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ARMA & environmental recommendations for paper



Dear Colleagues,

I just had a rather disturbing meeting with a representative of Iron
Mountain, the self-proclaimed "leader in records and information management"
about storing some of our archival records offsite with them.  When I asked
what their environmental storage conditions were, the representative said
that they had both air conditioned and non-air conditioned spaces available
for storage.  When I expressed my desire to have strict temperature and
humidity controls in place for any storage I might use, the representative
told me "Oh, heat doesn't really have any effect on paper."  When I argued
with her about this, she said that she was a member of ARMA and that other
reputable records managers affiliated with ARMA had told her this about heat
and its effects on paper.

For any of you who are members of ARMA, I'd love to hear from you as to
whether this is really something you're telling people, and, if so, what
you're basing your findings on.  It is widely known by anyone with any sort
of training in the preservation of paper materials that heat and humidity,
aside from water or fire, are the two worst things for paper in terms of
deterioration.  I'd be interested to hear any arguments from ARMA on why
they would encourage people in the records management business to claim
otherwise.  I realize that records managers often deal with temporary
records that will eventually be scheduled for destruction, and, in that
case, non-environmentally controlled storage might be ok.  But I beg to
differ with anyone who would claim that "heat is ok for archival records."

I welcome your thoughts.

Sammie Morris, CA
Archivist
Dallas Museum of Art
1717 North Harwood
Dallas, Texas 75201
(214) 922-1375

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