Like the US government, federal states have archives where all information about the state and its residents are preserved for safe keeping in what is known as state government records. State government records are state specific and contain all information about the residents of the state. This becomes really handy when you are looking for some distant relative or old friend with whom you have lost touch and are wary that they may be no more, but know they were residents of a particular state, where you can check the records.

States have their own laws on what should be made available for public viewing. Recent debates have centered on the need for maintaining privacy of individuals as public records open to everyone can be open to fraudsters for tampering. Critical information like phone numbers, addresses, personal information like the social security number are usually not made available to everyone. States like Georgia do not allow even phone numbers or addresses of scientists involve din critical research or of those doing investigations in special cases.

State government records also contain information about the workings and documents that have been collected by the employees in the course of their work. For instance the archive of the state of Michigan is directed by law to protect and preserve the state government records that are created. But less than just five per cent created and used by the state’s employees fall into this category.

Most state governments have over the years or decades produced some important government records containing public information that require preservation on a permanent basis. Public records contain information about original minutes of the meetings, annual reports, policies, project files, correspondences and electronic databases.

These provide evidence of the work of employees, the important decisions made during their tenure and how the operations were carried out. For reviewing past decisions and formulating future plans and directions, this information serves as pointers and ready references. Public records are not all about data and documents and they could be anything like letters, map, drawing, audio clippings and recordings, films, e-mail messages, microfilm, word processed documents or computer databases.

Some of these remain relevant for a short period while others have more shelf value, and others require permanent safekeeping for all future references. And a single information or record can have multiple uses like census that is used studying public health and the economy as well as for defining political areas and head counts in the localities. Many earlier census records were destroyed because their value had lapsed.

But all the state agencies are required to list individual records or record series through a records Retention and Disposal Schedule. It highlights how long the record has to be kept and how long its value would last. State records center are known to keep records outside the daily usage for offsite storage that are not used by the agency.

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