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[[underlined]] STATEMENT OF COLLECTIONS MANAGEMENT - COLLECTIONS INVENTORY [[/underlined]]

The Institution has determined that the inventorying of it's collections is a major operational priority.  Provisions for initiating a complete inventory of all the Museums collections were set down by the Secretary in an Office memorandum which was distributed to all museums and provisions have also been included in the budgets of various new ones.  Specifics concerning inventory policies are summarised in the office memorandum which is attached to this report.

In addition, the Congress made a special appropriation for FY 1979 of $500,000 to assist the Institution in accelerating the inventory process.  After a careful study of overall needs, it was determined that this amount should be allocated, primarily, to three of the museums which had the largest backlogs:  The National Museum of Natural History, the National Museum of History and Technology, and the National Museum of Design/Cooper Hewitt.  The latter has not had a complete inventory since it was formed.  These three museums have now established procedures to use this special appropriation in the most effective way possible.

It is expected that the inventory process will continue to be an institutional priority until its completion in the early 1980's. To this effect, the Institution plans to include in the 1980 budget, a request for another special appropriation of $500,000 which will be used to expedite this rather complex and time consuming process.

In developing inventory procedure, careful attention is being given to automatic data processing and to correlating inventory methodologies with the overall collection management process.  This is particularly important in view of steps being taken by the National Museum of Natural History and the National Museum of History and Technology in preparation for the removal of substantial segments of their collections to the Museum Support Center which, it is now expected,will be completed by the latter part of 1982.