Documenting, Managing and Preserving DOI Museum Property Housed in Non-Federal Repositories

The Department of the Interior (DOI) owns and manages over 204 million artifacts, scientific specimens, and documents in trust for the American public,as reported in the DOI Museum Property Management Summary Report Fiscal Year 2016. A collection surpassed in size only by that of the Smithsonian Institution. This diverse collection consists of archaeological materials, archives, art, biological specimens, ethnographic artifacts, geological specimens, historic artifacts, and paleontological specimens that are held by ten of DOI's bureaus and offices. The majority of DOI's collections are housed in bureau facilities; however, over ten percent (more than 25 million objects) are housed by at least 880 non-Federal repositories, the majority of which are museums associated with, or departments of, U.S. colleges and universities. Most are scientific collections from the disciplines of archaeology, biology, geology, and paleontology and include associated archival records. DOI museum collections, regardless of where they are housed, must be managed according to preservation, documentation, educational, and other requirements in the public interest. Federal laws and regulations require the following information be collected, used, and retained by all bureaus that hold ownership of museum collections: Facility Checklist for Spaces Housing DOI Museum Property; museum catalog records; accession records; and inventories of museum collections. These requirements apply to all DOI museum collections regardless of each collection's location (DOI facility or non-DOI facility) or the personnel that accomplished the work (DOI staff, contractors, partners, cooperators, agencies, institutions, or similar organizations associated with the Department). This ICR enables gathering of the required information from the non-Federal Repositories currently housing DOI museum collections.

The latest form for Documenting, Managing and Preserving DOI Museum Property Housed in Non-Federal Repositories expires 2021-06-30 and can be found here.

Catalog Records

Federal Enterprise Architecture: Education - Cultural and Historic Exhibition