The same idea as Ginny's came to mind with one addition.  When I ran a 
municipal records center a few years back, we did some of the destruction 
ourselves (shredding of especially confidential records) but we did not have 
to bale them.  We put them in these large wheeled tubs and our recycling 
vendor took them away.  Our general destruction process was to get a city 
trash truck to haul away about 500 boxes a quarter to the waste-to-energy 
plant where they would be burned/turned into electricity  Once burned the 
plant would send a destruction certificate.  Ironically our records center 
was formerly the city's incinerator!

Tod Chernikoff, CRM
[log in to unmask]

PS - Jackie - is this still the case?

--------------------------------------------------
From: "Jones, Virginia" <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Monday, August 17, 2009 15:10
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Subject: Re: [RM] In-House Records Shredding

Jeff:
Welcome to the list!  Do you shred all your records for destruction or only 
those considered confidential or containing personal information?  The cost 
is much less if you contract with a recycling company or pulp mill for the 
destruction of non-confidential or non-private records.

Ginny Jones
(Virginia A. Jones, CRM, FAI)
Records Manager
Information Technology Division
Newport News Dept. of Public Utilities
Newport News, VA
[log in to unmask]

-----Original Message-----
From: Records Management Program [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf 
Of Jeff Collins
Sent: Monday, August 17, 2009 2:22 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: [RM] In-House Records Shredding

Hello,

As this is my first post, a quick introduction: my name is Jeff Collins and 
I have been in the records and information management field for a whopping 
18 months!  I have master’s degrees in both history and library science and 
am currently employed as a Public Records Archivist at the Connecticut State 
Library.  I have responsibility for providing records and information 
management services to the state agencies in the Executive branch of 
Connecticut state government.  This includes writing records retention 
schedules; establishing guidelines, and standards; conducting training; and 
supervising the State Records Center.

(I have already checked the RECMGMT-L Listserv archive and found some good 
information.)

Our organization is researching the possibility of moving shredding services 
in-house.  To contextualize our situation, the Connecticut State Records 
Center houses nearly 80,000 boxes of inactive records of state agencies. 
These are standard 1.0 cubic foot records cartons and the records are almost 
exclusively paper.  The facility was converted from a root cellar in 1958 
and has very little free space.  We currently do not charge fees for any of 
our services, although we have proposed a chargeback system in the past with 
no success.  Our annual destruction costs have averaged about $7,000 a year 
and we have contracted with private vendors (they come to our facility, 
physically remove the boxes, shred the records off-site, and then provide a 
certificate of destruction).

Due to severe budgetary reductions, we are unable to destroy records for the 
foreseeable future.  However, we may have access to money from a separate 
fund dedicated to the purchase of equipment.  Oh the irony!

So, we are researching the return on investment (ROI) of bringing the 
shredding services in-house.  We are cognizant that there are many issues 
(e.g., space for equipment, proper electrical wiring, will the machine shred 
the entire box or will we have to empty and pre-sort the contents?, the cost 
and space of baling machine, and what to do with the recycled product).

Specifically, for those of you that have researched the ROI of bringing 
shredding services in-house, what was your determination?  Of those of you 
that operate shredding equipment in-house, do you have any advice?

We would love to hear any stories/advice, anecdotal or other (especially 
government records centers).

Thanks!
Jeff

Jeffrey E. Collins, Public Records Archivist
Connecticut State Library, 231 Capitol Avenue, Hartford, CT 06106
(860) 757-6513 / [log in to unmask] 

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