Press Release
August 16, 2012
August 29
Washington, DC…The National Archives National
Declassification Center (NDC ) will host its
third public forum on Wednesday, August 29, at 10 a.m. in the William G. McGowan
Theater of the National Archives Building in Washington, DC. This
event is free and open to the public. Please enter via the Special Events
entrance on Constitution Ave. 7th St., NW
The forum’s theme is “NDC
challenges at two years: what did we learn, and how are we moving forward?” NDC
Director Sheryl Shenberger will update the public on declassification progress
toward meeting the President’s goal of eliminating the backlog of unprocessed
classified records by December 31,
2013 . She will also discuss the fifth Bi-annual Report on
Operations of the National Declassification Center [www.archives.gov/declassification/reports].
Two inter-agency panels will address NDC ’s
progress over the past two years. National Archives staff will update the
public on standardized declassification training and changes to
declassification policy. The forum will conclude with a question and answer
session with members of the public.
For additional information or to submit questions in advance
question, contact Don McIlwain[don.mcilwain@nara.gov]
or (301) 837-0587.
The National Declassification
Center College Park December
30, 2009 . The NDC ’s mission is
to align people, processes, and technologies to advance the declassification
and public release of historically valuable permanent records while maintaining
national security. For more information see the National Declassification
Center’s website [www.archives.gov/declassification].
The National Archives and Records Administration is an
independent Federal agency that preserves and shares with the public records
that trace the story of our nation, government, and the American people. From
the Declaration of Independence to accounts of ordinary Americans, the holdings
of the National Archives directly touch the lives of millions of people. The
National Archives carries out its mission through a nationwide network of
archives, records centers, and Presidential Libraries, and online at www.archives.gov.
For press contact the National Archives Public Affairs staff
at 202-357-5300.
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More Information
RIDAY, AUGUST 17,
2012
Washington, DC…The National Archives National
Declassification Center (NDC ) will host its
third public forum on Wednesday, August 29, at 10 a.m. in the William G. McGowan
Theater of the National Archives Building in Washington,
DC. This event is free and open to the public. Please
enter via the Special Events entrance on Constitution
Ave. 7th St., NW
The forum’s theme is “NDC
challenges at two years: what did we learn, and how are we moving
forward?” NDC Director Sheryl
Shenberger will update the public on declassification progress toward meeting
the President’s goal of eliminating the backlog of unprocessed classified
records by December 31, 2013 . She
will also discuss the fifth Bi-annual
Report on Operations of the National Declassification Center. The report is
online at www.archives.gov/declassification/reports.
Two inter-agency panels will address NDC ’s
progress over the past two years, focusing on inter-agency quality assurance
and streamlining declassification processes. National Archives staff
will update the public on standardized declassification training and changes to
declassification policy. The forum will conclude with a question and answer
session with members of the public.
For additional information or to submit questions in advance
question, contact Don McIlwain at don.mcilwain@nara.gov or (301)
837-0587
Bi-annual Report on Operations of the National
Declassification Center
Reporting period: January
1, 2011 – June 30, 2011
This is the third report on the status of the National
Declassification Center (NDC ). NDC
status reports are issued bi-annually, approximately two weeks after the
reporting deadlines of June 30 and December 31.
Executive Summary:
In 18 months, the NDC has
shown measurable progress. The center also faces certain challenges. The
initial collaborative effort between government agency programs begun in late
2009 to draft a new declassification review and release process has developed
into a stable and streamlined methodology. The segregation of less-sensitive
and newly declassified records from the most sensitive ("Releasing What We
Can") as well as the completion of equity review for the more sensitive
national security information ("Protecting What We Must") is allowing
us to provide records to the public more quickly than with past practices.
Because of our new processes, inter-agency cooperation, and data gathering
analysis, we have evaluated 30% of the back log, and facilitated prioritized
review and release for two special collections. Our challenge for the remaining
70% involves confirming past original agency review for Restricted
Data/Formerly Restricted Data (RD/FRD )
and/or arranging the review resources that will be necessary for the
identification of RD/FRD in records that
have been assessed and identified as needing this legally required review.
Nearly half of the remaining records within the back log have been confirmed as
still needing this review, and that number may grow as we continue our
assessment of data continuing to be supplied by the affected agencies. We are
working with our agency partners, including the Department of Energy to address
the page-level review required for these documents. Inter-agency support for
the NDC remains strong, and we remain
confident that we will successfully resolve this issue and meet the 2013
deadline in the Presidential Memorandum.
The NDC was established
by Executive Order 13526, "Classified National Security Information,"
under the direction of the Archivist of the United
States December
29, 2009 Presidential Memorandum accompanying E.O. 13526 specified
a December 31, 2013
deadline for making available to the public the declassified records within the
approximately 400 million pages currently back logged (that is, currently
accessioned but not yet fully processed for release to the public) at the
National Archives and Records Administration (NARA )
and under NDC purview.
In The Strategic Plan of the National Archives and Records
Administration, 2006 – 2016 (revised 2009), the Archivist singled out this
inter-agency center as reflecting "the ongoing challenge to balance the
needs of national security and the right of citizens to have access to the
records of their Government."
Each NDC Status Report
will contain the following three sections: a narrative highlighting events and
activities of the previous six months; a brief description of the interagency
cooperation during the previous six months; and a quantitative update that
charts cumulative progress on the back log and against the current year"s NDC
Civilian and Defense Annual Work Plans, since the January 1, 2010 stand up.
These plans are Appendix B and C to the overall Prioritization Plan and may be
may be viewed at http://www.archives.gov/declassification/final-prioritization-plan.pdf.
Openness and Public Comment:
We continue to invite public comments and suggestions by way
of the NDC Blog and email
boxndc@nara.gov. Updated information
regarding new releases and other NDC initiatives may also be found on the NDC
website: http://archives.gov/declassification/.
During the reporting period, we blogged about our processes, special efforts,
and certain records we have released.
In February, we held a small meeting at Archives II with
several public interest group representatives to discuss our progress and
the previous
NDC report.
Process Improvement:
Our new Metrics Team, created last autumn, continued its
work to provide end-to-end tracking for all NDC
operations, and our current numbers reflect their clean up and continuing
analysis of our data. The work of this team is allowing us to pinpoint
potential chokepoints in our processes, report more accurate production
statistics, and work toward streamlining all of our data capture efforts.
Working with other NARA
We implemented a new process for interagency declassification
review and processing of special media and electronic records, including
coordinating and facilitating special media original reviews due December 31, 2011 .
With the support of most major agencies, we implemented
several new work processes, including digitization, for requests under the
Freedom of Information Act and the Mandatory Declassification Review provisions
of E.O. 13526 for classified Federal records to provide for more timely
responses to public requests. In a comparison of similar active second
quarters, in Fiscal Year 2010 we closed 53 cases; in Fiscal Year 2011 we closed
77 cases. We expect our case handling efficiency to continue to improve as the
new processes are fully implemented and adopted by staff.
Review:
We coordinated and completed the declassification and
release of material associated with the Pentagon Papers (40th anniversary)
on June 13, 2011 . This
release marks the first authorized availability of the complete report to the Vietnam
In conjunction with the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA ),
in April, we released the oldest classified documents in the Federal government
held at the National Archives. On the use of secret writing, these are
available for public use at the National Archives as well as online at http://www.foia.cia.gov/.
We continued our declassification review and processing of
information relating to the Berlin Wall construction (50th anniversary).
We are planning a seminar, including a panel discussion, related to the opening
of the records, for October 27, 2011
at the National Archives building in Washington ,
DC
Agencies are continuing to do page-by-page equity review for
their referrals in the NDC Interagency Referral
Center June 30,
2011 ), 779,451 referred pages were completed for equity review. Of
those pages, 321,597 were declassified and 457,854 pages were exempted.
The NDC Joint Referral
Center (JRC ), which coordinates and
facilitates the review and referral of the Department of Defense (DOD) subset
to the back log, is conducting a 100% quality assurance review of untabbed
(non-exempted or referred) DOD records and a final review of DOD referrals to DOD
components. The Armed Services, Office of the Secretary of Defense (OSD), Joint
Chiefs of Staff (JCS), Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA ),
National Security Agency (NSA), Missile Defense Agency (MDA ),
and National Reconnaissance Office (NRO) are participating. In June, Department
of State representatives also began equity review there. During the six-month
reporting period, the JRC completed
1,590,311 pages, declassifying 1,555,300 pages. This is triple the amount of
pages completed from the previous reporting period. Since January 1, 2010 , the JRC
has completed 2,224,631 pages, declassifying 2,107,196 pages. These results are
reflected in the NDC Status of the
Workload and Production numbers after the records have been returned to NARA
Through the NDC , the
Presidential Libraries prioritized 1,364,471 pages within certain collections
of the Truman through Carter Administrations, as well as the China-associated
materials within the Kissinger Personal Paper Collection, for completion of
referral review through the Remote Archives Capture (RAC )
project. As of June 30, 2011 ,
equity-holding agencies had completed review on 736,465 of those pages. RAC -reviewed
pages are not reported as part of the Federal accessioned-records back log in
the Status of the Workload and Production portion below.
New issues and business processes under development:
To provide declassified historical documents to our
customers in a timelier manner, we recognized the need to track all records
from accessioning to their final availability in order to facilitate referral
review for declassification and release. We continued our work, begun in
September 2010, with a contractor to develop the requirements for an IT system
that would be responsive to agency needs, including improved NDC
processes, improved data collection, and integration.
We stood up an Information Technology Working Group, headed
by officers from the MDA and the US Air
Force (USAF) Declassification Programs, to encourage inter-agency examination
of uses of newer technology, such as context accumulation techniques, the
computer generation of standardized metadata, and enhanced information
retrieval tools. Although much of this technology will not directly impact our
back log processing, it will have applications as we move further into
electronic records and digitization.
We are hosting a Declassification Conference, November 7-10,
for executive branch declassification professionals. The objectives of the
conference are to enhance our community's protection of national security
information, promote cohesion and common methodology among declassification
professionals and foster greater understanding of our individual and collective
responsibility to protect national classified information during the records
management lifecycle through purposeful and deliberate declassification
guidance.
Interagency Cooperation:
During the six-month reporting period, agency personnel from
Army, USAF, OSD, NSA, CIA , DIA ,
and Department of Energy (DOE) participated in daily Evaluation Team
activities, frequently providing staffing for up to three inter-agency teams
per day/four days each week. In addition, the following agencies supported
Quality Assurance Team and special targeted review activities: Army, Department
of State, NSA, DIA , USAF, JCS, CIA ,
and DOE. DOE continued the expansion of its workforce commitment in order to
assess all records in the back log. CIA
expanded its capability to assess certain specific record series and to assist
in Kyl-Lott reviews of those series.
Many of our records cannot be processed because they lack
the required Kyl-Lott review for RD/FRD .
Several agencies, such as the Department of State, are addressing these
required page-level reviews within their records with the assistance of NARA FRD ,
and they cannot move through the remainder of our process without the required
page-level review.
Quarterly NDC Advisory
Panel meetings were held with office-level heads from the Intelligence,
Defense, Law Enforcement, and Diplomatic Communities in order to keep them
apprised of progress and issues. During this six-month reporting period, we
also met with office directors and declassification managers for Army,
Commerce, CIA , DOE, Federal Bureau of
Investigation (FBI), USAF, National Geo-Spatial Intelligence Agency (NGA),
Navy, NSA, Department of State, MDA , Office
of the Under Secretary of Defense for Intelligence (OUSD(I)), OSD, and the US
Trade Representative (USTR ). Every three
months, an on-site agency meeting was held to discuss working level concerns
and suggestions for process improvements.
We briefed the Department of State Advisory Committee on
Historic Diplomatic Documentation (HAC) on NDC
progress in March.
Status of Workload and Production:
Because of the increased maturity of our metrics program, we
are better able to report our accomplishments. This expanded capability has of
necessity affected all our numbers, from the initial back log reported to the
status of the various stages of processing. With that in mind, we are reporting
production using a reporting period of January
1, 2010 (establishment of the NDC
by E.O.) to June 30, 2011 .
These production numbers reflect the number of back log pages evaluated in the NDC
for referral quality review. A subset of these pages has been declassified and
is available for public use. The remaining pages that have completed NDC
referral quality evaluation are in the NDC
final indexing queue, have been excluded for Department of Energy
sensitivities, or have been exempted from automatic declassification by an
agency.
Included in the pages released to the public during the
January – June 2011 reporting period are documents from record group (RG) 43,
International Conferences, Commissions, and Expositions; RG 65, FBI; RG 84,
Foreign Service Posts of the Department of State; documents from a number of
military services-related record groups; RG 306, U.S. Information Agency; and
RG 472, U.S. Forces in SE Asia. Additional information on these and other
releases is provided on our website.
Total back log pages as of NDC
stand up on January 1, 2010 :
386.2 million pages (vice 417.9 million pages reported in the last report).
This new number is based on our developed metrics capability to analyze and
de-conflict the available data and research the type of containers and records
affected.
Total pages evaluated in the NDC
referral quality review process (January
1, 2010 – June 30, 2011 ):
117,404,134 pages.
Total pages that have completed all processing: 18,038,692
pages. Total pages released to the public (also includes 603,126 pages released
in the Interagency Referral Center; January 1, 2010 – June 30, 2011):
16,594,585 pages.
Total back log pages requiring referral quality review
processing as of June 30, 2011 :
268,795,866 pages.
The National Declassification
Center NDC )
The NDC released its
latest Bi-annual Report:
Bi-annual Report on Operations of the National
Declassification Center January 1, 2012 – June 30, 2012 ) [PDF
Format ]
The NDC has released a
listing of 237
separate entries
that have
completed declassification processing between May 23 and July 5, 2012 and are now available for researcher
request. This release consists primarily of military records.
that have
completed declassification processing between May 23 and
Highlights include:
Navy records relating to the underwater search for a missing
thermonuclear bomb near Palomares Spain
Department of State Post Files from Australia France
Office of the Secretary of Defense records relating to
research into medical aspects of atomic warfare,
Office of the Secretary of Defense records relating to the
Cuban Missile crisis,
Office of the Secretary of Defense, Advance Research
Projects Agency records relating to “Project VELA”,
Army Assistant Chief of Staff records relating to civil
disturbances in the 1960s,
Army Command Files for the 4th and 3rd Army, and
Air Force records from Wright-Patterson, Langley, Patrick,
and Andrews Air Force Bases.
Requests to access the newly released records or to order
copies should be directed to Archives 2 Reference at 301-837-3510 orarchives2reference@nara.gov.
(When making a request, please cite the HMS Entry and Series
Title.)
Participate in the NDC
Prioritization Plans:
Comment on the Plan: ndc@nara.gov
The National Declassification Center (NDC )
was created when President Obama signed the new Executive Order released
by the White House on December 29,
2009 .
-
timely and appropriate processing of referrals between
agencies for accessioned Federal records and transferred Presidential Records;
-
-general interagency declassification activities
necessary to fulfill the requirements of sections 3.3 and 3.4 of this order;
-
the exchange among agencies of detailed
declassification guidance to support equity recognition; the development of
effective, transparent, and standard declassification work processes, training,
and quality assurance measures;
-
the development of solutions to declassification
challenges posed by electronic records, special media, and emerging
technologies;
-
the linkage and effective utilization of existing
agency databases and the use of new technologies to support declassification
activities under the purview of the Center PDF files require the free
Adobe Reader.
Frequently Asked Questions about the National
Declassification Center NDC )
The
To align people, processes, and technologies to advance the declassification and public release of historically valuable permanent records while maintaining national security.
Vision:
To be the world's preeminent declassification organization, responsive to all customers, committed to the free flow of information and the requirements of national security.
Everyone will benefit:
The research community and the public at large will benefit
because the National Archives will be able to make millions of records available
more quickly. Therefore citizens will have greater access to their nation's
history.
The agencies that create or have information included in
classified permanently valuable records will benefit from a more streamlined,
efficient declassification process.
Agencies with equity in records created by other agencies
will benefit as improved processes, and better training will facilitate better
equity recognition.
The authority for the
As outlined in section 3.7 of the new order, the
- streamline declassification processes
- prioritize the declassification of sought after records
- facilitate referral processes and quality assurance
measures
implement standard declassification training for records
determined to have permanent historical value
Section 3.7 provides seven specific areas of focus for the NDC :
- timely and appropriate processing of referrals in
accordance with section 3.3(d)(3) of this order for accessioned Federal records
and transferred Presidential Records.
- general interagency declassification activities necessary
to fulfill the requirements of sections 3.3 and 3.4 of this order;
- the exchange among agencies of detailed declassification
guidance to support equity recognition;
- the development of effective, transparent, and standard
declassification work processes, training, and quality assurance measures;
- the development of solutions to declassification
challenges posed by electronic records, special media, and emerging
technologies;
- the linkage and effective utilization of existing agency
databases and the use of new technologies to support declassification
activities under the purview of the Center; and
storage and related services, on a reimbursable basis, for
Federal records containing - ----- classified national security information.
The Executive Order instructs the Archivist of the United States to appoint a Center Director in consultation with Secretaries of State, Defense, Energy and Homeland Security, the Attorney General, and the Director of National Intelligence.
National Archives employees will staff the NDC
and provide support for agency reviewers.
Agency heads will assign personnel to the Center review and
exempt or declassify information originated by their agency.
The NDC Director will be
advised by an inter-agency Policy Planning Group (PPG )
and assisted by an inter-agency Program Management Team (PMT).
All Executive branch agencies who create or are responsible for classified information found in permanently valuable Federal or Presidential records will participate, unless they delegate that authority in writing to another agency.
Initially, the
The current declassification review and release processes have caused a massive and growing backlog of reviewed classified records.
There are currently approximately 409 million pages of
reviewed Federal records at the National Archives that require referral and archival
processing prior to release to the public. Additionally, there almost three
million pages of highly sought after scanned images of Presidential records
awaiting processing as part of the Remote Archives Capture project.
In addition to the backlog, there remains concern about the
quality of some (mostly earlier) reviews. These issues center on missed equity
due to lack of standardized training. These errors led to the passage of the
Kyl-Lott Amendments, which require additional review for nuclear weapons design
and related information.
The NDC will also address
the pressing issue of how to streamline the declassification of electronic
records.
Realizing the opportunity to fundamentally change how records are declassified, the National Archives has begun taking steps to meet the challenge. The National Archives established:
- a high level inter-agency steering group that will oversee
the establishment of the NDC and later serve
as a policy planning group for the Center. This group is chaired by Assistant
Archivist for Records Services, Washington, Michael Kurtz, who will also serve
as the Acting Director of the NDC pending
the selection of a permanent director.
-
a Program Management Team, responsible for working
level coordination, data collection, and
-
collaboration with the Defense Change Management
Organization, which is conducting a study of current declassification processes.
The work currently underway may lead to follow-on studies such as improved information technology integration, strategies and implementation of techniques to meet the challenge of "born digital" records, and related changes to processing FOIA and Mandatory declassification review requests. Read a Report on Declassification Challenges
You can visit the NDC web site (www.archives.gov/declassification/) to obtain updates and results. The web site will also post information about upcoming open forums and other opportunities to learn more as they become available. Finally, you can send a comment, question or concern to NDC@nara.gov
The National Declassification
Center NDC )
The NDC released its
latest Bi-annual Report:
Bi-annual Report on Operations of the National
Declassification Center January 1, 2012 – June 30, 2012 ) [PDF
Format ]
The NDC has released a
listing of 237
separate entries that have
completed declassification processing between May 23 and July 5, 2012 and are now available for researcher
request. This release consists primarily of military records.
that have
completed declassification processing between May 23 and
Highlights include:
Navy records relating to the underwater search for a missing
thermonuclear bomb near Palomares Spain
Department of State Post Files from Australia France
Office of the Secretary of Defense records relating to
research into medical aspects of atomic warfare,
Office of the Secretary of Defense records relating to the
Cuban Missile crisis,
Office of the Secretary of Defense, Advance Research
Projects Agency records relating to “Project VELA”,
Army Assistant Chief of Staff records relating to civil
disturbances in the 1960s,
Army Command Files for the 4th and 3rd Army, and
Air Force records from Wright-Patterson, Langley, Patrick,
and Andrews Air Force Bases.
Requests to access the newly released records or to order
copies should be directed to Archives 2 Reference at 301-837-3510 orarchives2reference@nara.gov.
(When making a request, please cite the HMS Entry and Series
Title.)
General Information about Restricted Records
Federal records may be restricted by statute, Executive
Order, or by the agency that transferred the records to NARA
The public may request access to all closed records under
the Freedom of Information Act, in addition, access to classified records may
be requested under the Mandatory Declassification Review (MDR )
provisions of Executive Order 13526. If your initial access request for
archival records is denied, you will be notified of your right to appeal the
decision. Please note that EO 13526 provides for alternate appeal methods for
Mandatory Review requests if you have not received a response in one year, more
information is available on the website for the Information Security Oversight Office.
The National Declassification
Center NDC )
Prioritization Plan
The NDC Prioritization
Plan will serve as a roadmap for the NDC to
declassify and process for release federal records and presidential materials.
Comment on the Plan
E-mail Us: ndc@nara.gov
Comment on the Plan Post Comments on the NDC
Blog: http://blogs.archives.gov/ndc E-mail
Us:ndc@nara.gov
Contact Us
National Declassification Center (NDC )
National Archives and Records Administration, Room 3400
8601 Adelphi Road
College Park, MD 20740-6001
E-mail:ndc@nara.gov
Phone: 301-837-3110
Fax: 301-837-3633
National Archives and Records Administration, Room 3400
8601 Adelphi Road
College Park, MD 20740-6001
E-mail:ndc@nara.gov
Phone: 301-837-3110
Fax: 301-837-3633
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