I'm forwarding this compilation of comments from the GovDocs list about government information that once was online and then wasn't. Among the items mentioned are reservoir maps and NGA nautical charts.
Angie
AGS Library
UW Milwaukee
________________________________________
From: Discussion of Government Document Issues <[log in to unmask]> on behalf of Mary-Jane Walsh <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Wednesday, May 6, 2015 4:15 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: removal of government information
Folks,
As promised, here is a compilation of responses that I got to my question:
what's your "favorite" example of online government information being
removed. I received responses about both tangible and online, and included
both.
Several people mentioned the ERIC and NASA Technical reports “temporary”
removal, and the government shutdown in 2013.
Reservoir maps removed after being in public for years and on Google Maps,
etc. (after anthrax scare? I forget when)
The Census Bureau has dropped the 1990 census information from the American
FactFinder database. They have substituted static files, but this is not
the same as being able to search and manipulate the data as in the past.
This seem a huge step backward in the move to put data in online in usable
digital format.
The largest removal I know of was the shutdown of most of the Department
of the Interior by the DC District Court in response to a lawsuit by Native
American peoples of the Southwest. The documents were unavailable until the
websites containing information that was to be confidential were isolated
and the remainder of the websites were brought back up. (Cobell v. Salazar
(previously Cobell v. Kempthorne and Cobell v. Norton and Cobell v.
Babbitt) )
ALA published "Less Access to Less Information By and About the U.S.
Government” for nearly 20 years. We’ve had it digitized with the permission
of ALA and posted to FGI at http://freegovinfo.info/less_access (it’s also
in the top level navigation). Besides the access to digitized “Less
Access”, we’re also documenting ongoing efforts at restricting, altering,
removing, and privatizing government information.
AHIP Survey links in OCLC not linked:
E 1.111: M94/v.1--Joint DoD/DOE Munitions Technology Development Program
I 19.16: 99-248--Source-Area Characteristics of Large Public Surface Water
Supplies in the Conterminous US...(MJW framed her library's copy after
slicing it in half - very pretty and a good reminder!)
http://www.fdlp.gov/requirements-guidance/guidance/25-recall-and-return-of-depository-material
includes archive of recall notices
Just after George W. Bush took office in 2001 his administration had GPO
issue a recall of a volume of Foreign Relations of the United States that
had already been distributed and my recollection is that part of the
declassified information revealed activities from 30+ years earlier of
individuals serving in G.W. Bush's administration.
Couldn't quickly locate details but my recollection is that GPO recalled a
pamphlet around 15-17 years ago that had the information translated into
various languages and the Cajun version was embarrassing because they
hadn't verified it and it was more like Saturday Night Live's Cajun Man.
Whenever there is a change in the chief executive (President of U.S. or a
state governor) there is a high likelihood that material from the previous
administration disappears online (not just those from the office of the
chief executive but also from executive branch agencies). Even if it
doesn't totally disappear, it often gets hidden so well that it might as
well not exist.
My "favorite" example is the NGA nautical charts of the world that were
once entirely accessible online and that are now entirely not. Some charts
are, I think, also no longer available to the public at all--meaning it's
not just free online access that went away, but public access (i.e., they
can no longer be purchased).
In Bamford's the Puzzle Palace, he mentions government documents released
and on the shelves for a couple of years before the Reagan administration
had them removed and reclassified in the 1980s.
Recommended reading: McDermott, Patrice. Who Needs to Know: the state of
public access to government information. Lanham, MD: Bernan, 2007
And some of MJW's favorites: scientific studies on CDC & NIH websites that
were not in keeping with executive branch ideology (I believe it was
abortion) and a paper recall: "Cultural Landscape Report, Bremner Historic
District, Wrangell-St. Elias National Park and Preserve, Alaska and
Appendices". Anyone ever figure out the "why" on that one?
Thanks all
MJW
--
Mary Jane Walsh
Government Documents, Maps, Microforms
Colgate University Libraries
13 Oak Dr, Hamilton, NY 13346
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315-228-6194 (voice)
315-228-6227 (fax)
I do not keep my email open. If you need to contact me ASAP, please call me
at 315-228-6194
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