The Santa Paula Fire Department will be shredding all miscellaneous notes, letters, memos, telephone messages, draft reports, copies of reports and other written material for the years 2002 and earlier, but with the caveat that they do not involve employee personnel matters, code enforcement cases, or specific land development project files. All SPFD training books and materials, texts, records and reports that are no longer current and do not constitute specific training records for individual fire personnel for the years 2002 and earlier will be tossed.The SPFD incident reports for the years 1999 and earlier that do not “appear to involve minors either as injured subjects or suspects in arson situations” will be given the boot unless the minors will have attained the age of 22 years old by December 31. The same goes for photographs and negatives of fire or accident scenes or investigations for the years 2002 and earlier.Elsewhere in City Hall, documents covering safety training, including those covering customer service training, workplace answers training, sexual harassment training - how to avoid, not refine - and defensive driving training are headed for the shredder, among the numerous documents listed under the heading. Mobile home park and rent commission related documents, internal correspondence, mayor’s correspondence, grand jury reports, phone message books and weekly reports will also be destroyed.City Attorney Karl Berger reviewed the list of 18 pages of single-spaced records and documents headed to the shredder.
Shredders to work overtime when city destroys old documents, records
December 28, 2005
Santa Paula City Council
Shredders will be working overtime after the City Council approved thousands of records and documents that can be destroyed for New Year’s housekeeping. The council approved the move at the December 19 meeting.
By Peggy KellySanta Paula TimesShredders will be working overtime after the City Council approved thousands of records and documents that can be destroyed for New Year’s housekeeping. The council approved the move at the December 19 meeting.City Clerk Josie Herrera reported that in 1999, the council approved a Records Retention Schedule that complies with all state and federal requirements for either holding on or destroying old documents. Herrera noted that several city departments have oodles of old paperwork and records that no longer serve a purpose or must be kept for future reference.According to the resolution, “Keeping and maintaining public records that are unnecessary or duplicate results in the consumption of significant public resources including money, time and space,” and it is in the public’s interest to trash those records that are not required to conduct city business. After the documents and records are destroyed, Herrera will complete a certificate verifying the action to be filed with the city’s official records.The city Finance Department has account payable records stretching back to 1993, as well as records of cash receipts and revenue registers. Finance Department journal entry postings from 1988 could have been destroyed in 1993.
