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Friday, August 31, 2007

Ind. Courts - Tippecanoe County Courthouse floor groans from paper weight gain

Dan Shaw reports today in the Lafayette Journal & Courier, in a story that begins:

Court files stuffed into the fifth floor of the Tippecanoe County Courthouse became such a weighty problem that maintenance crews finally issued a warning:

Put much more up there and the fifth floor could collapse.

Pat Harrington, county prosecutor, said that warning hit home. Something had to be done to reduce the amount of documents his office stored.

In 2006, the prosecutor's office used 1,128,610 sheets of paper, more than any other county department. Altogether, the county, which employs about 620 people, went through slightly more than 7 million sheets that year. And the county is well on its way to surpassing that amount in 2007.

"We never had an engineering study done," said Mike Haan, the county maintenance director, about the courthouse's fifth floor. "But with the copy paper we store up there ... we were basically concerned about the amount of weight on that floor."

Harrington said he hopes the solution lies in storing old files on computers. The county has hired interns to undertake that work. They had scanned 245,421 pages by the end of last week, Harrington said.

The project has cleared out a room that used to be filled with boxes. Harrington afterward made it his office.

Even so, Harrington doubts county prosecutors could ever function without using large amounts of paper. Even with scanning, they still must furnish copies of criminal files -- which he estimated contain from 500 to 700 sheets -- to defendants, judges and jury members.

For others in county offices, the law is a hindrance to reducing the use of paper.

County clerk Linda Phillips said she would like to place more files on computers, but Indiana requires her to keep paper records. Criminal files, for instance, must be stored for 55 years, she said.

The recorder's office, on the other hand, has been scanning property records since 1992. And those paying child support at the Tippecanoe County Courthouse will soon notice a lot less paper floating around in the offices they visit.

Posted by Marcia Oddi on August 31, 2007 01:02 PM
Posted to Indiana Courts