Updated planning information for Tobacco Industry Litigation (TIL) Freeze records stored in the Federal Records Centers

August 14, 2016

To Our Valued Customer:

This memorandum provides updated planning information on the disposal of records formerly covered by the Tobacco Industry Litigation (TIL) Freeze and stored in Federal Records Centers. In a memorandum of February 5, 2015, the Federal Records Centers Program (FRCP) described the plan to first focus on larger-volume transfers to get the most impact based on existing resources and agency funding levels. Agencies were also encouraged to work directly with FRCP to create an agency-specific plan for their TIL disposal if that proved preferable. FRCP delivered disposal notices based on these plans and agencies are encouraged to carefully review and authorize destruction of the records as appropriate.

Plans for the disposal of all remaining TIL-eligible records are now complete in the absence of any agency-specific plan. For the next step in FY 2016, the FRCP will add to the April and July cycles a portion of the many low-volume fiscal transfers associated with TIL, as well as certain long-frozen transfers stored on pallets in the Midwest. The pattern will continue over the following two fiscal years with larger-volume transfers addressed in the first quarter of each fiscal year and smaller transfers processed in subsequent quarters.

At the time the TIL Freeze was lifted, 2.25 million cubic feet of records, in 190,000 transfers, were eligible for destruction. To date, 100,000 TIL-eligible transfers totaling 1.4 million cu. ft. are being reviewed and potentially destroyed through FY 2016 thanks to the plans developed with individual agencies and the initial TIL schedule, or other circumstances have intervened. This resolves 30 out of 54 agencies and 75 out of 111 record groups impacted by TIL disposal.

The final plan for FY 2016 adds about 10,000 transfers of 4 cu. ft. or less covered by the General Records Schedule to the schedule. Because these are low-volume transfers, the impact on agency storage budgets will be small. For the April 2016 disposal cycle, FRCP does plan to add more than 3,800 transfers and 80,000 cu. ft. of formerly frozen records stored on pallets at our Fairfield and Great Lakes facilities managed by the Dayton and Chicago FRCs, which were trans-shipped from other locations pending freeze lifts such as TIL.

To complete the TIL-lift project, FRCP will address 10,000 transfers of greater than 20 cu. ft. in the October cycle and a further 30,000 transfers of 4 cu. ft. or less over the remainder of FY 2017. The remaining transfers of fewer than 20 cu. ft. will be addressed in FY 2018 beginning with the largest volume transfers in October.

Throughout, FRCP remains available to work with our customers to develop agency-specific plans for the balance of their transfers eligible for disposal. Agency account managers can provide specific schedules and cost estimates resulting from the plan.

If you have any questions concerning this memorandum, please contact the FRCP National TIL Coordinator Russell Loiselle at (301) 837-3527 or Russell.Loiselle@nara.gov or your agency account manager. 

Sincerely,

DAVID M. WEINBERG
Director, Federal Records Centers Program