. - tentative time line: . a 7 Ji2,.11/30/97 - = boxes 1-6 ML *! 42/31/97 * Boxes 7-13 - 1/31/98 boxes 14-19 . Be 2/28/98 _ boxes 20-25 ; a See 8/81/98 boxes 26-81 & 44-45 = Co ce -" + | (Boxes 32-43 contain LHO’s 201 file, which will - be treated as a special case.) 2 NE 4/30/98 — boxes 46-51 | 5/31/98 boxes 52-62 6/30/98 boxes 63-72 4, Microfilm copy of Oswald 201 (approximately 12 boxes) ~ issue: The vast majority (if riot all) Oswald Microfilm records : are duplicates of records the Board has already reviewed under the JFK '_ .. Act. To the extent that the records previously have been reviewed, ___ there is little value in re-reviewing the records. The ARRB staff will -. . survey the Microfilm 201 in an effort to identify any additional ' records that have not already been acted upon by the Board. All . _ .. ’ xecords not previously acted upon by the Board willbeso oxen si" desteaiated, a RIP will be prepared, and they will be sent for Board . action. The remaining Microfilm 201 will be transferred to the JEK Collection at NARA and opened in full in 2017. 28 Snestebie mesh eae eS, , Staff has completed its initial survey and has thus far identified no __ Tecords in the 201 Microfilm that are not already in the JEK Le “e. Working Fi Files” +" (including “Russ Holmes” papers, s etc) ~ Status: No Record Identification Forms have been prepared. ARRB staff has conducted a general survey. aera ro ee ee . . ~ target dates: Work to commence by CIA on October 1, 1997. CIA should " prepare Record Identification Forms for all records by January 1, 1998. Completion of review and Board determinations by March 31, 1998.
13-00000 - “osneret TUE 12: 36 , FAX ‘202 724 0457 - _ “Strategy: The “working files” is a group of records thats ‘was assembled: at CIA by Russ Holmes.. Although he was not'asked formally by CIA® to create this separate records group, he did so in order to facilitate his work and, perhaps, to satisfy his own curiosity. The group _ . contains:many original records (copies of some of which are already in the collection) and it includes some records of which w oo - are aware of no other copies. It is the best-organized collection of *: oc . assassination records held by CIA. Its value as a reference tool is | - greatest as a collection. Therefore, though the file contains many duplicates of records found in the JFK collection, the ARRB staff recommends that it be preserved as a single group. Duplicates and open-in-full documents should be treated in the same manner as they are in the rest of the JFK Collection. As.with the microfilm from the Sequestered Collection, the ARRB staff has no objection to the records being identified on the folder level provided that all records iri the folder are open-in-full. If there are records in which CIA is requesting redactions, those records must be identified individually. The remainder of open in full records may still be identified with one RIF as being the contents of the same folder. Dz Additional Records -status: — Research, requests, and negotiations continue to identify and include additional CIA records for the JFK collection. — Oswald Office of Security File. As a result of an ARRB staff request for additional information and records, CIA located portionsofa = previously undisclosed Office of Security fileon Lee Harvey _- Oswald. This seven-volume file, of which six parts have been . located, contains two volumes of press clippings, third agency material on Oswald, a copy of Oswald's address book, and Marina Oswald's INS file. In the upcoming months CIA will begin to review and process these materials. - time line: _ Completion by July 31, 1998. - Continue current efforts. Bo
13-00000 E. Referrals 1. HSCA referrals (Numbered files, Security Classified ‘Teele, status: most of these records have been reviewed, The database suggests - that a percentage of them has slipped through the cracks. - target date: . | . Complete Congressional records to be reviewed by March 31, 1998. - strategy: | | nO Continue to clarify the status of records. Review a any remaining etc.) 2. Other referrals (FBI, Church Committee, LBJ Library, JFK Librany, etc.) _ «Status and strategy: _ Records willbe coordinated and reviewed on a case by case basis. WG e:\...\cia\timetabl.wpd SO egies 4.20.7 - - | | wt tare SES mre Pt tee 27.
13-00000 ER 97-4602 Assassination Records Review Board 600 E Straet NW « 2nd Floor - Washington, DC 20530 (202) 724-0088 « Fax: (202) 724-0457 October 28, 1997 CIA HAS UC SP IECTION TO DECLASS MIGATON AND/OR : Mr. David W. Carey - RELEASE OF CIA INFORMATION Central Intelligence Agency Washington, DC 20505 Re: . mpleting the Review of Assassination rd I would like to congratulate you on your new appointment at the Agency and wish you the very best of success in the difficult challenges that lie ahead. As you probably are aware, the Assassination Records Review Board has been mandated by Congress and the President to oversee the declassification and transfer to - _ the National Archives of all records rélated to the assassination of President Kennedy. During the past three years we have received excellent cooperation from CIA in regard to the processing of the relevant Agency records. From our perspective, this is due in significant part to the work of John Pereira, Chief of the Historical Review Group, and J. Barry Harrelson, who has shouldered the extremely complicated, burdensome, and frequently thankless task of overseeing the project. Both of them have proved to be superb representatives of the Agency. We also very much appreciated receiving a strong message of support from your predecessor, Nora Slatkin, who advised us in a meeting on October 16, 1996, of her full support for the project and her willingness to commit the necessary Agency resources to complete the project. . Because the Review Board is now in the final twelve months of its statutory tenure, I thought it would be appropriate to advise you of our goals for the upcoming year. It is our wish to be able to state in our Final Report to the President and to Congress that CIA has made all reasonable attempts to locate, review, and declassify all available records on the Kennedy assassination. We would like the Review Board to be able to assure the American people that the Agency has been fully cooperative in this enormous and difficult task, and that the Agency no longer retains any “secret” files on the assassination. In addition, we are obligated to keep Congress informed, on a monthly basis, of the status of our work and any difficulties that would interfere with our ability to achieve our objective. Although many important strides have been made to further our goals, we nevertheless perceive that the pace of review and declassification of Agency records will need to be
13-00000 Mr. David W. October 28, 1997 Page 2 accelerated in order for us to succeed. We must keep in mind that the goal includes _ teviewing, processing, and transferring to the custody of the National Archives all identified assassination records by September 1,'1998. (We do not perceive that duplicate copies of such records need be transferred by September 1.) Many time- consuming difficulties inherent in this project have been overcome, and we perceive that the pace of review is accelerating. Nevertheless, we wanted to signal to you our concern that, unless the pace of review increases further, we may not be on target to satisfy what I hope to be our common objective. It is our firm intention to .complete our task within the congressionally mandated time . limit. If CIA is unable to pre-review and process its records consistent with completion of this task, the Review Board will vote to release-in-full all relevant CIA records and mandate that custody be transferred to the National Archives in atimely way. We _ sincerely hope that it will not be necessary for the Board to make wholesale decisions on unreviewed records and we will be pleased to work with the Agency to see that such a step is unnecessary. But we are prepared to make such decisions to the extent they are " required to fulfill our own responsibilities. Although it is our perception that CIA may. wish to devote additional human resources to this project, we of course leave such decisions to the sound judgment of knowledgeable CIA officials. We therefore strongly urge the Agency to take all appropriate steps to complete its review of records in an orderly and systematic manner. To the extent that the Agency is able to satisfy appropriate deadlines, there will be no need for us to resort to any unfortunate -- but potentially necessary -- measures to complete our own obligations to Congress, the President, and the American people. If you would find it helpful, the Review Board members and I would be pleased to discuss these issues with you or others at the Agency. Sincerely, cc: Assassination Records Review Board
13-00000 Lea A vee te chee aturvendi cet ore hat Keb eege eC LAL, COLLECTIONS 2000 31 October 1997 Request for Additional Funds for the JFK Assassination Records Review Project, through 31 September 1998. Reference: Ltr. to Executive Director form J. Jeremy Gunn, Executive Director, Assassination Records Review Board (ARRB), copy attached. Background. 1. The ARRB will go out of business on 31 September 1998. Before that date, it has a statutory obligation to complete its review of all records held by the U.S. Government which relate to the assassination of President Kennedy, determine those which are relevant to the assassination story and ensure that the same are transferred to the National Archives. As the board begins its final _ year, it has become increasingly concerned about the pace of the review and transfer process. Referent letter is the latest of a number of exchanges dealing with that concern. 2. CSI/HRG has carefully reviewed its current position with respect to its ability to meet the deadlines imposed and has concluded that it cannot fully do so without additional resources, at least through 30 September 1998. — This conclusion is based in large measure on three changed circumstances: A. The ARRB has recently exercised its statutory authority and designated additional CIA records to be within the JFK collection (to date approximately twenty cubic feet or 40,000 pages). Additional records may be identified as the ARRB staff continues its review of Agency files. B. Over the past three months we have received an increase in the number of “Assassination Records” referred from third agencies which include both Agency documents held by another agency or third agency documents which must be reviewed because they contain CIA information; and C. The ARRB itself has established a deadline which was not anticipated. All agencies had understood that the review process and ARRB action would have to be completed by 30 September, but it was widely assumed that final processing and transfer of the documents to the National Archives could occur after that date. However, the Board has now mandated that all relevant records which are not duplicates must be transferred to custody of the National Archives before it goes out of business.
13-00000 Additional Resources Requested. 3. The following estimate is based on our understanding of the ARRB requirements at this time. A. Review of records: equivalent of 2 man-years (3 contractors -- average daily contractor cost $270) ; B. Preparation of documents for National Archives: equivalent of 1.5 man-years (2 contractors -- average daily contractor cost $180); C. Indexing: approximately one-man year of overtime ($25 hourly rate); D. Reproduction: approximately one-man year of overtime ($25 hourly rate). Estimated cost FY98: $300,000
13-00000 NOTE FOR: — FROM: OFFICE: DATE: SUBJECT: i passed to the EXDIR the information “DCI _ SECRET Brian S. Latell 11/05/97 07:27:26 PM CSI Resource Request regarding JFK CIA SPECIAL COLLECTIONS RELEASE AS SANITIZED CL BY:'705641 CL REASON: Section 1.5 DECL ON: X1 DRV FRM: COV 2-87 rovided regarding the possible resource implications of the letter from the Assassination 3 Executive Director, T. Jeremy Gunn, and the possibility that you will ask that some of the $5.5 million additional money Congress has added for declassification be allocated to this task (and perhaps also the Korea project). | also showed him Gunn's letter. The EXDIR asks that you provide him the following information: , , Whatis the size of the JFK declassification problem? How much work remains to be done? How many people do you have working on the JFK project now? What difference would X more make? ce: Sent on § November 1997 at 07-27-25 Pa SECRET
1 3-00000 Qerteor Ste WI k CON. "RELEASE EN CULL 2000 ADMINESTRATIVE——ENPERNAE-USE-ONDY 21 November 1997 FOR: D/EXDIR JFK PROJECT The following is in response to your request for a statement “reaffirming” CSI's commitment to apply available resources to complete the processing of records related to the assassination of President Kennedy. As Jeremy Gunn stated in his letter of 28 October to the EXDIR, the pace of reviewing JFK-related documents is accelerating. He also stated that the JFK Board has established 1 September 1998 as the deadline for all agencies to finish the processing of records and transfer them to the National Archives. In order to complete all the necessary tasks required by the Board and meet the deadline, we will clearly need to increase the resources now dedicated to JFK. There are a growing number of requests from the Board to review records from both CIA and other agencies, to search files for additional information, and to brief the Board and its staff. At present, one staff officer and 13 part time. independent contractors are devoted to JFK. In addition, we draw on a small CSI computer unit for support and share overtime employees who perform indexing and document copying for the Center. In the absence of additional resources being provided from elsewhere, CSI (or OIM) will need to shift resources from other projects to JFK for all tasks to be done on time. One option is to interrupt other declassification projects, such as that on DI finished intelligence on the Soviet Union, and the Guatemala covert action, and assign reviewers and others working on those projects to JFK. The moves ; would need to happen in the next few weeks. me Another important consideration is that the a directorates, particularly the DO, will need to increase their resources to keep pace with HRG. These resources are required to coordinate declassification of records and to prepare responses for requests from the Board for additional information and files. Whatever resource adjustments are made to bolster the effort on JFK, there will still be an unpredictable factor that could require a surge in additional resources later. This stems from the potentially large number of documents . from the FBI and other agencies containing CIA equities that
13-00000 the Board could ask us to review. There is a good chance that such documents will surface near the September deadline, which would leave little time to complete the processing.
13-00000 ADMINISTRATIVE - INTERNAL USE ONLY 10 Dec 97 NOTE FOR: Ed Cohen Jim Oliver FROM: John Pereira, HRG SUBJECT: JFK/Resource Priority Attached are four items that provide background on the issues that have been discussed with Dave Carey and Gina Genton with regard to the Agency's need to commit sufficient resources to declassify JFK records. The items include an exchange of letters between Carey and the JFK Board, a statement prepared by me at Gina's request, and a note reflecting congressional concern. Gina is being briefed on the last item today. Aside from providing you with background, the items also present a sense of why it is important that we assure that the resources i.e., independent contractors remain available so that the Agency meets the deadline for declassifying the JFK documents. John Pereira
13-00000 pet, NO, 1939 fr, J. Lode €.C4im CENTRAL INTELLIGENCE AGENCY seus D.C. 20805 CUTIVE DIRECTOR | 21 November 1997 | CSI 97-536 | Dr. T. Jeremy Gunn Executive Director Assassination Records Review Board 600 E Street, NW Washington, DC 20530 Dear Dr. Gunn: Thank you for your [letter of 28 October in which you outline the Asgassination Records Review Board’s goals for the coming year. I appreciate the complimentary remarks you made about the “excellent cooperation’ that CIA has been providing to the Board. You raised a concern that the Agency may not be able to increase sufficiently th pace ef the review process to meet the 1 September 1998 deatiline for completing the trarisfer of records to the National Archives. You also expressed the view that if any records] are not reviewed by the deadline, the Board will vote to r pisses them in full and mandate that custody be transferred : the National Archives. You can be assured that we are committed to taking all necessary steps to meet our statutory obligation to review all of the Agency‘s assagsination-related materials. It is important that a proper review of all relevant records be done. This will allow to recommend to the Board what information warrants continued protection. | 8 We appreciate the eat responsibility that Congress and. the President have given to the Board to inform the American people about th assassination. We share the Board’s goal of declassiffying and releasing the relevant records to the fullest extent possible. Please convey my regaxds to Chairman Tunheim and the other Board members, and jassure them of our continued cooperation. ‘Sincerely, | “8
ER 97-4602 Assassination Records Review Board 600 E Straet NW « 2nd Floor « Washington, DC 20530 . (202) 724-0088 + Fax: (202) 724~0457 October 28, 1997 Mr. David W. Carey Executive Director Central Intelligence Agency Washington, DC 20505 Re: Completing the Review of [EK : Assassination Records Dear Mr. Carey: | I would like to congratulate you on your new appointment at the Agency and wish you the very best of success in the difficult challenges that lie ahead. As you probably are aware, the Assassination Records Review Board has been mandated by Congress and the President to oversee the declassification and transfer to the National Archives of all records related to the assassination of President Kennedy. During the past three years we have received excellent cooperation from CIA in regard to the processing of the relevant Agency records. From our perspective, this is due in significant part to the work of John Pereira, Chief of the Historical Review Group, and -. "J. Barry Harrelson, who has shouldered the extremely complicated, burdensome, and frequently thankless task of overseeing the project. Both of them have proved.to be superb representatives of the Agency. We also very much appreciated receiving a - strong message of support from your predecessor, Nora Slatkin, who advised us ina meeting on October 16, 1996, of her full support for the project and her willingness to commit the necessary Agency resources to complete the project. Because the Review Board is now in the final twelve months of its statutory tenure, I | thought it would be appropriate to advise you of our goals for the upcoming year. It is our wish to be able to state in our Final Report to the President and to Congress that CIA has made all reasonable attempts to locate, review, and declassify all available records on the Kennedy assassination. We'would like the Review Board to be able to assure the American people that the Agency has been fully cooperative in this enormous and difficult task, and that the Agency no longer retains any “secret” files on the assassination. In addition, we are obligated to keep Congress informed, ona monthly basis, of the status of our work and any difficulties that would interfere with — our ability to achieve our objective. Although many important strides have been made to further our goals, we nevertheless perceive that the pace of review and declassification of Agency records will need to be Searo Menweaens: John A. Tunheim, Chair» Henry F. Graff + Kermit L. Hall « William L. Joyce « Aana K. Nelson Executive Denecror: David G. Marwell
Mr. David W. Carey October 28, 1997 Page 2 accelerated in order for us to succeed. We must keep in mind that the goal includes _ teviewing, processing, and transferring to the custody of the National Archives all identified assassination records by September 1,'1998. (We do not perceive that duplicate copies of such records need be transferred by September 1.) Many time- consuming difficulties inherent in this project have been overcome, and we perceive that the pace of review is accelerating. Nevertheless, we wanted to signal to you our concern that, unless the pace of review increases further, we may not be on target to. satisfy what I hope to be our common objective. - It is our firm intention to complete our task within the congreséionally mandated time . limit. If CIA is unable to pre-review and process its records consistent with completion of this task, the Review Board will vote to release-in-full all relevant CIA records and mandate that custody be transferred to the National Archives in a timely way. We sincerely hope that it will not be necessary for the Board to make wholesale decisions on unreviewed records and we will be pleased to work with the Agency to see that such a step i is unnecessary. But we are prepared to make such decisions to the extent they are to fulfill our own responsibilities. Although it is our perception that CIA may | wish to devote additional human resources to this project, we of course leave such decisions to the sound judgment of knowledgeable CIA officials. , We therefore strongly urge the Agency to take all appropriate steps to complete its © review of records in an orderly and systematic manner. To the extent that the Agency is able to satisfy appropriate deadlines, there will be no need for us to resort to any unfortunate -- but potentially necessary -- measures to complete our own obligations to Congress, the President, and the American people. If you would find it helpful, the Review Board members and I would be pleased to discuss these issues with you or others at the Agency. cc: Assassination Records Review Board
13-00000 ADMINISTRATIVE - INTERNAL USE ONLY From the Desk of J. Barry Harrelson NOTE FOR: Lee Strickland @ DA Swe ee USL LOINS John Pereira @ DCI RE i > TR FROM: J. Barry Harrelson LEASE IN F ULL OFFICE: _— OIMMHRP 2000 DATE: 01/29/98 11:43:38 AM SUBJECT: JFK Collection and Resources Staffing FY 1997: Current Staffing | FY 1998: Additional FY 98 Staffing needed: The FY 98 above does not include: Examples of JFK Records: Oswaid 201 File Sequestered Collection: duplicates of 1 Staff employee, 13 ICs, 3 summer employees 3 ADP contractors 1 full time staff employee, 1 part-time staff employee 20 ICs, 3 ADP contractors 4lCs 1 man-year (est) of overtime reproduction support 1 man-year (est) of overtime indexing support 5 summer employees or equivalent 25,000 pages 30,000 Pages of HSCA material 100,000 Pages of hardcopy material (from the investigation) 72. Reels (160,000 pages) of Microfilm including: 26 Reels of 201 Files 5 Reels of Personnel Files 13 Reels of Cuban related material plus reels on DO organization, project and operation files, Mexico City Station files, Nosenko files, and material in the hardcopy collection. All figures are approximate; | have not included working files (20+ boxes) and referrals. Cc: Sent on 29 January 1998 at 11:43:38 AM y yood ¥ preple My dag @ wk 4 morte 2 (1.5 ETE Rasy hes ack ADMINISTRATIVE - INTERNAL USE ONLY
13-00000 ADMINISTRATIVE - INTERNAL USE ONLY 4 February 1998 MEMORANDUM FOR: John Pereira @ OCI FROM: J. Barry Harrelson JFK Project Officer OFFICE: OIM/HRP SUBJECT: Additional JFK Resources REFERENCE: Previous discussions with you and Lee Strickland As we discussed, the JFK Project has an immediate need for "IA" type support over the next four months (Feb-May/June}. I estimate that we need at least the equivalent of four persons, four days @ week or 272 work days. Based on the figures provided by Rich Warshaw ($27 @ hr), the cost will be approximately $59,000 te cover the four months. Unless we receive the five requested “summer onlys". we will need an additional $70,000 (325 work days) for [A support to complete those project tasks which must completed by 1 September. There is also a need for additional overtime indexing support. | estimate we will need an additional 2 or 3 indexers to keep pace with the reviewers. Does OIM have any indexers who would be interested in working on the JFK project? Ce: Sent on 4 February 1998 at 09:22:08 AM ADMINISTRATIVE - INTERNAL USE QNLY
13-00000 ADMINISTRATIVE - INTERNAL USE ONLY 6 February 1998 MEMORANDUM FOR: Lee S. Strickland @ DA FROM: John F. Pereira OFFICE: CSWHRP SUBJECT: Additional JFK Resources REFERENCE: IMMEDIATE REQUEST We request your approval to add short-term IC resources to the JFK effort immediately as outlined in Barry Harrelson's request below. Funds would be needed to reimburse ADD. oc This request has taken on additional urgency, because the Board has returned to us 700 documents that need to be checked and prepared quickly for release to NARA. (Each month, additional batches of documents are returned to us.) As | mentioned earlier, we have talked with Warshaw, who is prepared to provide the 1A resources (contractors) once we have agreed to reimburse him. Original Text of J. Barry Harrelson Original Text of J. Barry Harrelson 4 February 1998 4 February 1998 MEMORANDUM FOR: John Pereira FROM: J. Barry Harrelson JFK Project Officer OFFICE: OIMPHRP SUBJECT: Additional JFK Resources REFERENCE: Previous discussions with you and Lee Strickland As we discussed, the JFK Project has an immediate need for "1A" type support over the next four months (Feb-May/June}. | estimate that we need at least the equivalent of four persons, four days @ week or 272 work days. Based on the figures provided by Rich Warshaw ($27 @ fr), the cost will be approximately $59,000 to cover the four months. Unless we receive the five requested “summer onlys". we will need an additional $70,000 (325 work days} for (A support to complete those project tasks which must completed hy 1 September. There is also a need for additional overtime indexing support. | estimate we will need an additional 2 or 3 indexers to keep pace with the reviewers. Does Off have any indexers who would be interested in working on the JFK project? ADMINISTRATIVE - INTERNAL USE ONLY
13-00000 re ~ FOR OFFICIAL USE ONLY 11 February 1998 MEMORANDUM FOR: eS. Strickland @ DA DA onn r. Pereira FROM: | aaa OFFICE: OM SUBJECT: Action: Review SAIC Contract Costs for JFK - REFERENCE: . Lee et. al: | have asked Jeffry to send us the detailed cost breakout by month. Now what | VA . need from all of you is what level of effort you think you will need beyond 30 Sep, whether you will need surge support to make Sept. deadline, etc. | also need to review this amount against $¥ to be transterred trom for FY 98 to make sure we can cover the bill. Thx, Nancy Original Text {| Original Text o sam te Desk of From the Desk of | [} DCINSMS Customer Service Team - Phone (46060 / NOTE FOR: [Cr DCI oT _ poet FROM: l /@ ocr OFFICE: DATE: 02/11/98 11:29:58 AM SUBJECT: SAle Contract Costs Hello to All - I've received an estimate from SAIC for contract costs for our next option period, 1 Apr 98-31 Mar 99. | wanted to get this information to you early for planning purposes. {| stress that these figures are estimates because we would like to change our contract vehicle from the current Cost-Plus-Fixed-Fee (CPFF) to a Cost-Plus-Award-Fee (CPAF) contract. With the current CPFF contract, we have very little leverage to ensure quality service. Although we have aot had any problems with SAIC to date, we would feel more comfortable with a CPAF vehicle. SAIC has not been notified yet of our desire to change. ’ We currently pay an 8% fee on our CPFF contract. Because, in switching to CPAF contract, the contractor assumes more risk, our fee offer will probably ge up to 9% or 9.5% (our original position will be to remain at 8%). In your planning you may want to add the difference to give you a grand total. Right now the pricing, broken down by affice for 1 Apr 98-31 Mar 99, is: FOR OFFICIAL USE ONLY
13-00000 FOR OFFICIAL USE ONLY CSt: $48,630 HRG/OMM: $497,665 ** Nic: $360,251 “* Nancy: if you'd like a breakdown of your costs, please let me know. OFL/{Contracts will begin negotiations with SAIC sometime this month. In the past we have incrementally funded our contract so / don't expect we'll need the total up front. That being said, Contracts will probably require 50% commitments from each office (if you want to fully fund the effort, please feel free). [ll keep you posted as | receive more information. (dettry_' ce: @0C! oCl . Sent on 11 Fenriiary at 17:29:58 AM Cc: Sent on 11 February 1998 at 04:14:40 PM FOR OFFICIAL USE ONLY
13-00000 mini istrative ~ Internal Use Only CIA SPEC CTA. COLLECTIONS RELEASE IN FULL 3 June 1998 2000 mo, Talking Points For Meeting of the Historical Review Panel Subject: JFK Assassination Records Review Project Background (1992 - 1995) The setting up of the Historical Review Program coincided with growing interest in Congress to require agencies to declassify records related to the assassination of President Kennedy. a. DCI Gates decided to start declassification process before Congress passed legislation b. DCI testified in Congress about “Openness Policy” (May 1992) --First folder of OSWALD 201 (also know as the pre-assassination file) released c. JFK Act passed late 1992: --Called for Presidential-appointed Assassination Records Review Board (ARRB). s d. First two years the Program focused on JFK with two major releases (August 1993 and August 1994) ~~ Approximately. 227,000 pages from CIA files were. released in full or in sanitized form -- In addition reviewed material at NARA (Warren Committee), SSCI (Church Committee) and Ford. Library (Rockefeller Commission) plus numerous referrals from other Agencies (FBI,STATE,Army,etc.) e. The Assassination Records Review Board did not — actually begin reviewing documents until May 1995. ~-Reasons: Delays in appointment. of members and hiring of staff and the time required to obtain security clearances Administrative - Internal Use Only
13-00000 Administrative - Internal Use Only ARRB (1995 to present) Board's interpretation of the law created a time-~ consuming, labor intensive review process: bd All sanitized records had be reviewed by the Board and action taken on each postponed item. Specific evidence of current harm was required for each postponement. , a. HRP began a. re- review of the material previously release. -- Approximately 80% of the 227,000 pages release in 1993/1994 contained deletions. -- Resources added to JFK project to meet Board's monthly deadlines (reviewers borrowed from other projects. b. Significant Agency resources required to prepare evidence to defend recommended postponements. -- Identification of “specific harm” involves extensive research by DO and other components; time cost comparable to court legations -- Frequently only a few documents or words are at issue. -- Usually the information is marginal or not germane to the assassination story. > EXAMPLES : * It took over two weeks of staff time, numerous meetings, and at least two Board sessions to protect the specific location of an Agency's facility in a few documents. The release of the location would have added nothing to the JFK assassination story. * 100s of hours have been expended in research to protect approximately 2000 names of agency employees and assets that appear in the material. Administrative - Internal Use only
13-00000 Administrative - Internal Use Only c. ARRB Special requests/searches for additional records have added to the overall cost of-the project. -~- 34 written requests, some requiring screening large blocks of records from the archives including files Office of the DDCI and DDP files for the JFK time-frame (1959-64) in search of additional records. -- Others require extensive research such as checking old financial and travel records. d. (Summer 1997) Additional resources added to the JFK project as a result of changes in ARRB's review process that greatly increased the Board's ability to act on documents. -~ Dramatic increase in the number of documents acted on by Board each month: March 1997 - 92 documents oe March 1998 - 1281 documents e. Board receives extension through FY 1998; mandated completion of review by September 1998. ~- Starting in December 1997, reviewers (11) shifted from other projects to JFK to meet the Board's deadline; = ADP and support staff also increased; -- currently over 35 FTE dedicated to the JFK review project. f. Project does not end in September; significant amount of work preparing duplicates. for. NARA Current Status of JFK Records Review = Agency Files: Reviewed over 300,000 pagés Released approximately 230,000 pages Referrals: Approximately 95,000 pages from other agencies, NARA, Congress Re-review: approximately 80% complete New material: Duplicate check 2/3 complete [Lee -- I will have a more detailed breakdown at the meeting] Administrative - Internal Use Only