Paul,
The City of Lakewood moved from microfilming to imaging about 3 years ago and we've done it using the same budget in the City Clerk's Office (which has steadly gone down every year for 5 years). There were start up costs shared by all departments in terms of software purchase, but our microfilm camera was on its last leg, so it was a bit of a toss up. The City Clerk's Office picked up the annual maintenance fees.

In order to staff the program we eliminated two positions: a FT microfilm tech and a PT records clerk position, then hired one FT scanning tech. In addition, there are about 15 other employees throughout the city (no new positions) who have taken on added responsibilities of scanning one or two record series for their departments. The advantage to an imaging system, of course, has been access to the records.  People hate coming over to look at microfilm, but they love LaserFiche, and in fact, we're making some decisions right now about scanning selected rolls of film into our imaging system.

We started very slowly (we focused on permanent records that had been previously filmed, and did "day forward" scanning). The program is managed by an interdepartmental "Digital Archives Group" team that meets monthly, but the CCO does the majority of scanning and indexing. We still have to maintain the microfilm library, have readers, etc. as most of the film will never be converted. We also have a public viewing station in the City Clerk's Office where someone can come and search public records on LaserFiche as well as on film.

So bottom line: ongoing price is the same, but the records are accessible and everybody's happy :)

Sharon G. Blackstock, CRM
Central Records Administrator
Lakewood City Clerk's Office
480 South Allison Parkway
Lakewood CO 80226-3127
303-987-7091 (office)
303-987-7088 (fax)
[log in to unmask]
www.lakewood.org

Lakewood's records management objectives: 1) Information is available when needed; 2) Records of permanent value are preserved; 3) Non-permanent records are destroyed per approved retention schedules; 4) Discarded paper is recycled.


List archives at http://lists.ufl.edu/archives/recmgmt-l.html
Contact [log in to unmask] for assistance