Meeting of the Board of Regents | October 2008

SUMMARY

Issue for Discussion

Expansion of the State Records Center.

Proposed Handling

The Regents will hear an update on and discuss plans for the Records Center expansion.

Procedural History

The New York State Archives is working with SED’s Office of Management Services and the Office of General Services to develop plans for an expansion to the current State Records Center on the edge of the State Office Campus. This area is not included in plans for the reuse of the campus, and the expansion of the records center will allow the Archives to meet its obligations to store the inactive records of state agencies. The current plan envisions a doubling of available space in the records center.

The planned expansion of the State Records Center in the Office of Cultural Education’s stewardship facility, now under development, is no longer an option. Given the great need to increase space at the records center, the Office of General Services hired Cannon Design to prepare a preliminary design and estimate of costs for an expansion.  This year’s enacted budget provided $12.8 million to carry out the expansion.  This figure, however, does not include some important infrastructure items including technology infrastructure and improved HVAC systems necessary to fully operate all aspects of the program.  Future capital budget requests will seek funding to complete the full design.

Background Information

The State Records Center currently holds about 235,000 cubic feet of records, but it has been at or above capacity for the last several years. In the absence of available space at the records center, some state agencies have been forced to seek alternative records storage space. Their choices are either much higher priced commercial storage or use of their own facilities, which are often already crowded. The planned expansion to the records center, will allow the Archives to guarantee storage space for state agency inactive records for many years and will provide additional necessary space for the storage of archival records that the Archives cannot currently maintain in the Cultural Education Center and that cannot be accommodated in the new facility until a second phase is constructed.

Recommendation

Staff recommend that the Regents support our efforts to ensure the better management of the state’s records through making increased and reasonably priced storage space available to our state agency customers.

Timetable for Implementation

The 2008-09 capital budget included $12.8 million for the expansion.   If this plan moves forward on schedule, the addition to the records center will be complete by 2010.