County clerk says indexing backlog could take up to 10 years in-house; council approves clerk budget but declines one-time funding

County Clerk Redondo told the Los Alamos County Council on Tuesday that the clerk's office completed digitization of microfiche records but still lacks indexing and redaction that would make older documents fully searchable online. Redondo described the backlog and presented two paths: an outside contractor, estimated by some bidders at hundreds of thousands to more than $1 million, or continued in-house indexing that he estimated could take five to 10 years at current staffing levels.

Why it matters: The documents are public records used for title searches, probate and other legal needs; difficulty finding records increasingly consumes staff time and slows responses to public information requests.

What the clerk said

Clerk Redondo said the office has added electronic public access and has integrated older microfiche images into a searchable system, but that searchability is currently limited to document number or book and page for records recorded before February 2006. "I'm expecting it to take between 5 and 10 years, probably closer to the 10 year, period" to index the historical corpus if done only in-house, he said. He said one RFP respondent priced service at "about a million dollars" using a per-keystroke model; he also suggested a smaller contract in the $250,000'$300,000 range might be possible.

Staff time, IPRA and redaction

Redondo said lack of indexing increases staff time responding to inspection requests and that some older records sometimes must be manually searched. He described a plan to index documents as they are requested so commonly sought items become searchable first and repeated requests decline. He also noted that certain historic documents may include personally identifiable information requiring redaction. "Once we have them properly indexed, we will be able to spend less time in requests for these documents," Redondo said.

Council debate and vote

Councilors asked about alternatives such as adding casual staff to accelerate in-house indexing; Redondo said a single 20-hour-a-week casual employee could reduce the in-house schedule to about five years and two casuals could accelerate work further. A budget option for outside indexing was discussed but the council voted 6-1 to tentatively approve the clerk's proposed $1,333,520 budget without the one-time indexing budget option. Councilor Hand voted no on removing the budget option and asked that the indexing proposal be kept in the "parking lot" for future discussion.

Community context

Redondo noted that New Mexico's changes to veteran's exemption legislation delayed this year's notice-of-value mailing schedule, and described the clerk's role in elections, records, and probate services. He told the council that the office's recent use of a mobile voting unit and state reimbursements offset much of the increased election-year costs.

Next steps

The council directed staff to leave the indexing budget option in the parking lot for further study; Redondo said he will continue to index in house and can return with more exact cost estimates, including options to hire casual staff or await advances in automated tools.

Provenance: Clerk Redondo's presentation and council questions run from the clerk presentation start through the motion and roll call approving the clerk budget without the optional indexing request.

Ending: The county will pursue internal indexing and return with a plan or additional budget request for an outside contract later; the council approved the clerk's operating budget but withheld one-time funds for indexing pending further review.