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The University maintains and enhances it Government Documents collection in support of the Libraries’ mission “as an essential partner in the University of Louisville’s mission to become a premier, nationally-recognized, metropolitan university, the Libraries meet the information literacy and research needs of a diverse population.” Although Kentucky does not have an official state depository collection, every attempt is made to acquire relevant state documents for our collection.
The Ekstrom Library, located in the 3rd Congressional District, was established as a Federal Depository Library in 1925. The library also supports scholarly endeavors and information needs in the local, regional, and national communities, and maintains several memberships in library organizations and consortia such as the Association of Research Libraries (ARL), the Association of Southeastern Research Libraries (ASERL), and the Federation of Kentucky Academic Libraries (FOKAL).
Responsibility for the Collection falls between the Reference and Technical Services Departments. The vast majority of the collection is cataloged in the Library of Congress classification system, with the print collection scheduled to be completely cataloged by the end of 2012.
The 3rd Congressional District boundaries follow the boundaries of Jefferson County, Kentucky with the exception of some portions of the 2nd District scattered throughout the southern and southwestern portion of the county. This district is a senate- 2 Ekstrom Library Government Documents Collection Development Policy Policy created: June 4, 2003 | Policy updated: July 10, 2012 // ac / cs designated district with a total population of 721,626. Specific demographic information about the district follows:
Total population = 721,626
According to 2010 Census counts, 378,138 (or 65.9%) persons over the age of 16 years were active in the 3rd District labor force, with 37% describing their occupation as "management, business, science and arts." 25% of persons in the 3rd District labor force were employed in the educational services and health care and social assistance industries. Jefferson County is home to employers such as Humana, General Electric, United Parcel Service (UPS), Ford Motor Company, and Brown Forman. More specific information about employment status, occupation, and industry in Kentucky's 3rd Congressional District follows:
The library has maintained a high selection rate since the University of Louisville achieved depository status in 1925, creating a large depository collection. The Ekstrom Library is a selective depository that currently receives 68% of materials published by the Government Printing Office (GPO). The selected item count is 4266 and the inactive item count is 1695. The collection consists of an estimated 300,000 documents. Approximately 40% of that collection consists of pre-1976 documents that are currently uncataloged. The collection's strengths include materials from the Census Bureau, the Commerce Department, the Justice Department, and the Interior Department.
Almost all government documents are part of the general circulating collection and are located in Stacks or the Robotic Retrieval System (RRS). In general, they follow the same circulation policies as other items in the main collection, including maps and CDROMs/DVDs. Depository materials, regardless of format, are available to all students, staff, and faculty of the University as well as the general public.
English is the primary language for US documents, although other languages are collected as offered.
The library strives to maintain a complete collection. Retrospective runs of materials before 1925 are obtained through exchange, gifts, or purchases. Examples of these purchases include the retrospective census volumes from Norman Ross Publishing and the US Supreme Court Decisions on microfilm.
All items are selected that relate to the Louisville metropolitan area and the Commonwealth of Kentucky. Special consideration is given to materials covering the Ohio Valley states and the United States as a whole.
Ephemeral materials, such as fliers, newsletters, pamphlets, and posters are not selected.
The Government Documents Department of the Ekstrom Library follows the weeding guidelines established in the Instructions to Depository Libraries. Weeding is an ongoing process performed by the Government Information Reference Librarian and the Government Publications Librarian.
Items that are not typically weeded from the Government Documents Collection include those that support the university curriculum, those that are of regional interest, annual reports, proceedings, serials, series, monographs, indexes, statistical sources, technical reports, histories, pre-1976 documents, rare documents, and documents that are not widely held by other libraries.
Titles are evaluated on an individual basis and are not withdrawn solely because they meet the criteria for withdrawal. Superseded items are typically weeded unless they meet the criteria for retention stated above. Other criteria for withdrawal include those items that do not support the university curriculum, items that are damaged beyond repair, catalogs, posters, directories, pamphlets, bookmarks, fliers, fact sheets, circulars, program or action plans, draft documents, outdated forms and applications and related instructions, grant information and guidelines, course manuals, users guides, law or regulatory related documents, electronic media (CD-ROM, diskettes, etc.), and print items with electronic equivalents (unless they meet the criteria for retention stated above).
All weeded materials are offered on the ASERL Disposition Database, which is reviewed by the regional depository library at the University of Kentucky, and then to other depository libraries in Kentucky, before being offered nationally on the "Needs and Offers" list.
Documents that are damaged are either placed in archival envelopes or sent to the Ekstrom Library's Binding Department for evaluation and repair. Documents that are lost, stolen, or damaged beyond repair are searched for on exchange lists or evaluated for purchase.
Although the University of Louisville is the main depository for the Louisville metropolitan area, item selections and weeding decisions are made in respect to the holdings of the other Louisville area depository, the Louisville Free Public Library (27% Selective), which is also in the 3rd Congressional District. Exchange lists are also sent to the regional library, other selective depositories within the state, ASERL libraries, and to the National Needs and Offers List. Other libraries' exchange lists are frequently checked for missing or needed items.
The University of Louisville offers many terminals with Internet access to view and print electronic documents. Community members are allowed guest accounts to view electronic resources. Electronic Only documents are also selected from the GPO and linked in the OPAC when appropriate.
Many popular maps series are collected. 1:24,000 topographic quadrangles are selected for much of the Eastern United States. Older editions of these maps are retained for Kentucky. The 1:100,000 and the 1:250,000 USGS topographic series are collected for the entire United States, along with all the USGS geologic series. Miscellaneous maps from the various agencies are also selected as available. Not selected are aeronautical charts, nautical charts, and Bureau of Land Management Surface and Mineral Status Maps. The depository collection is supplemented by a small commercial assortment of world and travel maps.
The following items are used to evaluate, select, and deselect items for the collection:
| Superintendent of Documents (SuDoc) Class Agency Levels | 0 = not collected; 4 = highest |
|---|---|
| Action (AA) | 2 |
| Agriculture and Forest Service (A) | 2 |
| Arms Control and Disarmament Agency (AC) | 44 |
| Boards and Commissions (Y3) | 4 |
| Civil Rights Commission (CR) | 4 |
| Commerce (C) | 4 |
| Congress (X, Y1, Y4) | 4 |
| Congressional Budget Office (Y10) | 4 |
| Defense (D) | 4 |
| Education (ED) | 4 |
| Energy (E) | 3 |
| EPA (EP) | 3 |
| Executive Office of the President (PrEx) | 4 |
| Farm Credit Administration (CFA) | 1 |
| Federal Communications Commission (CC) | 2 |
| Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEM) | 2 |
| Federal Housing Financing Board (FHF) | 2 |
| Federal Maritime Commission (FMC) | 1 |
| Federal Mediaiton and Conciliation Service (FM) | 1 |
| Federal Trade Commission (FT) | 2 |
| Federal Reserve System Board of Governors (FR) | 3 |
| Fine Arts Commission (FT) | 2 |
| Foreign-Trade Zones Board (FTZ) | 2 |
| General Accounting Office | 3 |
| General Services Administration (GS) | 2 |
| Government Printing Office (GP) | 4 |
| Health and Human Services (HE) | 4 |
| Housing and Urban Development (HH) | 4 |
| Interior (I) | 4 |
| International Trade Commission (ITC) | 2 |
| Judiciary (Ju) | 2 |
| Justice (J) | 4 |
| Labor (L) | 4 |
| Library of Congress (LC) | 3 |
| Merit Systems Protection Board (MS) | 2 |
| NASA (NAS) | 3 |
| National Archives and Records Administration (AE) | 3 |
| National Capital Planning Committee (NC) | 1 |
| National Credit Union Adminstration (NCU) | 1 |
| National Foundation on the Arts and the Humanities (NF) | 3 |
| National Labor Relations Board (LR) | 2 |
| National Mediation Board (NMB) | 2 |
| National Science Foundation (NS) | 4 |
| Overseas Private Investment Corp. (OP) | 1 |
| Peace Corps (PE) | 2 |
| Personnel Management Office (PM) | 2 |
| President (Pr) | 4 |
| Railroad Retirement Board (RR) | 1 |
| Securities and Exchange Commission (SE) | 4 |
| Small Business Administration (SBA) | 4 |
| Smithsonian Institution (SI) | 4 |
| Social Security Administration (SSA) | 4 |
| State Department (S) | 4 |
| Transportation Department (TD) | 4 |
| Treasury Department (T) | 4 |
| U. S. Information Agency | 3 |
| United States Postal Service (P) | 2 |
| Veterans Affairs (VA) | 2 |
The following SuDoc form levels often correspond to an item selection category, which allows for more precise selection decisions.
| Form Level | Superintendent of Documents (SuDoc) Class Agency Levels | 0 = not collected; 4 = highest |
|---|---|---|
| .1 | Annual reports | 4 |
| .2 | General publications | 4 |
| .3 | Bulletins [numbered series] | 4 |
| .4 | Circulars [numbered series] | 4 |
| .5 | Laws | 1 |
| .6 | Regulations, rules and instructions | 1 |
| .7 | Press releases | 1 |
| .8 | Handbooks, manuals, guides | 3 |
| .9 | Bibliographies and lists of publications | 2 |
| .10 | Directories | 1 |
| .11 | Maps and charts | 3 |
| .12 | Posters | 1 |
| .13 | Forms | 1 |
| .14 | Addresses, lectures, etc. | 1 |
Most time sensitive publications, such as directories and forms will rely on Internet access rather than paper copies.
Policy created: June 4, 2003 | Policy updated: July 10, 2012