State Agency Databases Activity Report 10/30/2011
It has been a productive week at the State Agency Databases Across the Fifty States project at http://wikis.ala.org/godort/index.php/State_Agency_Databases. ORPHAN NEWS Our last official orphan remains Rhode Island. Will you be the one to take the last "unadopted orphan?" If you're interested in adopting Rhode Island, check out our volunteer guide at http://wikis.ala.org/godort/index.php/SADATFS_Volunteer_Guide and then send me an e-mail if you'd like to adopt it. If you adopt Rhode Island, be prepared to put your name and contact information on the main project page AND your state page within two weeks of receiving your wiki login. See the Volunteer guide for more details. SUBJECT PAGE ACTIVITY Health Practitioner Databases (Lynn McClelland) By adding resources for AZ, CO, CT, GA and MI, Lynn now has 18 states plus the District of Columbia represented on this page. OTHER WIKI ACTIVITY See our last 7 days of activity at http://tinyurl.com/statedbs for a blow by blow description of changes to the page. Here are a few highlights: DATABASES ADDED MICHIGAN (Michael McDonnell) Business Entity Search - A service that provides information on business corporations, limited liability companies, and limited partnerships authorized to transact business in the State of Michigan. you can search the database by name, keyword or ID number. NEW MEXICO (Adrienne Walker) Official Transparency and Accountability Portal - The Sunshine Portal is the official transparency and accountability portal for New Mexico state government. This is your window into government spending, budgets, revenues, employees, contracts and more. Continue reading
Library Census Maps 1,000 Federal Libraries
From an LC News Release: Profiles of U.S. federal libraries from around the world are now available online. Presented dynamically with an interactive mapping tool, the Federal Library Directory displays geographic and collections data from more than 1,000 libraries. This publicly available dataset identifies members of the federal library and information center community and offers current information on their locations, collections, services and specialties. Sponsored by the Federal Library and Information Center Committee (FLICC), with research assistance from the Federal Research Division (FRD), this virtual directory provides a comprehensive view of agency library efforts both in the United States and throughout the world. The compiled data includes details on collections, staff size, leadership, circulation and reference services. "This directory raises awareness of federal libraries and information resource centers and the resources these organizations maintain," said Blane Dessy, FLICC’s Executive Director. "We are offering this data set to the public so that scholars can use the tool to locate government resources more easily and library researchers can access current data on federal libraries." FRD analysts surveyed federal library programs and then supplemented the survey data received with research and outreach to compile additional data from a variety of federal library programs. "Our collaboration with FLICC on this directory was an opportunity to engage the entire federal library community," said David L. Osborne, chief of the FRD. "With an updated directory and geospatial mapping of the results, patrons and agencies can now optimize their access to resources and target their research to meet any number of mission objectives." Federal Library Directory Info Page Access the Directory The mapping software is only viewed using the Mozilla Firefox browser. Please be patient if this link loads slowly. Continue reading
AP Report: Feds tighten belt by cutting agriculture reports
Via INFOdocket.com From the AP: The U.S. Agriculture Department has kept tabs for decades on a wide range of agricultural industries that generate billions of dollars for the U.S. economy. But that's about to change, as the agency eliminates some reports and reduces the frequency of others to save millions of dollars in tight budget times. [Clip] A spokeswoman for the USDA division that produces the reports said it didn't want to cut them but it had to do something to save money. Eliminating or reducing the frequency of 14 crop and livestock reports will save the National Agricultural Statistics Service about $10 million, Sue duPont said. NASS's $156 million budget was cut in the federal fiscal year that ended Sept. 30 and more reductions are expected this year as Congress and the White House aim to trim federal spending. The agency based its choices on the reports' impact on markets and use by other programs that provide assistance to farmers, along with the availability of information from other sources, DuPont said. Direct to Full Text Article Continue reading
Roundup of New Resources and Other Government Info News (12 Items)
Greetings from DC. Here's a roundup with a bunch of recent postings from our INFOdocket site containing news and new resources of possible interest to the FGI community. This is a small sample of what we post each day. Most of the following items were shared in the past week or so. We are also available on Twitter. 1. New From U.S. Census: 2008-2010 ACS 3-Year Estimates 2. Article: “Patriot Act Turns 10, With No Signs of Retirement” + Patriot Act Infographic (Facts and Stats) 3. State Library of Tennessee Partners With Ancestry.com, Database Includes Millions of Images and Names 4. New Report: The State of World Population 2011 (World Population Tops 7 Billion, via UNPA) 5. New from U.S. Census: American Indians and Alaska Natives in the United States Wall Map 6. “A 5th Anniversary For the Forest Service National Library Celebrates 100 Years of History” 7. U.S. Census: USA Counties (New Stats) 8 New: Director of U.S. Copyright Office Announces Priorities, Special Projects for Next Two Years 9. Register of Copyrights Names Associate Register for Policy and International Affairs 10. Archivist of the United States on Digital Public Library of America Plenary 11. Legal Information: Cameras in Court Pilot Project Now Has 70 Videos Online 12. Campaign Finance: OpenSecrets.org Unveils New Interactive Features To Monitor 2012 Presidential Money Race 13. EPA: Office of Pesticide Programs Launches Online Searchable Database of Inert Ingredients Approved for Use in Pesticides 14. New From the C-SPAN Video Library: MP3 Audio Files Available for All Programs We hope you find these resources useful. We hope you stop by or follow. Direct to INFOdocket INFOdocket on Twitter cheers, gary price Continue reading
Existing Regional Depository Library Models
There have been questions lately about shared regional depositories. Below is a table from the GPO Time for Change? document. Yellow indicates shared regionals within one state, and orange indicates one regional serving multiple states or areas. The same table is available as a PDF in the link below.
- Regional Depository Libraries in the 21st Century: A Time for Change?, A REPORT TO THE JOINT COMMITTEE ON PRINTING, U.S. Government Printing Office (June 2008). "Existing Regional Depository Library Models," Table 1, pages 5-6