follow-ups out of 644 

applications. The support we receive from

our customer service manager is always 

courteous and reliable. Our administration is 

happy about the revenue and, even better, our 

patrons tell us that they're happy too. 

Somewhere you will also have to store a 

year's worth (approx. one large binder) of 

copies of the daily transmittal lists you 

submit with each mailing–your records of 

whom you served and when. Our library 

took the extra precaution of creating a 

checklist we fill out for every patron, 

documenting the interaction, what ID we 

reviewed, and what citizenship evidence we 

submitted to the DOS, in the rare event that a 

problem arises later. 

4) You should determine how you'll process 

the $30 payments from the patrons; we have 

our patrons submit cash or check to our 

circulation desk before signing the 

application. In addition, you should 

streamline as much as possible your 

institution's mailing procedures–you really 

can't have the "expedite" (rush) applications

snoozing in the mail room. 

Please feel free to contact the author's agency 

if you have any questions or comments. 

John Milton Hendricks, Documents Librarian

Public Documents and Patents Department

Public Library of Cincinnati and Hamilton County 

800 Vine Street

Cincinnati, Ohio 45202-2071 

(513) 369-6971

pdpat@cincinnatilibrary.org

16 
AN-v25-#01-1/15/04

Readers Exchange 

Colorado State University Libraries Celebrates 

Its Centennial as a Federal Depository 

Doug Ernest 

Government Publications Specialist 

Morgan Library 

Colorado State University 

Ft. Collins, CO 

Approximately 80 people were in attendance 

at the event. Included were a number of 

documents librarians from the Colorado Front 

Range. Refreshments followed the remarks 

and certificate presentation. An exhibit on 

the second floor of the library displayed 

representative government publications from

1903 and 2003. The Colorado weather 

cooperated by presenting a dry, sunny day, 

expediting travel to the event by those from

elsewhere in the state. 

The Colorado State University Libraries 

celebrated its centennial as a Federal 

Documents Depository on November 10, 

2003. Several special guests presented 

remarks in observance of the occasion. 

Library Dean Catherine Murray-Rust began 

the program with a perspective from within 

the library. Ray Martinez, mayor of Fort 

Collins, then spoke of the importance of the 

documents collection and the library to the 

community. University Provost Peter 

Nicholls highlighted changes and continuity 

at the institution in the past century. Nancy 

Hunter represented Marilyn Musgrave 

(Congresswoman of the fourth Congressional 

District of Colorado), and spoke of the role of 

the depository within the District. 

Our special guest, Superintendent of 

Documents Judith Russell, provided an 

overview of the importance of the Federal 

depository system and its long-standing 

partnership with libraries around the country. 

She then presented Murray-Rust with a 

certificate from GPO recognizing the 

centennial of the Colorado State University 

Federal Depository. The framed certificate 

was later placed in a prominent location on 

the first floor of the library, near the map 

collection and reference area, where it can be

viewed by the public. 

As a land-grant institution, the Agricultural 

College of Colorado (as Colorado State 

University was known from 1870 to 1935) 

had a natural interest in acquiring 

publications of the Federal Government, 

particularly those dealing with the sciences, 

agriculture, forestry, and engineering. It was 

not until 1900 that the population of Colorado 

17 
AN-v25-#01-1/15/04

grew to a point allowing for the designation 

of another library in the state as a depository 

for such publications, joining four other 

libraries that already had depository status. 

Congressman Franklin Brooks secured 

depository status for the college in December 

1903. Brooks, a Republican, served two 

terms in Congress from March 1903 to March 

1907. In Colorado only the depositories at 

the University of Colorado-Boulder, 

Colorado College, the Denver Public Library, 

and the Pueblo Library District predate that at 

CSU. 

From the beginning, the CSU depository 

assumed an important role in library 

activities. By 1914, college seniors were 

receiving a lecture on government 

documents. By the late 1920s, the library 

featured a Technical Room that emphasized 

the documents collection. When other 

budgets diminished during the Great 

Depression, government publications 

continued to arrive in a steady stream. 

Among those librarians responsible for the 

depository over the years have been Laura 

Makepeace, Lorene Ashton, and Fred C. 

Schmidt. In the late 1970s Schmidt obtained 

a grant under the auspices of the Higher 

Education Act that enabled the library to 

catalog 15,000 ephemeral government 

publications not previously recorded by the 

Government Printing Office. The advent of 

an electronic "card catalog" in 1988 saw for 

the first time the inclusion of cataloging of

government publications with other library 

collections. In 1998, the documents reference 

function was integrated into the main 

reference desk when a new addition to 

Morgan Library opened, enabling staff to 

assist users with government publications at 

almost all times the library is open. Aside 

from electronic access, the tangible collection 

now numbers over one million items. 

The planning for the Centennial celebration 

was expedited by cooperation between staff 

at Colorado State University Libraries and the 

Government Printing Office. A team at GPO 

consulted with CSU staff on various aspects 

of hosting anniversary celebrations. [One 

result was several new depository anniversary 

promotional products, which may be ordered 

at <http://www.access.gpo.gov/su_docs/fdlp/ 

pr/order.html>.] 

Nancy Hunter (representing Congresswoman Marilyn Musgrave); Judy Russell; Library Dean Catherine 

Marray-Rust; Government Publications Specialist Doug Ernest 

18 
AN-v25-#01-1/15/04

19 

Fort Collins Mayor Ray Martinez; Nancy Hunter (representing Congresswoman Marilyn Musgrave); Colorado

State University Provost Peter Nicholls; Judy Russell

New Depository Anniversary Promotional Products 

order at <http://www.access.gpo.gov/su_docs/fdlp/pr/order.html> 

Happy Anniversary Federal 

Depository Library - Post Card

Happy Anniversary Federal Depository Library 

 Letterhead
AN-v25-#01-1/15/04 

20 

Table of Contents 

Applications Sought for the 2004 Library of the Year Award ..................................................... 1 

SuDocs Presentation, ALA, 1/10/2004 / Russell.......................................................................... 2 

GPO Update, ALA, Jan. 2004 ...................................................................................................... 8 

Readers Exchange: Notes on Becoming a Passport Acceptance Facility / Hendricks ............... 14 

Readers Exchange: Colorado State University Libraries Celebrates Its Centennial as a 

 Federal Depository / Ernest ..................................................................................................... 17 

Administrative Notes Cumulative Table of Contents 

http://www.access.gpo.gov/su_docs/fdlp/pubs/adnotes/adnotes_toc.pdf 

Updated with each issue 

Searchable by keyword 

Administrative Notes is published in Washington, DC by the Superintendent of Documents, 

Library Programs Service, Government Printing Office, for the staffs of U.S. Federal 

Depository Libraries. 

It is published on the 15th day of each month; some months have additional issues. 

Postmaster send address changes to: The Editor, Administrative Notes 

U.S. Government Printing Office 

Library Programs Service, SLLD 

Washington, DC 20401 

Internet access at: http://www.access.gpo.gov/su_docs/fdlp/pubs/adnotes/index.html 

Editor: Marian W. MacGilvray (202) 512-1119 mmacgilvray@gpo.gov