I had promised to post a summary of off-List responses I received on 
whether or not institutions other than NARA allowed people to renew 
their cards slightly in advance of expiration.  Now that the issue has 
wrapped up, I thought I'd let you all know that I did not hear 
privately from any institution that follows a policy such as NARA's.

My thanks to those of you who wrote me privately to provide me your 
perspectives on your dealings with NARA on this and on related issues.  
I would encourage you to let NARA know about some of these issues.  You 
may not always get satisfaction but I think NARA, as is the case with 
any agency, benefits from hearing from its customers.

Due to my raising the card issue last week, NARA now states on its 
website that it does not allow renewal of researcher i.d. cards prior 
to expiration -- due to security reasons.  See
http://www.archives.gov/research/start/researcher-card.html

I guess I've been a Fed for too long, I have a tendency to ask an awful 
lot of questions rather than to accept some things.  I just don't see 
why security concerns would affect my ability to renew on Thursday a 
card that expired Friday.  Especially since renewal would appear to be 
a quick and uncomplicated process.  (What could change in terms of 
security in the course of one day?  Beats me.)  But I'm not going to 
pursue that issue, there's no way I can make up the lost time from last 
week, anyway.   At least I was able to persuade NARA to post a public 
notice about a renewal policy which, as I pointed out, seems 
counterintuitive.  So I thank NARA for doing that, anyway.

My thanks also to those of you who sent me nice notes yesterday about 
my success in getting the NARA notice up.  Keep asking questions, 
everyone, you know I will, LOL!!

(The rarely passive) Maarja

A posting from the Archives & Archivists LISTSERV List sponsored by the Society of American Archivists, www.archivists.org.
For the terms of participation, please refer to http://www.archivists.org/listservs/arch_listserv_terms.asp.

To subscribe or unsubscribe, send e-mail to [log in to unmask]
      In body of message:  SUB ARCHIVES firstname lastname
                    *or*:  UNSUB ARCHIVES
To post a message, send e-mail to [log in to unmask]

Or to do *anything* (and enjoy doing it!), use the web interface at
     http://listserv.muohio.edu/archives/archives.html

Problems?  Send e-mail to Robert F Schmidt <[log in to unmask]>