Felicia,
Hello! I am a Records Manager, and from 2005-2010 I worked as a Records Analyst for the Commonwealth of Virginia. One of my service areas was corrections, and I did a huge project to update and consolidate records for all of Virginia's Correctional Institutions - at the time there were about 30 (give or take).
The situation in Virginia was that Corrections had long set its own retention, and most records personnel in corrections wanted to keep inmate records forever, just like Maine. A big situation in Virginia too was that there was a Central Classification Office in Richmond that maintained all permanent inmate records - what the actual prisons kept were their own copies of inmate records.
A big concern too in Virginia was "repeat offenders" - prison staff wanted to access records quickly for repeat offenders that might come back into the prison system within ten years.
I don't know if I am being very helpful or not, but a big help to me was the State Code that specifically addressed how long criminal records should be kept, and the fact that there was a central unit in Virginia Corrections that maintained inmate files permanently.
Let me know if you have any specific questions - the biggest arguments I remember came over how long to keep logs - firearm logs, visitor logs, inspection sheets - and also training records of prison staff.
Take care,
Tom Wellman
--- On Fri, 6/7/13, Kennedy, Felicia <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
From: Kennedy, Felicia <[log in to unmask]>
Subject: Retention schedules for Corrections
To: [log in to unmask]
Date: Friday, June 7, 2013, 12:22 PM
I am planning a meeting with staff from our State Corrections Department to go over some of their retention schedules. All of these were put in place before I took this position and I am trying to make the case that it's time for a change. Currently I can't find any justification in the files for such lengthy retentions. I looked at some other states to make comparisons. I am particularly interested in the following: 1) inmate case files 2) juvenile records 3) probation & parole.
What Maine has:
1) We have 3 correctional facilities - the schedules are 7 yrs in agency and 50 yrs in Records Center (destroy); Maine State Prison - 7 years in agency and 63 years in Records Center (destroy)
2) We have 3 juvenile facilities - the case file schedules vary: 7 yrs in agency/18 yrs in RC (archival); 100 yrs in agency (destroy); 0 yrs in agency/25 yrs in RC (archival)
3) Pardon Books/Case Folders for Parole/Pardon - 5 yrs in agency/25 yrs in RC (destroy)
Perhaps the agencies themselves have some justification why records have to be retained for this length of time. However, there are obvious inconsistencies and I don't believe any of our juvenile facilities are considered to have "historical" value to the state making their records archival. Many of these schedules were put in place 30 years ago and have not been revisited.
I would like to have as much information and support for the Corrections meeting as possible. Any feedback, information or schedules that might back-up shorter retention periods would be helpful.
Thank you,
Felicia
Felicia Kennedy
Maine State Archives
84 State House Station
Augusta, ME 04333-0084
207-287-5790
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