The Record Preservation and Access Committee (RPAC) needs your help on House Bill 10. As you may know, HB10 seeks to limit access to vital records in order to protect each of us from identity theft. The way the bill is worded, it could also limit however, our access to this information for genealogical purposes. The RPAC is recommending that the wording in the bill be adjusted to: Insert the following language as a new subsection 890A(b)(2)(E) of the Homeland Security Act of 2002 (see Title 6, Section 606(a) of S.2774): "shall not require a State to change its law or practice with respect to public access to (i) non-certified copies of birth certificates or to (ii) birth certificates or birth records once a period of 100 years has elapsed from the date of creation of the certificate or record." The combined Senate and House committee is meeting to adjust the language of the bill and the committee members need to hear from the genealogical community. It is particularly helpful if you live in one of the states represented by the committee members. If not, contacting someone you know in that state to make their opinion known would be the next most helpful thing you could do. If you do not live in any of these states and do not know anyone whom you could contact, then you should probably not take an action at this time other than to write to your representatives. Collins (ME) Lieberman (CT) Lautenberg (NJ) Levin (MI) Lott (MS) DeWine (OH) Roberts (KS) Rockefeller (WVA) Durbin (IL) Graham (FL) Sununu (NH) Voinovich (OH) Coleman (MN) House: Hoekstra (MI) Dreier (CA) Hyde (IL) Hunter (CA) Sensenbrenner (WI) Harmon (CA) Skelton (MO) Menendez (NJ) You can get the address of the various representatives at: <http://www.house.gov/>http://www.house.gov/ and the senators at <http://www.senate.gov/>http://www.senate.gov/ Jan Davenport, President Arkansas Genealogical Society