William Boesch Named GPO Chief Financial Officer

U.S. Government Publishing Office (GPO) announces William (Bill) L. Boesch, Jr. as the agency’s Chief Financial Officer (CFO). In this role, Boesch will administer and guide policy and oversight of the agency’s financial strategies and administrative support systems, personnel, and operations. He will serve as GPO’s principal financial liaison with the Appropriations Committees in the U.S. Senate and the U.S. House of Representatives. Boesch has served as GPO Acting Chief Financial Officer since December 2018.

Boesch has been part of GPO’s Finance department for nearly 40 years. He joined the agency in 1979. Since then, he has been intricately involved in managing GPO’s finances, including budgeting, financial audits, accounting, and financial reporting. Positions he has held at GPO include several account analyst positions, Assistant Comptroller, Comptroller, Deputy CFO, and Acting Chief Financial Officer. Before arriving at GPO, Boesch worked for the U.S. Army and private accounting and data processing companies. He is a native of Baltimore, MD and is the fourth generation in his family to work in the printing and publishing industry.

“I congratulate Bill on his promotion as Chief Financial Officer,” said GPO Acting Deputy Director John Crawford. “With four decades of experience working in GPO finances, he is an invaluable asset to the agency, and I can think of no one better fit to take on this role.”
Boesch holds a B.A. in Business Administration from the University of Baltimore (UB) and has completed graduate work at both the UB and George Washington University.

FDLP and C&I Scope Policy Revised

On April 9, 2019 the Superintendent of Documents issued SOD-PPS-2019-1, Scope of Government Information Products Included in the Cataloging and Indexing Program and Disseminated Through the Federal Depository Library Program (FDLP). This policy became effective April 10, 2019 and it supersedes SOD-PPS-2016-1, a policy with the same subject.

With this revision, the scope policy now explicitly states that Federal information products protected by copyright are in scope of the Cataloging and Indexing Program. Works that are both protected by copyright and for which the Government does not have rights to publish or otherwise use the work for Federal purposes, are not in scope of the FDLP.

Additionally, the scope policy now reaffirms our cataloging practice of creating a note in bibliographic records when copyright information is available. An example in the Catalog of U.S. Government Publications:

Title:  Our national cemetery: a place of honor, a place of valor, a place of remembrance
SuDoc Class:  D 1.2:N 19/4
Item no.:  0306
CGP System no.: 000862468

Five Libraries Sign Preservation Steward Agreements With GPO

Arthur Lakes Library, Idaho State University Libraries, Felix G. Woodward Library, Jerome Hall Law Library, and Salmon Library each signed a Memorandum of Agreement with the U.S. Government Publishing Office (GPO) to become Preservation Stewards. Under this agreement, the libraries pledge to permanently preserve print collections of the following:
Arthur Lakes Library, Colorado School of Mines

• Publications from the U.S. Geological Survey
• Publications from the U.S. Bureau of Mines
• Publications from the Department of Energy
• Publications from the Energy Research and Development Administration

Idaho State University Libraries

• Handbook of North American Indians and the Congressional Record and its predecessors

Felix G. Woodward Library, Austin Peay State University

• Publications related to the 101^st Airborne Division

Jerome Hall Law Library, Indiana University

• Code of Federal Regulations
• U.S. Reports
• Statutes at Large
• U.S. Code
• Revised Statutes
• Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents
• Public Papers of the Presidents
• The Congressional Record and its predecessors
• Monthly Catalog of U.S. Government Publications

Salmon Library, University of Alabama in Huntsville

• NASA History Series publications

To help Federal depository libraries meet the needs of efficient Government document stewardship in the digital era, GPO has established Preservation Stewards to support continued public access to historic U.S. Government documents in print format. Preservation Stewards contribute significantly to the effort to preserve printed documents, and GPO welcomes all Federal depository libraries that wish to participate as Preservation Stewards.
“GPO welcomes these five new libraries as Preservation Stewards and their commitment to maintaining Government information in multiple platforms,” said Superintendent of Documents Laurie Hall. “I encourage more libraries to become part of this venture of preserving valuable print collections of Government information.”

New govinfo Webcast Series

Six new govinfo webcasts are now available. These are part of a new series of tutorials that offers users introductory guidance in navigating GPO’s govinfo, performing various types of searches, narrowing search results, browsing, and using Help features. Recordings are brief—from two to seven minutes in length—and include:

• Introduction to govinfo
• What’s Available
• Introduction to Browsing
• Introduction to Basic Search
• Introduction to Advanced Search
• Introduction to Citation Search

No prerequisite knowledge is required, and GPO encourages all to share and post these brief educational webcasts on your web pages and social media.

More webcasts will be posted and announced throughout 2019.

GPO’s govinfo Makes History by Earning Global Certification for Trustworthiness

The U.S. Government Publishing Office (GPO) makes history by becoming the first organization in the United States and second organization in the world to achieve the highest global standard of excellence for digital repositories. The Primary Trustworthy Digital Repository Authorization Body Ltd. awarded GPO ISO 16363:2012 for govinfo, the one-stop site to authentic, published Government information. GPO achieved the certification by meeting official criteria for trustworthy repositories as defined by experts in the field.

ISO is the International Organization for Standardization and the world’s largest developer of international standards used by Government, business and new information technology companies. The standard achieved by GPO outlines the expectations for digital repositories to be certified as “trustworthy,” meaning that they are implementing digital preservation practices to ensure long-term preservation and access. Certification under ISO 16363 will provide assurance to the public that govinfo is a standards-compliant digital archive in which Government information will be preserved, accessible, and usable into the long-term future. The certification demonstrates that not only the documents themselves, but also the organizational structures and systems around those documents, maintain integrity.

“This certification reconfirms GPO’s mission of providing the public authentic, published information on the three branches of the Federal Government,” said GPO Acting Deputy Director Herbert H. Jackson, Jr. “I am proud of our employees for attaining this certification, which emphasizes the important work GPO does for our country.”
Certification has been a key GPO strategic initiative since 2015. GPO was evaluated against 109 criteria that assessed GPO’s organizational infrastructure (adequate staffing, staff knowledge, policies and procedures), digital object management (content management and access), and security risk management (plans in case of a system failure).

Partial Federal Government Shutdown – GPO Remains Open

As of the close of business today December 21, 2018 (5:30 pm EST), the GPO was notified that the U.S. Congress had not passed Federal Government appropriations to operate some Federal Government agencies beyond December 21, 2018. GPO, as a legislative branch agency, will be operating after December 21, 2018 because its operating budget was passed and signed by the President. In light of the shutdown, the following are updates on the statuses of GPO services.

• The Catalog of U.S. Government Publications (CGP) will be available, however GPO cannot ensure that all PURLs pointing to other Federal agency resources will work during this time. PURLs may point to content on agency websites where funding has not been approved past the December 21, 2018 deadline. All other CGP functionality will continue as usual and will not be affected.
• FDLP.gov, govinfo, the FDLP Web Archive, and Ben’s Guide to the U.S. Government will not be affected and will continue to operate as usual.

GPO will update the FDLP community as information becomes available on the status of Federal Government operations.

GPO Names Acting Inspector General

U.S. Government Publishing Office (GPO) Acting Deputy Director Herbert H. Jackson, Jr. appoints James R. Ives as the Acting Inspector General for GPO. Ives will oversee the agency’s Office of Inspector General (OIG), which provides an independent and objective means of keeping the Agency Director and Congress informed about problems and deficiencies relating to the administration and operations of GPO. Ives has been detailed to GPO while the agency searches for a permanent Inspector General, following the departure of Melinda Miguel.
Ives has over 25 years of Inspector General experience, including nine years of senior executive experience. He is currently the Assistant Inspector General for Investigations at the National Aeronautics and Space Administration's Office of Inspector General.
“James brings a wealth of Inspector General experience to GPO,” said Acting GPO Deputy Director Herbert H. Jackson, Jr. “I look forward to working with James and welcome his ideas for improving efficiency to GPO’s operations.”
Prior to joining NASA OIG, Ives served with the Department of Defense’s Office of Inspector General for 22 years. He held numerous positions of progressive responsibility at DoD IG, including Defense Criminal Investigative Service (DCIS) Special Agent, Criminal Intelligence Program Manager, Assistant Deputy Director for National Security, Deputy Director of the Investigative Operations Directorate, Special Agent-in-Charge of the DCIS’s Mid-Atlantic Field Office, Acting Principal Director of DoD IG's Office of Professional Responsibility, Deputy Director of DCIS, Acting Deputy Inspector General for Intelligence and Special Program Assessments, and Assistant Inspector General for Investigations. Ives received DCIS's Manager of the Year Award in 2007, and on two separate occasions (2005 and 2014), he received DoD IG's Team Work Award. Upon departing DoD IG in 2015, he received the organization's Distinguished Career Achievement Award.
As a special agent assigned to DCIS’s Boston Resident Agency, Ives conducted criminal investigations of allegations impacting civilian and military DoD components. Investigations focused on allegations of bribery and kickbacks, anti-trust, corruption, environmental crimes, health care fraud, export violations, significant thefts of government property, internal affairs related issues, acquisition and procurement fraud, computer crimes, and other issues impacting DoD. Following September 11, 2001, he served as a representative to the FBI’s Joint Terrorism Task Force in Boston, conducting counterterrorism investigations. As a result of his efforts in Boston, Ives received several awards for investigative excellence, including the President's Council on Integrity and Efficiency Award for Excellence, the Department of Health and Human Services' Award for Cooperative Achievement, and the U.S. Attorney's Office's Award for Investigative Excellence.
Ives is pursuing a Doctor of Criminal Justice degree at Saint Leo University. He is a 2005 graduate of Georgetown University, where he earned a Master of Public Policy degree; and a 1992 graduate of State University of New York, College at Brockport, where he graduated summa cum laude with a B.S. in Criminal Justice and a minor in Psychology. He is a 2017 graduate of Harvard University’s Senior Executives Fellows program. He is also an adjunct professorial lecturer at American University, and an adjunct associate professor at University of Maryland University College (UMUC). He currently serves as course chair for UMUC's Criminal Justice Ethics class.