Envisioning Oregon

Town Hall Meeting Summary

The first of two planned sets of town hall meetings for the Envisioning Oregon project was held the week of November 18, 2008. Meetings were held on November 18 in Portland, November 19 in Pendleton, November 20 in Philomath, and November 21 in Bend. Meeting attendees represented the full range of Oregon's archival repositories - large and small, public and private, urban and rural.

Each town hall meeting was organized around an identical series of questions intended to gather information on attitudes toward cooperative collection development within Oregon repositories. Project team members representing the libraries at the University of Oregon, Oregon State University, the Oregon Historical Society, and Lewis & Clark College, hoped to learn whether repository representatives would support cooperation between repositories and to listen to their collection-related concerns and hopes. Although based on the same questions, each meeting differed in character due to its geographical location and the types of repositories represented by its attendees. The Portland meeting had the largest attendance and the most urban representation of the four meetings; tribal concerns were at the forefront of the Pendleton meeting; the Philomath meeting focused on the needs of small repositories; whereas Bend meeting attendees stressed the need to overcome isolation between repositories. While the discussion at each of the four meetings focused on different aspects of cooperative collection development, meeting attendees agreed that Oregon's documentary heritage is at risk and shared the hope that cooperation between repositories will help to protect Oregon's historical resources. Following is a combined summary of the town hall meetings' main discussion points.

1. Current Collecting Situation

Oregon's historical materials collections face grave challenges. Oregon's citizens, as well as local and state governments, need to understand that the situation facing historical and cultural collections is dire. Collections are threatened by a lack of resources including trained staff, adequate and appropriate space, and stable and sufficient funding. As a result of insufficient resources, many collections are not adequately preserved, are not processed in a timely manner, and are not fully accessible to researchers. This situation affects both government and private collections; placing both at risk. Donor issues also threaten collecting activities by Oregon's repositories. The lure of eBay has convinced some potential donors to offer their historical materials for sale, rather than donating them to repositories that cannot afford to purchase collections. Thus a portion of Oregon's history is flowing into the hands of private collectors where it will not be available to researchers. Other collections – both public and private - are being permanently lost to dumpsters and recycling centers because their historical significance is not recognized by those who own them. Collections that are particularly at risk include local government records, electronic records, and twentieth century materials in general.

2. Collecting Issues and Concerns

The bulk of every town hall meeting discussion centered on the collecting issues and concerns facing meeting attendees. Representatives from Oregon's archival repositories identified numerous issues and concerns pertaining to the collection of materials documenting Oregon's history. Included were the following:

What to collect
- What factors should a repository consider when drafting a collection policy?
- How can a repository know what collections are available?
- What can archivists do about out-of-scope materials? Should repositories collect such materials to save them, even if they do not have sufficient space?

Staff training
- How can small organizations provide their (usually) volunteer staffs with the training needed to properly care for historical records?
- How do new archivists get the training they need to be effective?

Access to collections
- What measures can/should repositories take to speed processing and rapidly provide access to collections?
- What can be done to expand the inclusiveness of the Northwest Digital Archives (NDA)?
  - The NDA charges fees that make participation cost-prohibitive, especially for smaller organizations.
  - State involvement might enable the NDA to be more inclusive.
- How can repositories ensure access to electronic records? Changing technology is a problem.

Public perceptions
- The public perception is that some state collections are geared toward collecting Portland materials; not state-wide materials.
- Potential donors automatically think of certain Oregon institutions as a home for their collections; consequently these institutions find it difficult to keep up with records processing.
- Potential donors fear that repositories may cease to exist, thus making donors unwilling to give materials.

Resources
- How can repositories support each other, while still meeting their own needs?
- What can repositories do when they run out of space? Are there practicable solutions?

Competition between repositories
- Smaller repositories fear that larger repositories will monopolize all the best collections.
- There is a fear that private institutions are collecting public records that should go to government archives.

Isolation between repositories due to
- Administrative priorities
- Jurisdictional boundaries
- "Innocent" isolation between repositories that is self-imposed and results from not knowing the collecting interests of other repositories
- Institutional policies limit access to a particular membership
- Geographic barriers such as distance and/or topography
- Lack of communication between repositories

3. Desired Types of Cooperation

Meeting attendees at each town hall meeting agreed that cooperation between repositories is desirable. Representatives of both large and small repositories saw a positive benefit to cooperation, especially in the current economic climate. Attendees suggested a number of types of cooperation that they would welcome, including the following:

Shared collection space – this is a hope for the future, although it will involve overcoming numerous jurisdictional, administrative, financial, and geographic barriers.
Networking structures – attendees expressed interest in knowing who to call when in need of advice or when needing to refer donors or researchers to other repositories.
- Existing networking structures tend to involve professional archivists, but are not as available to smaller, volunteer, and rural organizations and societies.
- Networking opportunities, such as regular (annual, quarterly, or monthly) meetings can serve to bring people together in a neutral area and break down barriers between repositories.
Sharing of information and expertise sharing – attendees want to understand the issues that face other organizations.
- Those who care for historical collections need to know what resources are available in their areas.
- A mentoring program would help smaller, volunteer organizations, as well as new archivists. Larger organizations could mentor small organizations. Professional archivists could mentor volunteer archivists.
- Repositories can cooperate to share information about stolen or missing items in their collections.
Collection sharing – a number of attendees would like to work toward the sharing of collections between institutions. For example, one repository could house the physical collection, while another could house that same collection in digital format.
Developing cooperative collecting policies – Repositories should cooperate in their collecting activities to ensure that historically significant materials find a home. Attendees emphasized the need to collect underrepresented materials and listed a number of types of collections that should be collecting priorities:
- Twentieth century materials
- Environmental collections
- Ethnic/immigrant records
- Records documenting cultural movements
- Corporate collections
- Academic records
- Records documenting the performing arts
- Records documenting local governments and geographic areas
- Tribal records
- Records documenting Oregon's major industries

Project Hopes and Expectations

The hope is that this project will result in an understanding and overview of the collecting situation in the state of Oregon. Those attending the town hall meetings summed up their expectations in the following "3 C's" – communication, cooperation, and collaboration.

Communication – the hope is that regular communication between repositories will be one result of this project. Such communication can take a number of different forms, such as:
- Regularly-scheduled meetings at the regional or state levels.
- Training opportunities at the regional or state levels (specifically mentioned were training in genealogical research, preservation of photographs and records, grant writing, and using collection management systems.
- Sharing of information about collections at repositories in Oregon, so that those working at repositories large and small will know where to find collections.
- Sharing collection databases and links to research tools
- Sharing information about best practices for collections processing and description.
- Sharing information by means of an electronic bulletin board – this could be used by repositories looking for a home for orphan collections or wondering where to refer researchers.
- Investigating video-conferencing as a way to improve communication for archivists unable to attend meetings.

Cooperation – meeting attendees were enthusiastic about various types of cooperation, including:
- Cooperative group help in collecting.
- Cooperation between various historical societies and between historical societies and public libraries – library OPACs could post collections information.
- Connecting with the Oregon Museums Association.
- Cooperating in the transfer of collections where appropriate and practicable.

Collaboration – the consensus of meeting attendees was that repositories should work together to:
- Develop digital collections to improve access
- Develop online resources and expand access to the Northwest Digital Archives
- Apply for grants
- Support smaller institutions
- Develop regional shared storage facilities
- Develop a network of tribes to help Oregon maintain a tribal voice in matters of history and to ensure that materials go to the appropriate tribe
- Develop other methodologies for expanding access to collections – especially east of the Cascades.

5. Conclusion

The four town hall meetings held in November 2008 set the tone for a positive and productive interaction between Oregon's historical records repositories. Attendees were excited by the possibilities, though daunted by the challenges facing them. Their hope is that state-wide institutions such as the State Historical Records Advisory Board and the State Archives will become involved in developing sustainable cooperative collecting activities and structures in Oregon. Those attending the meetings believe that it is time to leave conflicts and suspicions between repositories in the past and to plan for a future in which Oregon repositories work together to efficiently collect, process, and describe the materials that document Oregon's history.

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Maintained by: N. Helmer, spcarref@uoregon.edu
Last Modified: 03/17/2009