Who

To members of the archival community and archives supporters.

What

The following call to action is in response to the elimination of the National Archival Development Program by Library and Archives Canada (LAC) on April 30, 2012, and the resulting impact on Canada’s 13 provincial and territorial archives councils, and the Canadian Council of Archives.

Background

On April 30, 2012, LAC eliminated the National Archival Development Program (NADP), a 1.7 million contribution program administered by the non-for-profit Canadian Council of Archives (CCA) for LAC and distributed to Canada’s 13 archives councils to support archival activities locally. Through the councils, NADP funding is on the ground in our 10 provinces and 3 territories, ensuring that Canada’s history is preserved in local communities. Canada’s archival councils provide user-centred services, providing support to archives and archivists so that they may better serve all Canadians.

A one-of-a-kind program, NADP’s goal is to assist in the preservation and accessibility of Canada’s archival heritage through the following objectives:

• Increase access to Canada’s archival heritage through the national catalogue of archival descriptions ARCHIVESCANADA.ca
  
• Increase awareness and broaden use of Canada’s archival heritage
  
• Increase representation of Aboriginal peoples and under-represented ethno-cultural groups in Canada’s archival heritage
  
• Increase the capacity of archival networks to undertake strategic and development activities; and;
  
• Increase the capacity of archival institutions to preserve Canada’s heritage
  

NADP funds the following activities across Canada:

• Development of the national on-line catalogue of archival descriptions, and its provincial and territorial counterparts, so all archives, including the very small, can reach Canadians
  
• Provision of archival and preservation advice to archives
  
• Job exposure for new graduates from Canada’s archival and information studies programs
  
• Access to archival holdings information on-line
  
• Outreach and educational activities in communities to help small institutions manage their treasures
  
• Cataloguing of archival materials to make them accessible to the public
  
• Training opportunities for local archives run by volunteers or one-person operations
  
• Site assessments to both urban and rural archives, to safeguard Canada’s documentary heritage
  
• Preservation of at-risk documents and other archival materials, including electronic records
  

Impact

NADP was a joint federal/provincial/territorial initiative; NADP, and its predecessor financial assistance program, was a critical source of funding to the community – CCA has operated for 26 years; elimination of NADP means that 11 of the 13 provincial and territorial councils will collapse within 30 days to 6 months, without any financial support. A number of councils have suspended their operations. The CCA's physical office in Ottawa will close its doors to the public effective May 4, as the organization moves to a virtual office and staffing has been immediately be reduced from 8 FTE to 4 FTE, and will soon be further reduced to a maximum of 2.5 FTE. Further adjustments may be necessary – but at this time minimum administration services will be maintained for the small program Young Canada Works in Heritage Institutions, ARCHIVESCANADA.ca, Arcan-l and other secretariat services.

What You Can Do

1. If your MP is a Cabinet Minister, call the local office and offer a briefing as well as the letter.
   
2. Write the Minister of Canadian Heritage, the Honourable James Moore, and your MP asking them to stop the NADP cut.
   

Members of Parliament
http://www.parl.gc.ca/MembersOfParliament/MainMPsCompleteList.aspx
Use the following key messages:

• Canada's documentary heritage is preserved it its over 800 archival institutions
  
• NADP supports archives to preserve Canada's documentary heritage for Canadians
  
• NADP leverages financial and partnership opportunities for archives across the country
  
• CCA serves the Canadian public. CCA's work ensures the preservation of Canada's heritage for the benefit of all Canadians-now and for the future. Through initiatives such as www.ARCHIVESCANADA.ca , CCA is the window through which the world may access Canadian archival information
  
• Archives support Canada's economy. Sustaining Canada's knowledge-based economy means sustaining and facilitating access to our knowledge resources. Archives are fundamental to the success of countless public, private, and educational enterprises.
  
• Archives preserve Canada's past. Millions of historical documents, photographs, maps and audio-visual materials are held in archives across the country
  
• LAC's stakeholder forum meetings cannot and will not take the place of an archival network of dedicated professionals and volunteers across Canada that took 26 years to build. The damage done by elimination of NADP will take years to re-build.
  

Tell your own story about the value of the NADP and CCA's services; use the following examples:

• books and other outputs that have utilized holdings made accessible by NADP
  
• non-traditional users whose access has been facilitated by NADP
  
• achievements realized through expertise made available to you through archives advisors, preservation services, training opportunities.
  
• how has www.ARCHIVESCANADA.ca and provincial/territorial networks helped users find you
  
• what holdings have been preserved through NADP and in what ways has that had public acknowledgement
  
• what activities by other groups have been assisted through the results of NADP funded projects
  
• what federal initiatives have benefitted by records that were preserved or made accessible through NADP
  

Visit and join "Archivists on to Ottawa Trek" for more information!

Hello AAO Members,

Please find below a message from Lara Wilson, Chair of the Canadian Council of Archives sent to the provincial and territorial archives associations last night. At her request this message is being forwarded to all of our members.

Thank you,
Danielle Hughes
AAO President

le français suit

Dear colleagues –

By now you will have heard of the budget cuts at the Library and Archives Canada (LAC) and the elimination of the National Archival Development Program (NADP) program. Like you, the CCA Board is stunned by this news. This is not only devastating to the archival community but will impede access to Canada's documentary heritage by Canadians for the foreseeable future.

Very shortly, CCA will provide you with more in-depth information, but the immediate impact is that there is no NADP funding for 2012-2013. Also, with the exception of the minor capacity needed to administer Young Canada Works (YCW) and the National Archival Appraisal Board (NAAB), the current CCA staff will no longer be in place and our office will be closing.

In preparation for CCA actions to be undertaken shortly, we would ask all of you to review the impact of the NADP, and the CCA generally, in your jurisdiction and institution over the years. Identify how that impact enabled you to provide the public with better service. Such examples are critical because they put a face on how archives serve many facets of the general public, and how the NADP assists archives to serve Canadians.

Such examples could include:

• books and other outputs that have utilized holdings made accessible by NADP
  
• non-traditional users whose access has been facilitated by NADP
  
• achievements realized through expertise made available to you through archives advisors, preservation services, training opportunities.
  
• how has ARCHIVESCANADA.ca and provincial/territorial networks helped users find you
  
• what holdings have been preserved through NADP and in what ways has that had public acknowledgement
  
• what activities by other groups have been assisted through the results of NADP funded projects
  
• what federal initiatives have benefitted by records that were preserved or made accessible through NADP
  

The CCA response and any community response needs to be driven by concrete examples and we understand that pulling these
together will take some time. We will communicate shortly with a strategy of how all of this information can be utilized. In the meantime if you have questions or suggestions please do not hesitate to contact any member of the CCA executive.

Lara Wilson
Chair - Canadian Council of Archives
Tel: (250) 472-4480
Fax: (250 472-5808
CCA toll free number: 1-866-254-1403
www.cdncouncilarchives.ca

Chers collègues,

La plupart d'entre vous avez entendu parler aujourd'hui des coupures budgétaires qui affectent Bibliothèque et Archives Canada (BAC) ainsi que l'abolition du Programme National de développement des archives (PNDA). Tout comme vous, le Comité de direction du CCA a été abasourdi par la nouvelle. Non seulement cette nouvelle est dévastatrice pour la communauté archivistique, mais elle entravera l'accès au patrimoine documentaire du Canada dans un avenir rapproché/prévisible.

Le CCA vous fournira sous peu de l'information plus détaillée. Les répercussions immédiates sont les suivantes : il n'y aura pas de financement PNDA pour l'année 2012-2013. De plus, sauf pour le personnel minimal nécessaire à l'administration de Jeunesse Canada au travail (JCT) et du Conseil national d'évaluation des archives (CNÉA), le personnel actuel du CCA ne sera plus en poste et nos bureaux fermeront.

En vue de préparer les actions que le CCA devra entreprendre sous peu, nous vous demandons de mesurer l'impact du PNDA, et du CCA en général, sur votre région et sur votre institution à travers les années. Identifiez de quelle façon le PNDA et le CCA vous ont permis d'offrir un meilleur service au public. Des exemples de ce genre sont de la plus haute importance car ils mettent un visage sur les diverses facettes des services offerts au public par les centres d'archives et démontrent de quelle façon le PNDA aide les centres d'archives à servir les Canadiens.

Ces exemples pourraient inclure:

• des ouvrages publiés et autres produits ou réalisations qui ont utilisé des documents rendus disponibles grâce au PNDA;
  
• des utilisateurs non traditionnels pour qui l'accès à votre service d'archives a été facilité par le PNDA;
  
• des réalisations complétées grâce aux connaissances acquises par l'entremise de conseillers(ères) en archivistique, de services
  
• conseils en préservation, ou d'activités de formation;
  
• de quelle façon ARCHIVESCANADA.ca et les réseaux provinciaux et territoriaux ont aidé les utilisateurs à trouver votre
  
• institution;
  
• quels fonds ou collections d'archives ont été préservés par l'entremise du PNDA, et de quelle façon ces projets ont-ils
  
• été reconnus publiquement;
  
• quelles activités par d'autres groupes ont été rendu possible par l'entremise de projets ayant été financés par le PNDA;
  
• quelles initiatives fédérales ont bénéficié de documents qui ont été préservés ou ont été rendus accessibles par l'entremise du PNDA.

La réponse du CCA ainsi que toute réponse de la communauté se doit d'être motivé par des exemples concrets et nous comprenons qu'il vous faudra du temps pour recueillir l'information. Nous communiquerons avec vous dans les plus brefs délais avec une stratégie pour utiliser ces informations. En attendant, si vous avez des suggestions ou des questions, n'hésitez pas à contacter l'un des membres du Comité de direction du CCA.

Lara Wilson
Chair - Canadian Council of Archives
Tel: (250) 472-4480
Fax: (250 472-5808
CCA toll free number: 1-866-254-1403
www.cdncouncilarchives.ca

Dear Members,

The deadline for submitting NADP applications is Friday January 6, 2012 at 4:30pm.

Please mail applications to:
Diocese of London's Archives
1070 Waterloo St.
London, ON
N6A 3Y2

Alternatively, this year you may also submit your application electronically to dmajer@dol.ca.

To gain access to the application please visit the CCA's website http://www.cdncouncilarchives.ca/NADP.html.

If you have any questions regarding the NADP application process, please do not hesitate to contact Debra Majer, at 519-433-0658, ext. 242 or via dmajer@dol.ca.

Good Luck!

Dear Members,

The Institutional Development Committee (IDC) and the AAO’s Executive Board has come to a decision to suspend National Archival Development Program (NADP) funding for the coming year to institutional members in order to support the migration costs from ARCHEION to ICA AtoM. We apologize for any inconvenience regarding potential archival projects or initiatives that were dependant upon NADP funds to be carried out. Please note that the AAO is still very much committed in supporting archival projects and initiatives through its other services and programs.
The AAO realizes how important creating descriptions and having them available through ARCHEION and the national catalogue are for our archives as they aim to increase awareness towards Canada’s archival heritage. ARCHEION is in grave state and in need of an upgrade to a new server and more modern software. Supporting the costs associated with the migration to ICA AtoM will allow for greater access to Canada’s archival heritage byway of multi-level descriptions with their hierarchical context. Not forgetting that there will also be the opportunity for implementing goals and initiatives for ARCHEION and the membership that have never been realized.

For those of you who are interested in learning more about ICA AtoM or would like to try a demo please access the link provided: http://ica-atom.org.

If you have any comments, questions or concerns about this decision please email me by November 15th. Your feedback is important to both the Executive and the IDC. All comments, questions and concerns will not go unnoticed and will undoubtedly assist with making us a stronger organization!

Yours truly,
Deb Majer,
IDC Chair
dmajer@dol.ca