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NEWS ROOM   |   Press Releases

For immediate release: September 5, 2007
Contact: Shawn Karrick

NASCIO on E-Discovery: An Impact Statement for State CIOs

(Lexington, KY) - The National Association of State Chief Information Officers (NASCIO), which represents the chief information officers (CIOs) of the states, is pleased to announce the release of its issue brief "Seek and Ye Shall Find? State CIOs Must Prepare Now for E-Discovery". The brief may be found online at www.nascio.org/publications/. It is a product of NASCIO's E-Discovery Working Group. In response to the movement of critical business information into electronic form, e-discovery is an issue that has quickly risen to prominence for both the public and private sectors. The successful location and retrieval of electronic information can be critical to the outcome of a lawsuit.

In increasingly consolidated state technology environments, State CIOs may have heightened responsibility for the storage, preservation and retrieval of electronic information in response to e-discovery requests. Since government information is a knowledge asset, State CIOs must ensure the proper management of state information assets in addition to the technological infrastructure for locating and retrieving that information.

This issue brief explains the impact for State CIOs of e-discovery requests and encourages State CIOs to pursue a holistic approach to enterprise records management as part of a team of state government stakeholders, including state legal counsel, archivists, records managers, and agency business leaders.

"Through a collaborative, enterprise approach to organizing state government knowledge assets, State CIOs can be responsive to e-discovery requests and ensure that those requests can be successfully handled across state agencies," said Gary Robinson, State CIO, State of Washington, and Chair of NASCIO's E-Discovery Working Group.

NASCIO will explore issues of e-discovery and records management at its 2007 Annual Conference in Tucson, Arizona, September 30 through October 3, 2007, during a conference panel on "The Challenge of Electronic Records in the Digital Age". The panel will be moderated by Gary Robinson, CIO, State of Washington. Panelists will include:

• Jason Baron, Director of Litigation, National Archives and Records Administration
• Adam Jansen, Deputy State Archivist, State of Washington
• Bill LeFurgy, Project Manager for Digital Initiatives, National Digital Information Infrastructure and Preservation Program (NDIIPP), The Library of Congress

NASCIO is the premier network and resource for state CIOs and an effective advocate for technology policies at all levels of government. State members are senior officials from any of the three branches of state government who have executive-level and statewide responsibility for information resource management. Representatives from federal, municipal, and international governments and other state officials participate in the organization as associate members. Private-sector firms and non-profit organizations may join as corporate members.

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Please contact Mary Gay Whitmer, NASCIO Senior Issues Coordinator, at (859) 514-9209 or mwhitmer@amrms.com or Shawn Karrick, NASCIO Membership and Communications Coordinator, at (859) 514-9156 or skarrick@amrms.com.

AMR Management Services provides NASCIO's executive staff. For more information about AMR visit http://www.AMRms.com/.