Public Record
KRS 171.410, Section (1), defines "public record or record" as
"all books, papers, maps, photographs, cards, tapes, disks, diskettes,
recordings, and other documentary materials, regardless of physical form or
characteristics, which are prepared, owned, used in the possession of or
retained by a public agency."
While all records created by public agencies, state or local,
are public (government) records, not all are open records (that is, open to
public inspection) under Kentucky’s Open Records
laws.
Permanent Record
Records which have been appraised by KDLA staff and by
university staff as having sufficient historical, informational, or evidential
value to the university that their continued preservation beyond the time they
are needed for administrative, legal, or fiscal purposes is warranted. Such
records are preserved because they constitute evidence of the university’s
functions, policies, decisions, procedures, and operations. Generally, permanent
records comprise only 5% to 7% of an organization’s total records.
Examples of permanent records include but are not limited to:
official correspondence; minutes of meetings of Board of Trustees, Board of
Regents, President’s Cabinet, Faculty Senate, Department and Administrative
units; special studies; publications; annual reports; and audit
reports.
These are records with specific, fixed, retention periods, such
as three years, six months, fifty years. The duration of a record’s
administrative, fiscal, or legal value is defined by both agency use and state
and federal requirements. Recommended retention periods are determined by KDLA
staff and by the university’s Records Officer during the scheduling process and
are fixed and authorized when approved by the State Archives and Records
Commission. To realize economic benefits, the agency should destroy its
non-permanent records when retention periods expire, unless some legal action is
pending.
Indefinite Record
The term "indefinite" is not a retention period and does not
mean permanent. Indefinite means the period of time before the retention of the
record begins. For example, the retention period for Leave Accrual Reports is
five years, but the retention does not begin until the individual’s employment
with the university is terminated. In this case, the indefinite period is the
time between creation of the record and termination of employment, which
triggers the five year retention period. Another example is a lease. The
retention period of a lease is triggered by its termination or cancellation. In
the case of reference and informational material, the retention is determined by
when the records cease to be of value administratively, which could be one day,
one month, or several years. The disposition instructions in the schedule
explain conditions under which indefinite records may be
destroyed.
Summary fiscal records which provide a general picture of the
fiscal operation of the university must be kept permanently. Examples include:
operating budgets, audit reports, annual financial reports, and journals and
ledgers. These and similar records are identified in the records retention
schedule.
Records of the university which are subject to audit are those
which relate to financial transactions or represent an audit trail. Audits may
be either fiscal or compliance in nature. When the word "audit" appears in the
disposition column of the records retention schedule, it refers to state,
federal, or internal agency fiscal or compliance audits. In the case of fiscal
or compliance audits, such audits are prepared or approved by the Auditor of
Public Accounts. Audits of university records intended to meet state
requirements occur annually and are completed by independent auditing or
accounting firms, with the express approval of the State Auditor’s
Officer.
Unless otherwise supported by Kentucky Revised Statutes or
federal regulations specifying a longer retention, the retention requirement for
records subject to audit, as approved by the Auditor of Public Accounts, is
three years. If the university is aware of the need to maintain records longer
than the standard three year period, as may be the case with some federal
audits, then all affected records should be retained until the audit has been
completed and the retention period met. In no case should records which have
been identified as subject to audit be destroyed until the audit has been
completed and retention periods met, or the records have been officially exempt
from any audit requirements.
Records which are subject to audit also fall into the category
of indefinite records because it is the completion of the audit which actually
triggers the retention period of three years. The schedule reflects a "three
year" retention period in the agency with disposition of "destroy after audit."
This means that the record must be retained by the agency for three years after
the audit has been completed, even though the university is audited annually. In
other words, the record can only be destroyed after the audit has been completed
and three years has elapsed. This ensures that all records which have been
audited are available for further review, should there be exceptions to the
completed audit. The indefinite period, then, is the time between creation of
the record and completion of the audit.
The departmental copy (or duplicate) of university personnel
records for faculty and staff may be destroyed five years after termination of
employment. The originals of these records are retained permanently by the
university’s personnel office. Individual departments or units should contact
the university personnel office for information about specific documents
maintained within the duplicate file which should be transferred to the
personnel office for inclusion in the master file prior to termination of
employment.
Subunit copies of personnel files may be destroyed two years
after termination of employment with the university.
Vital Records
Vital records are defined as those records essential to the
continued functioning of the university during and after an emergency, and also
those records essential to the protection of the rights and interests of the
university and of the individuals for whose rights and interests it has
responsibility. Vital records are identified in the retention schedule with a
ã(V).ä The records which have been identified as vital on the retention schedule
may not be fully inclusive; therefore, university staff should identify the
additional records which may be vital and take the necessary steps to ensure
their protection.
All records which have been identified as vital to the
university should be isolated and protected so as to ensure their availability
should the need arise. Vital records protection methods include: 1)natural
dispersion (that is, duplicates of vital records are dispersed to off-site
locations by virtue of the university’s normal operating procedures);
2)duplicating the record and storing it off-site in a protected environment;
3)duplicating the record and storing it on-site in a protected environment; 4)
storing the record in its original form on-site at the end of the day in a
protected environment; and 5) storing the record in its original form off-site
at the end of the day in a protected environment.
Because a record is vital to the university does not mean its
retention is always permanent, nor is a record judged of permanent value always
equal to a vital record. A vital record can be essential to the university for a
portion of the retention period or for the entire period, depending on what the
record documents comprise less than 5% of the total records of an
organization.
Confidential Records
While all records created by a public agency, using public funds
and public employees, in carrying out its official business are public records,
not all of those records are open to inspection. For example, medical records
created by the University of Kentucky Medical Center are public records because
the Medical
Center is a part of the
university, which is a public agency; however, medical records are not open to
public inspection because of statutory restrictions on access.
Whether a record is open to public inspection is a matter
determined by the application of the state’s Open Records laws and other
relevant statutes, or federal regulations. Public inspection of confidential
records is restricted. Records of the university which are considered to be
confidential and to which a claim of restricted assess can be supported by a
proper citation from Kentucky’s Revised Statutes, Administrative Regulations,
Code of Federal Regulations, or similar authority are identified on the
retention schedule with a ã(C)ä, plus the accompanying legal citation which
restricts access.
Official Correspondence
Official correspondence is a permanent record which documents
the major activities, functions, and programs of the university and the
important events in its history. It is critical that official correspondence be
preserved as it provides a record of policy evolution and formulation, how and
why decisions are made, and the effect of those decisions upon the university
and its constituencies. Without official correspondence, we lose much of the
understanding of the administration of an organization. Its retention,
therefore, is crucial to the preservation of the administrative history of the
university.
In general, the correspondence of the president of the
university, as well as that of vice-presidents and other administrative heads is
considered to be official correspondence.
General Correspondence
General correspondence is correspondence which is not crucial to
the preservation of the administrative history of the university. It is
generally of a non-policy nature and without permanent value. It deals only with
the general operations of the university, operations which are better documented
by other records. General correspondence should be retained no longer than two
years. However, before destruction occurs, the files should be screened to
remove any official correspondence which may be present.
Minutes of Meetings
The following have been identified as formally constituted units
which operate within public universities, and which are subject to public
records management statutes: Board of Trustees, Board of Regents, President’s
Cabinet or similar body, Faculty Senate, and committees of departments,
colleges, administrative units or other academic bodies. This list is not meant
to be inclusive but rather indicative of the types of meetings which might be
held and for which minutes should be created and retained. Minutes of meetings
constitute proper documentation of essential university transactions and
organizational functions, as required in KRS 171.640. While individual
committees within a university are not public agencies in and of themselves they
are an integral part of an existing public agency. The requirement to document
committee actions then is the same that applies to other elements of the
universities.
One copy of each set of approved minutes should be transferred
to the University Archives for permanent preservation and one copy should be
maintained in the creating unit.
Tapes or stenographic notes from which minutes are prepared also
should be retained by forwarding them to the University Archives. Since minutes
which are produced from tapes or notes are not always verbatim transcriptions,
the original tapes and notes should be retained as supporting
documentation.
Informational and Reference Materials
Informational and reference materials are aids of a
technical or non-technical nature used in the conduct of official business. The
disposition for such materials is destroy when no longer useful to the receiving
unit. Examples of informational and reference materials may include externally
created brochures and publications, duplicate copies of memoranda which do not
require action by the receiving unit, literature not related to day-to-day
activities, and some tracking tools, such as logs.