In keeping with Patrick's stand today of providing a response of a
different flavor...

The US National Archives General Records Schedule 16 states:

2.      Records Disposition Files.
Descriptive inventories, disposal authorizations, schedules, and
reports.
a.      Basic documentation of records description and disposition
programs, including SF 115, Request for Records Disposition Authority;
SF 135, Records Transmittal and Receipt; SF 258, Agreement to Transfer
Records to National Archives of the United States; and related
documentation.
(1)     SF 115s that have been approved by NARA.
Destroy 2 years after supersession.
(2)     Other records.
Destroy 6 years after the related records are destroyed or after the
related records are transferred to the National Archives of the United
States, whichever is applicable.
b.      Routine correspondence and memoranda.
Destroy when 2 years old.

Most have responded that their support information generated to document
the records destruction process is retained permanently, I do not agree.
Item 2.a(2) of GRS 16 identifies that the records generated as a result
of the disposition process are retained for 6 years after the records
are destroyed or transferred to the Archives.  I typically agree with
that idea and here's why. If you have an efficient and effective records
program, and you confidently follow your own policy and procedures, you
don't need to actually prove all the steps that were taken to authorize
the destruction of specific records.  The retention time is in your
schedule and your process is documented in your procedures.  That is all
you really need to prove what happened to specific records.

At least that's my opinion...


Lee Michael, CRM
Records Program Manager
National Renewable Energy Laboratory
Golden, CO

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