GPO Turns Tables, Calls on Librarians
Not to Restrict Access
In an ironic role reversal, the U.S. Government Printing Office has advised librarians at the State University of New York/Oswego that they have no authority to restrict access to Nuclear Regulatory Commission documents. GPO’s response followed a February 15 e-mail message, sent by the university’s documents librarian, Mary Bennett, urging fellow federal depository librarians to screen requests for NRC microfiche documents “to protect the security of our nation’s nuclear plants.”
According to the February 26 Chronicle of Higher Education, GPO’s Library Programs Service sent an e-mail message to Oswego, saying that “Ms. Bennett has no authority to make such a request. The U.S. Government Printing Office takes its responsibility to assure free public access to depository library collections very seriously. We do not condone this unofficial request to restrict public access, and we urge you to disregard it.”
Oswego is “imposing a screening process that at this point is not being required,” GPO’s Superintendent of Documents Francis Buckley told the Chronicle. Librarians who challenged GPO’s post–September 11 decision to order libraries to destroy copies of a CD-ROM about water supplies were pleased and supportive of the agency’s reprimand.
The university may have more difficulty, however, offering full access to sensitive data because in January, New York’s director of public security, James K. Kallstrom, in a confidential policy memorandum to state agency heads, laid out a plan to restrict information and tighten security. According to the February 26 New York Times, Kallstrom said the policy is aimed at preventing details about potential targets, such as bridges and nuclear power plants, from falling into the hands of terrorist groups.
Posted March 4, 2002.
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