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County clerk seeks $252,500 for records preservation, $90,000 for archive system fees
Summary
Cooke County Clerk requested a $252,500 records preservation project, a $90,000 annual archive service fee and continued funding for a scanning position, saying decades of birth and death records need conservation and digital access.
Cooke County Clerk Pam Neely asked the commissioners court on June 25 to fund a major preservation project for historic birth and death records and to maintain annual archive fees for the county archives system.
Neely said she wants $252,500 from the county’s records preservation fund to treat and preserve birth and death books dating roughly from 1955 to 1970, a block she described as about 95 volumes that are “ragged and falling apart.” She said preservation work increases the physical size of some books — “one birth book can go from one book to two books” — and will require new shelving at an estimated $8,000–$10,000 to store the restored volumes.
Separately, Neely asked commissioners to preserve a $90,000 line for the county’s Avenue OPR (online public records) management system, which she described as the service the county uses to scan and store official public records. She said the fee has not increased from the prior year and is necessary for the county’s scanned records infrastructure.
Neely also described a smaller fraud‑alert service fee and a prescriber alert program she said currently covers roughly 1,400–1,500 prescribers, evidence she said that “it’s definitely working” to notify people of suspected identity issues.
The clerk asked to keep a part‑time scanning clerk in place to finish moving older criminal scans into case files and to continue indexing work. The district clerk and others noted the scanning clerk scanned “8½ years of criminal” records in the past year and that finishing indexing requires staff time; Marcy, the district clerk, supported retaining that position, saying the scanning work “is definitely paying for itself.”
Neely identified the records preservation fund as distinct from the general fund and said the money she proposed for shelving would come from that dedicated fund. She asked commissioners to review the schedule of archival projects she will present next month, including the exact quote for shelving and a contingency line she placed in the request.
No formal vote was taken; Neely presented the proposal for the FY2026 budget and asked the court to consider the preservation funding when they review appropriations.
