In my search for answers about the county and courthouses' charging and/or contracting out or not allowing persons to get xeroxes or even view the records, I had 2 wonderful messages from one of the county clerks. In these messages were many things that I felt the Indiana genealogical community would like to read. I have NOT asked this person's permission to quote from message, but everything I quote here is generalized stuff and I don't think they would mind. Because of lack of permission I am not giving name, county, etc. I am not putting this here as a means of saying this is way everything should be, but just so others have "several sides of the 'picture'" of our courthouse research and the resulting problems we may/may not encounter with these offices and the records. Many valid points and observations were made and pointed out here. [For those on the list that held these 2 answers of his, my apologies for repeating, but would like you to read my response at end at least/jm] I am also going to send parts of my most recent reply which points out some other things which go along with having records available to the public (something that occurred in our family) as well as just some "thrown your way" suggestions of things that could be done. I do not need a reply back to this message -- just thought it was interesting reading and you would like to see what was said, plus learning more of "both sides of the coin". -Quote Msg#1- I have the ability to look at this issue from both sides of the coin, and while I cannot speak for all of my colleagues, I know this issue has been discussed at length among public officials all over Indiana. As an avid genealogist I understand the importance of having access to public records of all types of research. As a public official I also understand the importance of preserving these records for future generations and for use by individuals as eager as myself to find that 'missing link'. While I have never denied access to anyone to inspect a public record allowable by law, I also would like to point out that public officials are not required to do genealogy, but are only required to provide access to records. For those of you who are actually denied access to records, provided that they are not sealed or confidential, I would also find that frustrating. Please, however, remember that there may be various reasons why these public officials act the way they do. I know of instances in my county where someone took advantage of the openness of our records to take the original records from the office for themselves. Also, as many of our records become older and more fragile, officials may be hesitant to allow access until microfilming or imaging may be performed. Ultimately this is of benefit to the researcher, but I agree it is not what the statutes require. Regarding passing these requests on to private contractors, please remember that the main responsibility of these offices is not necessarily to cater to you and I in a genealogy function. Clerks of Courts are responsible to keep a myriad of records for the courts, collect all court monies, administer elections, collect and disburse child support, etc. Our duties and workloads are always increasing, but our staffing is not. Utilizing private contractors may be the difference between getting the information within days or having it lay on someone's desk until they get time to take care of the request. ... There are bad apples in every line of work. But there are many more of us good ones. I can share as many horror stories of genealogists with attitudes as you can clerks with one. ... -UnQuote Msg #1- -UnQuote Msg #2- An old saying in Indiana government circles is that we are 92 different 'states' because of the way each county performs certain functions. Sometimes that can be good because not everything that works in Marion County (Indianapolis) would not apply here in XXXXX [I removed county name/jm] County. The other side is what you are experiencing with the various problems in obtaining access to records. A good example is the price for copies. State statute requires the clerk of the circuit court to charge $1.00 for a copy of a clerk record, and an additional $1.00 to place the document under seal (certify it). There is no statute, however, for the other courthouse offices. That is up to the individual county's commissioners who set the rates for such things. That is why you will find not only differences among counties but also within counties. My first six years in office I followed this law and charged the $1.00 per page. What I found was that local attorneys would sign out files (yes, actually take them out of my office) to take back to their law offices and copy what they wanted. Signing files out was an old practice in existance long before I was around and the judges were hesitant to allow me to stop it. What I finally did was lower my price to 25 cents a copy and not allow the files out of the office. Yes, I'm breaking state statute, but it was one of those situations that called for a local policy change. In contrast, my Recorder's office next door charges 50 cents a copy. And I'm really not sure what the Auditor's office charges. As I mentioned, I would also agree that not allowing access to public records is a violation of state law. Why certain offices choose this stance, I do not know. I must say I have never had that kind of problems in the counties I research, but that is not to say it doesn't happen. A recent investigation of various county offices by several Indiana newspapers discovered the same problem, but the offices with the most violations were those of the sheriff's departments. I agree that maybe our state legislature should look at the situation. But I don't want to see this backfire and make us like Tennessee where marriage records have to become so many years old before they become public record. Maybe a letter to the elected or appointed department head of the county office you are having trouble with would help. It is possible that that person is not aware of any problem. ... [This person mentioned that there is an annual state clerk's conference held -- I didn't even know this organization existed and it enlightened me -- at least with the clerks gathering to analyze problems we might also get help in resolving or standardizing the issues we may have here in the genealogical community/jm]. Also mentiooned was that there are representatives from the State Court Administration (a division of the Indiana Supreme Court), another interesting fact of which I hand not been aware even existed./jm] -UnQuote- -My last response sent back- You furnished to me here some info that I have been trying to find out and no one could tell me -- that is the state statue of $1 + $1 for seal as well as the one about being allowed to look at the records, etc. You have overall given me answers that (for some unknown reason) my many calls to the county offices were unable to obtain. Thank you so much. I too agree that I would NOT like to see the records kept for x number of years. But I too can see the reasoning behind this law (privacy of individuals, etc. as well as the preservation of the documents themselves). Again, a double street that we have to figure out what which way is more important, etc. I also know that access to death and birth recrods are used a lot in crimes (especially immigration ones) and this in itself has "hit home" in particular. My son was born in San Antonio, Texas and got his social security card there. Because of this record being open to the public, some illegals got his birthdate, his parents names and birthdates, address and other things. They then applied for another social security card and birth certificate, and obtained drivers licenses. In turn they sold these to other illegals in California and Texas and Florida. (somehow they made new documents that passed those 3 states' examinations) and then started working under that name and social security card, opened bank accounts, etc. We did not even know this was going on (and this might even still be occurring in other persons in the family without us knowing). He decided on a whim to check his social security card account and found out there was showing he had worked in places he had never even been. Then about a week later he started being hounded by creditors trying to say he had ran up $xxx debts and they were trying to collect on these California and Texas debts these illegals had run up. Now going on what has happened to my son, people could cry "seal the records" but what really should be done is NOT the sealing of the records but CHANGING the ways the records are maintained and handled. For instance -- if when a person dies a copy of this info could be forwarded to the social security office, statedrivers license bureau AND the place of birth (this can be done by an electronic media and a database that interfaces with one another) then when someone tries to get a copy of the birth certificate, drivers license, social security card, etc. it would FLAG a response to that department that this person has died. Now that would NOT help in the case of FBI federal protection programs, but then they have their methods anyway. It would NOT have helped in the case of my son since he had not died (but death is only one example I used here) but if the social security office had noticed that they were getting money for same dates of work in different locations then it would have alerted them that there is a problem and then notified the different employers and possibly immigration or the local authorities too so they could determine which is the correct person with this social security number. (again only an example of what could be done with the cross-referencing). (BTW -- many persons I have spoken with who work at social security say they KNOW this exists and that they have hundreds of these monthly show up -- but because of their supervisors' instructions (and desire to keep their jobs, not be trouble-makers, etc) these duplicates are just ignored). Another method of change would be to ALLOW the genealogists ACCESS to these records to be scanned and/or typed into databases and maybe even use of the microfilm camera setups themselves (so they could VOLUNTEER in typing up data, getting the scanned or microfilmed images of pages of these books, etc. in exchange for being allowed to type this info into computer and GETTING the necessary xerox copies/computer COPIES of things they typed up and/or hardcopy of the information they typed into the computer databases to have for their own research records. With this free help we could get these records ALL on microfilm and computerized into databases at minimal cost to the county (the payroll, soc. sec, insurance the county has to pay to have this done or contracted out would be zilch, and this would allow them the extra money to put into the computer, microfilm processing, etc. necessary for carrying out this work). Of course once this is in the computer AND VERIFIED by at least one other person, then the access to the actual books themselves would be minimal (saving the books and amount of clerks' time and number of clerks needed) since people could then use the databases, the microfilms, and the digitized images of these documents (and so on) from their home via inernet, or by purchase of cds (which purchase monies could help the county in making the cds, computer upkeep, etc). The counties have lots of free resources (the people who make up the genealogical community) which could be used on a volunteer basis. When you think about the HUGE number of persons who use the county's resources each day just for vital statistics and genealogical research, and all that wasted energy that helps only the genealogists and not the county itself, it really is a shame that some type of method could not obtained so it helps the county and genealogists both at minimal cost to the county. Sort of one hand shaking the other's hand to benefit both. Of course these are just ideas -- but if one analyzes the wpa movement and the work that these wpa workers did for the genealogical community and counties too (although not 100% accurate because the typing and indexing was not cross-checked by another individual, lack of good typewriters and frequent cleaning of the type) you can see that there ARE "do-able" methods and resources out there if we just tapped into them. I did like your method of changing the state statute to fit your needs and at the same time you were bringing in revenue for the county that would otherwise have been lost (from them using their own xerox machines) and also preserving those documents from coming up missing, destroyed, etc. Sounds like your method was the better one over the state statues' method. Congratulations for making such a wonderful decision for your county. Again, thanks so much for this info you provided to me -- it is truly refreshing to know that persons such as yourself exists in the county clerks' offices. Judy M. -end of my response- As mentioned before, no need to respond to this is necessary -- there were just some things brought up I thought you would enjoy reading. My courthouse problem/question has really given me some extremely wonderful insights into things I had never encountered or really thought about much. (the above is only one aspect I received back in the answers). Thanks to everyone who had previously replied to my question. Judy M.