Background
The government offices of Anne Arundel County, Maryland are located in the state capital of Annapolis. With print archives dating back nearly 100 years, Anne Arundel County’s offices include storage rooms filled with more than 300 boxes containing nearly 1 million pages of County Council Legislative documents including bills, resolutions, supporting documentation and zoning maps – essentially, all of the records dealing with the regular operations of a county government.
Challenge
Reliance on print records placed the County at a disadvantage. For example, the archives primarily consisted of hard-copy documents, which put decades of County Legislative records at risk in the event of a disaster. Locating essential documentation, such as specific Bills and Resolutions, for County Council members and constituents was time consuming. To find documents, staff manually searched numerous print indexes and bound volumes of legislative records – a process that could take up to several hours.
Solution
Aging archives presented another major concern. Many documents, such as meeting minutes dating back to the 1920s, were very fragile and required handling with the utmost care.
Anne Arundel County needed to preserve decades of information to ensure the availability of its content for years to come. The County turned to Quality Associates Inc. (QAI), a systems integrator with extensive experience in developing customized electronic document management (IIM) systems for numerous counties and government agencies. QAI worked closely with Anne Arundel County staff to understand the County’s requirement and goals.