Ramsey Library Government Information
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Federal Documents Collection Development & Access Policy

I. Statement of Purpose

D. Hiden Ramsey Library at the University of North Carolina at Asheville was designated a selective depository for U.S. government publications in December 1995. As the only depository in the Asheville MSA, the library is committed to making depository items available to and useful for the general public while serving the curricular needs of the University.

Ramsey Library administers and develops the collection according to the requirements of Title 44, Chapter 19, of the United States Code and the guidelines in Instructions to Depository Libraries issued by the Library Programs Service, Superintendent of Documents, U.S. Government Printing Office (GPO).

The documents staff will make depository documents available to the inquiring public by providing an appropriate local collection and comprehensive indexes. For UNCA-based students and faculty with valid ID, Ramsey Library will borrow documents held by Appalachian State University or Western Carolina University through the ABC Express van service. UNCA also lends documents through ABC Express. Interlibrary loan service from the Regional Depository in Chapel Hill is provided for UNCA students, faculty, and staff. For other patrons, the documents staff will provide reference service to identify bibliographic information, and refer them to their local public library for interlibrary loan from the regional depository.

To make needed documents available in the region, which includes the 10th and 11th Congressional Districts, member institutions of the WNCLN will cooperate in a systematic collection development program. To this end, the WNCLN will provide complete coverage of the "Core List for Small Academic Libraries" and other essential material. For little-used titles or supplementary information, Ramsey Library will use the resources of:

  • The Regional Depository
  • The Patent Depository at North Carolina State University
    Note: Patent and trademark searching is now available on the World Wide Web from the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, so referral to NCSU is less common than in the past.
  • The North Carolina State Data Center
  • The Census Bureau Regional Office in Charlotte, NC

II. Administration

As the overall administrator of the federal depository collection, the Public Services Librarian responsible for government publications supervises one full-time documents technical assistant and one half-time documents assistant. Responsibility for selection rests with the documents librarian and the Library Faculty Collection Development Committee. Suggestions from library staff, UNCA faculty, staff, and students, and the general public are encouraged. The WNCLN Documents Task Force meets regularly to consider network item selections or deletions.

UNCA selects item numbers that:

  1. Support the UNCA undergraduate curricula or the Asheville Graduate Center programs.

  2. Support faculty research at UNCA.

  3. Fill a realized or potential information need of the community.

  4. Are in a format which can be supported at UNCA, such as paper, microfiche, microfilm, A-V kits, posters, and CD ROM.

  5. Are of high quality or suitability, as measured by: scope, intended audience, time value, and reference use.

Criteria for special categories of documents:

1. Highly Specialized Titles

Ramsey Library will consider Selective Housing Agreements for titles that are selected and retained for use primarily by specialists, in order to make them available at their primary point-of-use. Such documents might include NASA astronomical research CD-ROMs, or data requiring special software or equipment, such as census microdata or GIS files. Selective Housing Agreement sites must maintain federal documents in accordance with Title 44, Chapter 19, of the United States Code and Instructions to Depository Libraries issued by the Government Printing Office, Library Programs Service. These sites may not discard any documents, but may return them to the UNCA documents department.

UNCA will not collect items for which little demand is anticipated, or for which adequate housing or expertise is not available. Examples of such materials include patents and military specifications.

2. Maps

UNCA will collect topographical, or other, maps necessary to meet the needs of the Environmental Studies Department and the general public. The primary map collection in the WNCLN is at Western Carolina University.

III. Determining Needs

Libraries in the WNCLN will build upon their strengths for the benefit of the network, while striving to meet local needs. Coverage of the Suggested Core Collection Annotated for Small to Medium Public (P) and Academic (A) Libraries and for All Law Libraries (L) will continue to be achieved in the region. Reports based on merged Item Lister data for the 3 depositories will be reviewed annually to avoid unnecessary duplication, to make efficient use of available space, and to optimize coverage of available depository items. Major changes in local needs or curricular needs will be reviewed at the network level. These reports currently include:

The following methods are used to determine informational needs of the library community:

1. Examination of the UNCA curriculum and requests from faculty, staff, and students.

2. Actual use of documents, as evidenced by reference questions, circulation, in-house use, and interlibrary loan requests.

3. Needs expressed by libraries in the region at networking meetings or discussion lists.

4. Data from the U. S. Census, the North Carolina State Data Center, and commercial sources is used to create a demographic profile of the 11th Congressional District.

5. Workshops, which help to identify present and potential users, as well as promote use of the collection.

Outreach activities include:

  • Notification to Departmental Library Representatives of significant new documents in their disciplines.
  • Listing in the Office of School Services Directory as willing to provide assistance or workshops to school librarians who wish to acquire federal documents.
  • Promotion of government information on the library home page. For example, we are using small rotating "banner ads" to publicize documents in the news, and have featured the Lexis-Nexis indexes, the American Memory Project, and other sites in a space reserved for currently "featured sites."

IV. Access

Access to federal documents held at Ramsey Library and Federal Depository Library Program (FDLP) Information on the Internet is free and open to all library patrons. For more information see the Library's Public Service Policy for Federal Government Information in Electronic Formats.

Access to federal documents at UNCA is ensured by:

1. Posting of the depository library logo at the library entrance.

2. On-going literature displays or special exhibits, with free copies of GPO consumer catalogs and brochures.

3. Open stack access to the depository collection during all hours of operation.

4. The availability of indexing tools, specifically

These tools identify documents, locally held or not, and LexisNexis provides full-text of many titles.

5. The arrangement of documents by SUDOC number in a separate documents collection, except for a few titles that are more useful in the Reference or General collections.

6. The shelving of several prominent current periodicals indexed in available commercial indexes in the current periodicals area.

7. The provision of reference service for federal documents by all reference desk personnel in addition to documents staff.

8. Circulation of all non-reference documents to any patron with library privileges, including Friends of the Library.

9. Informational Web pages with links to major government agencies, indexes, publications, and data resources. Government information is treated as a major subject area and prominently placed in the library Web for ease of navigation and use. The library Web is freely accessible to anyone and serves as a gateway to information for our user community.

10. Provision of Web-enabled PCs in public areas of the library which offer unrestricted access to http, PDF, telnet, ftp, and gopher links in government Web pages. Users may print or download Web pages or documents. Limits to printing or downloading are consistent with public service policies for other resources. At least one computer workstation is dedicated to documents reference use to ensure availability of federal government information even in times of peak library usage.

11. The ready availability of microfiche reader-printers and paper copiers near the documents collections.

12. Unrestricted interlibrary loan of any circulating document to any requesting library. Unrestricted loan of circulating documents within the WNCLN network on the ABC Express van service.

13. Interlibrary loan from the regional depository for UNCA students and faculty. Referral with all necessary bibliographic information to public libraries for non-UNCA patrons.

14. The availability of FAX transmission.

15. Announcement of major acquisitions or new services to the public through the UNCA Public Relations Office and to the University Community via Internet discussion lists.

V. Maintenance

The collection will be maintained in accordance with the guidelines set out in the Instructions to Depository Libraries. An accurate shelflist of all depository publications will be maintained to the piece level. All documents will be clearly marked with the depository property stamp and the SUDOC number.

Superseded documents will be withdrawn. Other documents may be reviewed for retention after five years. Those titles no longer needed will be offered to other libraries and/or discarded with the permission of the regional depository. Hearings, for example, are regularly reviewed; those of lasting value are retained indefinitely.

Worn documents will be evaluated for replacement or withdrawal. A deposit account will be maintained with the Government Printing Office to supplement the depository collection and to replace lost or damaged materials. Documents staff may selectively bind printed materials to preserve them. Rare or fragile materials may be transferred to the Special Collections unit for storage in a climate controlled environment and to ensure special handling.

Item selections will be reviewed annually, independently and in cooperation with the Western North Carolina Library Network. Any GPO surveys that are received will be made available to the library faculty for review.

Sources

Ramsey Library Patron Usage Policy for Computing and Networking
http://bullpup.lib.unca.edu/library/policy/polcompuse.html

UNCA Student Usage Policy for Computing and Networking
http://www.unca.edu/compcenter/computer_use.html

Guidelines for the Federal Depository Library Program (Federal Depository Library Manual, Supplement 2. February 1996)
http://www.access.gpo.gov/su_docs/fdlp/pubs/fdlm/guidelin.html

Depository Library Public Service Guidelines For Government Information in Electronic Formats
http://www.access.gpo.gov/su_docs/fdlp/mgt/pseguide.html

FDLP Internet Use Policy Guidelines [from Administrative Notes, January 15, 1999 (v.20, no. 2)]
http://www.access.gpo.gov/su_docs/fdlp/mgt/iupolicy.html

Public Access to Electronic Government Information Provided Through Federal Depository Libraries
http://www.access.gpo.gov/su_docs/fdlp/mgt/index.html#access

Recommended Specifications for Public Access Work Stations in Federal Depository Libraries.
http://www.access.gpo.gov/su_docs/fdlp/computers/rs.html

Suggested Core Collection Annotated for Small to Medium Public (P) and Academic Libraries (A) and for All Law Libraries (L)
ftp://fedbbs.access.gpo.gov/gpo_bbs/guidline/corelist.txt

Last updated 4 June 2003. Comments to sinclair@bulldog.unca.edu

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