[COMMISSION ON ORGANIZATION OF THE EXECUTIVE BRANCH OF THE GOVERNMENT REPORT ON RECORD MANAGEMENT]

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP86B00269R000200010017-0
• Release Decision: RIFPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 5
• Document Creation Date: December 14, 2016
• Document Release Date: May 22, 2003
• Sequence Number: 17
• Publication Date: December 22, 1948
• Content Type: REPORT

Approved For Rase 2003/06/20
Commission on Organization
of the Executive Branch of
the Government
1626 K Street, N. W,
EX 4160 - C. B. Coates (2788)
-- Fred Hamlin (2789)
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Release to AMEs of
Wednesday, December 22, 194
A better and cheaper way to handle the federal government's 18,500,000
cubic feet of records -- enough, all told, to fill an estimated six Pentagon
Buildings -- was laid before the Commission on Organization of the Executive
Branch of the Government today.
Creation of a Federal Records Administration to simplify the making and
keeping of the government's records was proposed to the 12-man bi-partisan
Commission by a research "task force."
Records management is one of 24 major problems of government on which the
Commission, created by unanimous vote of Congress in July 1947, will report to
Congress early in the new session. Task forces have been at work in each field
for many months. The Commission will study the task force reports before making
its own recommendations.
The records management task force, headed by Emmett J. Leahy, executive
director of the National Records Management Council, made these points in its
study:
I.. While record making and keeping are "indispensable tools" of government,
they are also the "greatest consumers of salaries, space, and equipment" among
its administrative or "housekeeping" functions. Their current yearly cost is
1.2 billion.
2. When non-current records are filed in costly office space, a single
4-drawer filing cabinet may cost as much as $29 a year to maintain. This can be
2.15 a year by moving the contents to cardboard cartons on steel stacks
and centralizing their storage in low-rental structures.
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3. The study "confirms for the first time that more than 50 percent of
the total records of the average organization, government or business, can be
eliminated from office and plant equipment and spac,e." This can be done pri-
marily by elimination of useless or duplicated records and the transfer of others
to storage.
The proposed Federal Records Administration would have as one of its integral
parts the existing National Archives Establishment which currently handles about
5 percent of existing government records. The new Administration would establish
and operate Federal Records Centers in Washington and in the field for the storage,
servicing, and screening of all federal records which must be preserved for a time
but need not be maintained in office space and equipment.
Currently, there are over 100 records centers operated by individual depart-
ments and agencies. Many of these duplicate and overlap. The new Records
Administration would consolidate these, reducing their total contents. In many
cases surplus war plants would be utilized for storage purposes. The location of
the new records centers would be related to the efficient servicing of the agencies
Concerned and to the interest of national security.
The Federal Records Administration would also promote government--wide im-
provements and economies by setting standards and controls for record making and
record keeping; by applying tested methods, practices, materials, equipment, and
machines; and by maintaining a staff of trained arc}tivists responsible frr
evaluating, preserving, and servicing records of permanent value,
The task force suggests enactment of a law to be known as the "Federal
Records Management Act" which would provide for tho establishment of the new
Administration. It would also require that outgoing officials and employees
deliver records to their successors and establish safeguards against the removal
or loss of Approved For i e ease Ol~~3~}Q /20ur rR~~8b ~ 0~oz~ 0186f s
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Administration Council superseding the existing National Archives Council and
comprising the same membership with the addition of an Administor of Federal
Records,
The report also proposes that each department and agency of the government
appoint a qualified records management officer to organize a program designed to
eliminate duplication, utilize modern office machines, and stroamlinL corres-
pondence through the use of form letters, pattern letters, fewer copies, pro-
cedural guides, automatic typewriters, and other labor saving equipment. The
task force expresses belief that if the changes it proposes were adopted within
two years, savings in excess of 5832,000,000 might be realized in that period with
recurring annual savings of over ,x6,000,000 a year thereafter.
Many officials of the government and industry worked closely with the task
force, its consultants, and its staff in producing the data on which the report
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Personnel of the "task force" rep6xting on Records Management in the
United States Government to the Commission on Organization of the
Executive Branch of the Government
Research Director
Emmett J. Leahy, Executive Director
National Records Management Council
Herbert E. Angel; Department of National Defense
Robert H. Bahrmer, Assistant Archivist of the United States
Frank M. Root; Westinghouse Electric Corporation
Edward 'W'Tilber, Department of State
Commissioners
Honorable Herbert Hoover, Chairman
Waldorf--Astoria Towers
Apartment 31-A
New York, New York
Honorable Dean Acheson, V ice Chairman
701 Union Trust Building
,Washington, D. C.
Honorable George D. Aiken
Room 358, Senate Office Building
Washington, D. C.
Honorable' Arthur S. Flemming
President, Ohio Wesleyan University
Delaware, Ohio
Honorable James Forrestal
Secretary of National Defense
Room 3D727; National Defense Building
Washington, D. C.
Honorable' Clarence J. Brown
Room 1401 "House Office Building
Washington, D. C.
Honorable Joseph P. Kennedy
270 Park' Avenue
New York, Now York
Honorable John L. McClellan
Room 437, Senate Office Building
Washington, U. C.
Honorable, Carter I,ianasco
Room. 1306,'House Office Building
Washington, D. C.
Honorable George H. Mead
131 North Ludlow Street
Dayton, Ohio
Honorable James T.I.
Pollock
Professor and Chairman of the
Department of P oliti_cal Science
Univors ity of Michigan
Ann Arbor, Michigan
Honorable James Rowe, Jr.
1626 K Street, N.
?l.
:ashington, D, C.
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I'APPROVAL II INFORMATION II SIGNATURE
ACTION II DIRECT REPLY II RETURN
I COMMENT PREPARATION OF REPLY I DISPATCH
=CONCURRENCE II RECOMMENDATION II FILE
REMARKS:
tied F60I iIB lki 1~003/0611~ ~~IA71RD
010017-0
FORM NO. 80.4
SEP 1947