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Duties and Responsibilities of State Agency Records Officers

Section 30-1-20 of the Code of Laws of South Carolina, 1976, as amended, designates the chief administrative officer of each agency as the official records custodian and authorizes that official to appoint a records officer to carry out the records management responsibilities of the agency. The agency records officer is responsible for coordinating the agency's program for the management of all records--both paper and electronic--and for serving as the agency's liaison with the Department of Archives and History's Archives and Records Management Division in the administration of that program. Under the program, records are inventoried, retention schedules are established, micrographics, optical disk and other applications are applied as necessary, inactive records are properly stored, and records are disposed of at the proper time in accordance with approved records retention schedules.

The agency information/records officer:

  1. Works with records management analysts from the Archives to develop specific retention schedules for all appropriate agency records, regardless of physical form or format (i.e., paper files, computer files, photographs, audio/video recordings, etc.). Records surveys and inventories are conducted and information on the organizational structure and function of the agency is supplied.
  2. Secures agency review and approval for specific records retention schedules. This review includes all legal as well as administrative requirements
  3. Implements general retention schedules and approved specific records retention schedules by:
    • transferring records to the State Records Center or to the Archives as scheduled, according to transfer procedures.
    • approving the disposal of records stored in the State Records Center when retention periods are met.
    • securing approval for the disposal of records designated for destruction after reformatting onto microfilm, optical disk, or any other medium created by a new technology.
  4. Notifies the Archives when new records series are created and when changes in recordkeeping--from manual to electronic, for example--will require new or revised schedules.
  5. Appoints individuals as needed to serve as records liaison officers with both agency and Archives staff.
  6. Confers regularly with Archives staff to solve records management problems.