This page contains the decisions reached about collection
recovery during discussions on disaster preparedness. At a glance,
it will inform the staff member, the fire department, or other authorities
which parts of the collections are to be protected or salvaged first, second,
and so on, if that decision ever has to be made. When such priorities
have been discussed and established ahead of time, it eases the stress
of disaster recovery by indicating which collections may be left until
last for salvage, which can be replaced, which are rare and valuable, which
may have value as scholarly works but not as artifacts, or which may be
required for the functioning of the institution. Priority decisions
may be based upon a number of considerations including the following:
monetary value as a collection or as
an individual rare item
irreplaceability
ability to replace in another acceptable
format such as microfilm
value in supporting the mission of
the institution
scholarly resource
breadth or depth of the collection
fragility of the medium, e.g., film
or magnetic tape
kind of disaster, length of time of
exposure to adverse conditions
value to the nation, state, region
ability to salvage the items
Examples of such a list might
be:
The card catalogue (see map in appendix)
The Reference Collection, call numbers: _________________________________
The Rare Book Collections on shelves marked with red dot on the __ floor
