Allison Landers
Deputy  Director of Public Services

Interview transcription coming soon.

 

Now, if I was able to understand you, and correct me if I'm wrong, your major concern  appears to me to be that, um, when ordinary citizens want to find out something about the government, or want to find out about some action that the government is taking, it's very difficult to find information even in libraries.  Would that be a fair assessment?

 

Shaiyel Seltzer:
Yes.  Accessibility to finding the information that you really want.  And - it's time imperative.

David Cismowski:
Right.

A lot of what I am going to be saying is just from personal opinion, and a lot is based on what I've read, and is more factual than just personal opinion - but I think one of the difficulties that has always been present with government, and is certainly exacerbated today by the complexity of government - that is government is far more complex than 100 years ago.  One of the problems is that any action that is taken by government or any trend or direction that appears to the ordinary citizen to be occurring is not taken just by one government agency, it is taken by many agencies together.  For instance, if there is a major building project in the city of Sacramento, the City Council is going to be looking at it, the Planning Commission is going to be looking at it may, it may, if it has to do with roads, CAL-Trans may get involved with it -  the California Department of Transportation will get involved with it.  There can be lawsuits filed which then become court records. And so, to get a full picture of anything, one probably has to contact a number of government agencies.  I think the libraries can serve to bring those resources together in one place.  Sometimes that's done very successfully, and sometimes it isn't.  But, I think that the whole purpose of libraries, and library catalogs, and library web sites is to try to make some sense of a lot of very, very difficult and complex things.  That's not always successful because libraries have funding problems right now, libraries of all kinds are not being funded at the level that would allow for maximum help to the people that they serve.  I think that you are generally an individual citizen walking into a library is going to get better and  more consistent help trying to get at the true issues or to get the documents that are necessary or at least be able to fully explain to a professional what that person needs to know, than if they would if they were to go into a government office and try to get the same information directly.  I don't think that is always the case.  There are many many many wonderful government offices that have really good customer service, but generally it's going to be more difficult I think.  One of the other things you mentioned was the switch from depending on tangible publications, such as paper and microfilm, microfiche, CDRoms - things you can actually hold in your hand - a switch from that to disseminating information on the internet. {Pause}  I think, I think first of all, it's inevitable that more and more government information is going to be published on the internet instead of distributed in tangible formats.  Whether we want it to or not it's going to happen that way.  And, the reason I believe that is going to happen that way is because of money.  It's cheaper for agencies to create an electronic document and just post it on their web site than it is for them to pay a printer to print out X number of copies - on the chance that someone is going to want some of these copies.  Lots of government agencies back in the old days would say, "Print out 500 copies" of a certain report and maybe, they would have half of that number left over after a few years.  Well it's expensive to store these things, and after a period of time nobody's going to want that report anyway.

 

Shaiyel Seltzer: 
What about just doing it - "printing on demand?"

 

David Cismowski:
Well that's expensive too.  It's not as expensive and it can - that's certainly is something that the government printing office in Washington is going more and more toward that sort of model.  We're not going print a thousand copies of every government report - paid to put them in a warehouse and then, just hope that people are going to buy them.  Instead, they're going to this model which is you have a electronic version of a publication that can be very cheaply stored electronically and if somebody wants to buy it then we will print out a copy from the electronic version - and sell it to them. 

 

Shaiyel Seltzer:
How does it work in the state of California?  The Federal Government sends you all the pamphlets and packets and all that stuff to this library and then you send it out to the different libraries in the state?

 

David Cismowski:
No.
Here at the California State Library we are what is called a Federal-Regional Depository, and we are the only Federal-Regional Depository in the state of California.
That doesn't mean that we distribute federal publications to other libraries in the state of California - that is done directly by the government {United States} printing office.  There are 90 other depositories in the state of California and those depositories essentially chose the types of publications they want to receive as Depositories and the federal government mails those directly to the selected depositories.  They don't come to us first - we don't distribute them.  What our role is as a regional depository is that we work with the government printing office as does every regional depository to try to help and provide support for the selected depositories in the state.  And that support is interpreting federal guidelines for the processing and intention of federal documents , helping with depositories operations providing advice.  We don't provide any money - but we can provide advice and certain non-monetary assistance.

 

Shaiyel Seltzer:
One of the challenges that I saw in Baltimore was at one of the branch libraries.  At the Waverly library I noticed that there was Native American literature there.  That was part of the depository.  Well, if you are Native American and you don't ever go to the Waverly library because you live in Northwest Baltimore for instance.  Just by chance that you would ever find information regarding - being able to pick up a pamphlet.  For me personally doesn't really make sense as to how the literature is distributed.

 

David Cismowski:
Well, the traditional model for a depository library was as follows: the government distributes tangible publications to certain library locations that are geographically dispersed and the citizens who are interested in those publications travel to those buildings in order to access the publications.  That's the traditional model - that's the model that's been used for over a hundred years. You're right, that one of the drawbacks of that is how does the ordinary citizen that there is something that they want to read, or consult in these depositories.  Well back in the old days, the only way that they could find out would be to travel to a library, look in a catalogue, or ask a librarian.  But they had no idea when they got in their car and were driving to the library whether the library would have anything that would help them or not.  The new model is tending toward libraries doing more outreach to the public. A big part of that outreach is using the World Wide Web (WWW) in many different ways to allow the public from the comfort of their own homes, or from their own offices to find out what the library has, to  provide citizens with a certain amount of help; that is a well designed web page or set of descriptions about documents; federal or state documents.  It can mean that somebody can sit at a computer in their home or in their office and read what is available, what types of information are available.  Library catalogs are generally on the web, so that I can sit at home and I can find out at home what the state library has, in certain subject areas without having to travel there just on the chance that they are going to have something there - and maybe they don't.  And also the other major advantage of distributing publications on the internet is that people can access the full text of publications, especially government publications at home - and they even can print them out at home if they want.  One of the problems with the old model was that okay, lets say you traveled to a library and you found out that they did have something that you wanted, well, if you couldn't check it out and take it home with you then it meant that either you had to read it in the library or take notes in the library or maybe make photocopies of the pages that you wanted.  But you had to go to the library in order to do that.  With the new model - using the internet, not only can you find out what libraries have, but many times, from the library's catalog, actually can click on a link which will take you to the full text of the publication itself.  So, you can actually read what you need to have or access the information that you need to have at home or in the office, not fight the traffic - all that. 

The drawback of course is that you have to have a computer.  Many people don't have computers.  Another drawback is that you have to have a fast internet connection.  If you are going to be downloading publications to your own computer, and if you have a "dial up" connection, it's going to take a long time.  And the other major drawback which most don't really yet realize, or maybe they do realize this - I don't know, is that it's not easy to find what you want on the web.  Libraries try to make it easier by cataloging certain publications and you can use the library's catalog to do things like subject searching, but if you don't find what you need there the maze of government agencies out their on the web, each with their own web sites and no real portal that will actually take a question and deliver the information to you is very daunting - it's very difficult to find what you want on the web.  That's why, that's why I think that even though the model has switched to where people don't have to come to the library anymore, it's still important for libraries to provide: reference service, help with questions, with government information.  Maybe even more important now than it was before because people find it very difficult to find the information that they need on the web.

Shaiyel Seltzer:
So are libraries going to be more education based? That you can read it at home and then come into the library to say, "Well, how does this all work?"

 

David Cismowski:
I think so.  I think that it's not just with government information, it's libraries in general.  Libraries are changing the way they do business.  The image that everybody has of libraries is the old image - which is you have the big building, you have librarians sitting behind a desk, looking rather prim, unapproachable and you go into the building and you're pretty much on you own.  Sure you can ask questions but it's kind of intimidating and you have to get into your car, go down and find a parking place and walk into a building in order to get the information from a library that you need.  That's really changing.  Not just with government publications, but with libraries across the board.    They're doing more outreach, they're doing more programming. They're doing more - more going out into the community and finding what the people that they serve want. They're putting kiosks in shopping malls - information kiosks with a computer terminal.  And they are going out to schools.  They're putting public libraries in school libraries and are joining forces so that libraries are more and more, especially in the state of California the model is that you try to combine different library types.  There is a brand new library at San Jose State University that is both a public library and a university library.  There are any number of public libraries in the state of California that are both school libraries and public libraries together so that you have school kids and you have members of the public coming to the same building, using the same collection.  And that type of thing can generate a lot of community so that people can view libraries as community centers instead of forbidding places that have big collections of books and   rather sour faced librarians. 

Shaiyel Seltzer:
I interviewed James Scott.  He is a librarian at the Sacramento Public Library.

 

David Cismowski:
Yes, I know him.

 

Shaiyel Seltzer:
He said, "I can take any book and look in the index and find out exactly where the information is in this book, but if I were to go onto a computer it may take half an hour to try to find that same information."  What about that?  What about that type of quickness that you can't get on a computer?  

               

David Cismowski:
Well, where I would disagree with James is that there is a lot of quickness on the internet.  But, a lot of what people find on the internet isn't exactly what they want or is not necessarily the best information.  That is if you have - to use his example, if you have a book that is published by a major publishing company by an author who is an authority  in a particular area and you look in the index of that book, you are using that book to quickly access authoritative information or presumably authoritative information.  You  can go online - on the web and use a search engine - such as Google and throw out a few key words and you can get a lot of hits, but is the information that you find going to be quality information?

 

Shaiyel Seltzer:
That's why I use Lycos first. {Lycos search engine is owned and operated by Carnegie Mellon University}

 

David Cismowski:
So the question - it actually comes down to, "Yes you can get very quick information on the internet - but are they good results.  And I think a lot of school kids have grown up with the internet and they believe that it is perfectly possible to write a great school paper just using the internet.  MAYBE IT IS - maybe it isn't. 

Shaiyel Seltzer:
Even the yellow pages isn't accurate.  Somebody recently wrote to me, "Help I can't a find shoe repair place!" {in Portland, Oregon} Well, it's page 1206 and there is almost a full page here of listings.  They're looking on the internet, and I am just concerned that there is going to be a lot of inaccuracies of "internet only" government documents.  Are there any safety measures that are being talked about in regards to inaccurate glitches - because when it's gone it's gone.

David Cismowski:
There is a lot of study being done, particularly at the federal level regarding these issues, that you have just mentioned. One major issue is what we call authentication.  That is if I go into the stacks and I pull out a government publication that was printed in 1940 by the Department of Agriculture and I show it to you, both of us are going to have the assumption that this publication that we are holding in our hands is, number one, an official U.S. government publication, number two, that it truly was issued by the Department of Agriculture, and number three, that everything that we read in this publication that we have in our hands is going to be the same as what somebody a hundred miles away who has the same publication in his hands is going to be reading.  That is, there are a thousand copies out there in the United States, or 5000 copies out there in the United States that are EXACTLY THE SAME.  And that in 1940, the text was the same as it is today. 

I mean we have these assumptions about paper federal publications and I think they are pretty true assumptions, when you think about it.  We TRUST a paper publication from 1940 to be authentic and official.  Now, that publication is 60 years old - that we are holding in our hands.  ARE WE GOING TO BE ABLE TO SAY THE SAME THING 60 YEARS FROM TODAY about a publication that's only been published on the web?    That is, can we look at our computer screens and say with ABSOLUTE one hundred percent (100%) fact that this is an official publication, that it's content has not changed  for 60 years, that nobody has hacked into it and changed a few words here and there ?  What if we read that publication on a library web site?  Is that the same as reading it on the Department of Agriculture web site?  Or is better, it could be even better, given the political climate that we are in, where we hear certain disturbing things about politicians messing with the official record.  It might even be more authentic to access a publication from a library web site than it would be from the original agency's web site in the future.  All of these things are very important issues.  And, another one is the disappearance of publications from web sites.  There have been any number of federal and state publications that have simply vanished from web sites.  Now if they were PRINTED OUT, and LIBRARIES HAVE THEM or if they were also issued in paper, and libraries have the paper copies, then things are okay.  But, if the only distribution of those publications is on the web and nobody CAPTURED that electronic file, and the agency removes it, then it COULD BE GONE FOREVER. 

 

Shaiyel Seltzer:
What is your relationship with the state government in regards to getting - do you get publications pretty rapidly or do you have to advocate?

 

David Cismowski:
No.

Shaiyel Seltzer:
 James {Scott} mentioned that he wrote to the city and county asking for documents - advocating for documents to be SENT to the library that just weren't being SENT.  

   

David Cismowski:  
It can be difficult.  If you are going to be talking with Janet Coles she's the one who handles California Publications.  She can probably give you a better idea than I could about what is happening at the state level. 

 

Shaiyel Seltzer:
Is it a challenge to even get federal documents sent here?

   

David Cismowski:
To get actual physical copies here - YES!  I think the federal government is - the government printing office is  is much better than - doing a much better job than the state of California right now in providing access to web only federal publications.  That's not to say that the state is not aware of the problems or is not trying to do that, but I think that there are greater successes at the federal level than there are at the state level right now. 

But, all of these issues: such as availability, the persistence of government publications through time on the internet, the accuracy and authentication of governmental information on the web. they are all very very difficult questions which are continually discussed - by librarians and by um, by people in government. 

 

Shaiyel Seltzer:
Would it help if there were local commissions and state commissions that would be regarding civic participation - that would bring libraries, school systems, organizations such as League of Women Voters, public television/media, and anyone else other organizations, other people who are genuinely interested in civic education.  Do you think that would help in attempting to solve some of these - problems?  

        

David Cismowski:
I think it would VERY MUCH HELP.  I think that {pause}. I think that, first of all these problems that we have been talking about are not totally apparent to the general public, and they're not even totally apparent yet to our representatives in congress and our representatives in state government.,  We often times hear talk about the distinct probability that there will be a GAP in our history, starting around 1995, when publications began to be published more and more on the internet and maybe running as long as twenty years there are going to be a lot of publications that will be LOST - records that will not have been kept. electronic records, and we are going to have a GAP in our primary resources for HISTORY.  There is only so much that libraries can do.  If the public were to become aware of this danger, and I don't think there are yet, and if the public were to demand more attention be paid to these problems then I think that solutions will be found sooner than they will be if the public doesn't.  I think that the TRADITION of government informing the people is maybe one of the most important traditions in this COUNTRY.  That is, we've always believed as a people that we have a government that must be responsive to the people.  Well, if the people don't know what's going on in government; if the record of legislative decisions, if the record of judicial decisions, if the reports of executive agencies are not made public and not provided in such a way that the people can access them easily, then the people aren't going to know what their government is doing.  And we as librarians, that is probably the thing that is most important to us - as government librarians is that we passionately believe that it is the right of people, of citizens to know what their government is doing.  And not just what their government is doing now, but what their government did ten years ago, what their government did fifty years ago, what their government did a hundred years ago.  Because if you don't have that historical foundation - I am talking about the PRIMARY documents of government, not what somebody has written about  decisions, but actual recordings of legislative debates and committee reports, things like that - that go into building laws.  If you don't have that foundation, that STRUGGLED foundation to make a whole picture of a certain issue, then, you are not going to be informed, and you are not going to know what your government has done, is doing, and will do in the future.

 

Shaiyel Seltzer:
And it is also, just in a language perspective, of how people talked, and how people wrote -

 

Exactly.

 

Shaiyel Seltzer:
And the connection of being a citizen in the United States.

 

David Cismowski:
YES.
And so if people, if the ordinary citizen can ONCE AGAIN REALIZE how important that is, I think that, I think we've kind of gotten away a little bit in this country from people participating in government.  If they can realize just how dangerous it is to just assume that government is always going to be good and "do the right thing," and act in everybody's best interest... {keep filling same sentiment yourself}  Start to LOOK a little more critically at the processes of government that we are heading into a difficult time in our nation.  But you have to have the ammunition, you can't just think that there is a problem in government you have to know it by reading what government publishes.  And that is what it all comes down to for us is that we want to, first of all, make sure that that is available, second of all, collect as much as we can so that we can make sure it's going to be available forever, and third of all, enable people, enable citizens to find it and to use it.

 

Shaiyel Seltzer:
And to meet in libraries.   

 

David Cismowski:
Well, if they don't meet here to at least to have a presence out there in the community.   A WEB SITE that people CAN access or a survey that was done shows that we, that the public would really benefit from say CLASSES that were done in the library.  To teach people how to find government information - that type of thing.  But libraries more and more are reaching out - going outside of the building, establishing a presence in community, and not just sitting here, waiting for people to come in.

Shaiyel Seltzer:
Thank you very much.

 

David Cismowski:
I hope this has been helpful.