I worked in the Virginia Records Management program and I am 99.9% sure that 
the Public Records Law did not mention any time period for permanent 
records. I just checked the definitions section and there is no definition 
of "permanent".

Permanent meant permanent.  Though such designations often need review since 
one archivists' declaration of permanent often did not stand the test of 
time 25 years later.

There are very few records that are permanent and actually if you do assign 
a time period to permanent it is not permanent. My favorite retention period 
related to records about the Yuca Mountain nuclear waste storage area. They 
said there retention period was 10,000 years + 6 months. The 10K years being 
the half life of plutoniom.

I am sure that Mark Walsh who is still at LVA can give us the final answer 
about Virginia's definition of permanent.



Robert F. Nawrocki CRM
Innovate and Infuriate
My opinions are my own and not my employers.






>From: "Grieme, Gary L." <[log in to unmask]>
>Reply-To: Records Management Program <[log in to unmask]>
>To: [log in to unmask]
>Subject: Re: [RM] Definition of Permanent (Forever) Retention
>Date: Thu, 27 Jul 2006 13:21:48 -0500
>
> >>>>  Please read the confidentiality statement below  <<<<
>
><<<Does anyone out there in Listserv land know where I can find a US state
>or federal citation defining a time span regarding a retention period of
>"forever" or "permanent"?>>>
>
>No disrespect Robert--am I just being naïve again, or is this absurd?  
>Can't we just rely on the definition we'd find in any dictionary?  Why do 
>people have to take a nice word like "forever" and abuse it?  If the 
>legislatures in California and Virginia decided forever means 500 years, 
>then why can't the retention period be "500 years?"  It's not like people 
>won't have time to change their mind!
>
>Gary L. Grieme
>Records Manager
>[log in to unmask]
>
>
>
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