Sec. 1. (a) The definitions in this section apply throughout this chapter:

(b) "Administration" means the Indiana archives and records administration created by this chapter.

(c) "Agency" means any state office, department, division, board, bureau, commission, authority, or other separate unit of state government established by the Constitution of the State of Indiana, by law, or by executive or legislative order.

(d) "Critical records" means records necessary to:

(1) resume or continue governmental operations;

(2) the reestablishing of the legal and financial responsibilities of government in Indiana; or

(3) protect and fulfill governmental obligations to the citizens of Indiana.

(e) "Form" means every piece of paper, electronic content, transparent plate, or film containing information, printed, generated, or reproduced by whatever means, with blank spaces left for the entry of additional information to be used in any transaction involving the state.

(f) "Forms management" means the program maintained by the administration to provide continuity of forms design procedures from the form's origin up to its completion as a record by determining the:

(1) form's size, style, and size of type;

(2) format;

(3) type of construction;

(4) number of plies;

(5) quality, weight, and type of paper and carbon; and

(6) use of the form for data entry as well as the distribution.

(g) "Imaging" means the process by which a record is converted from physical form to a computer readable digital image file.

(h) "Indiana state archives" means the program maintained by the administration for the preservation of those records and other government papers that have been determined by the administration to have sufficient permanent values to warrant their continued preservation by the state.

(i) "Information management" means the program maintained by the administration for the application of management techniques to the purchase, creation, utilization, maintenance, retention, preservation, and disposal of forms and records undertaken to improve efficiency and reduce costs of recordkeeping, including management of filing, microfilming, and imaging equipment and supplies, filing and information retrieval systems, files, correspondence, reports and forms management, historical documentation, micrographic retention programming, electronic content management systems, and critical records protection.

(j) "Local government" means a political subdivision (as defined in IC 36-1-2-13).

(k) "Microfilm" means a photographic film containing an image greatly reduced in size from the original.

(l) "Nonrecord materials" means all identical copies of forms, records, reference books, and exhibit materials that are made, or acquired, and preserved solely for reference use, exhibition purposes, or publication and that are not included within the definition of record.

(m) "Personal records" means:

(1) all documentary materials of a private or nonpublic character that do not relate to or have an effect upon the carrying out of the constitutional, statutory, or other official or ceremonial duties of a public official, including diaries, journals, or other personal notes serving as the functional equivalent of a diary or journal that are not prepared or used for, or circulated or communicated in the course of, transacting government business; or

(2) materials relating to private political associations, and having no relation to or effect upon the carrying out of constitutional, statutory, or other official or ceremonial duties of a public official and are not considered public records.

(n) "Public official" means:

(1) an individual holding an office created by the Constitution of the State of Indiana, by act or resolution of the general assembly, or by the governor;

(2) all officers of the executive and administrative branch of state or local government; and

(3) all other officers, heads, presidents, or chairpersons of agencies of state or local government.

(o) "Record" means all documentation of the informational, communicative, or decision making processes of state and local government, its agencies and subdivisions made or received by any agency of state and local government or its employees in connection with the transaction of public business or government functions, which documentation is created, received, retained, maintained, or filed by that agency or local government or its successors as evidence of its activities or because of the informational value of the data in the documentation, and which is generated on:

(1) paper or paper substitutes;

(2) photographic or chemically based media;

(3) magnetic, electronic, or machine readable media; or

(4) any other materials, regardless of form or characteristics.

(p) "Records center" means a program maintained by the administration primarily for the storage, processing, retrieving, servicing, and security of government records that must be retained for varying periods of time but should not be maintained in an agency's office equipment or space.

(q) "Records coordinator" means a person designated by an agency to serve as an information liaison person between the agency and the administration.

(r) "Records series" means documents or records that are filed in a unified arrangement and having similar physical characteristics or relating to a similar function or activity.

(s) "Retention schedule" means a set of instructions prescribing how long, where, and in what form a records series must be kept.

As added by Acts 1979, P.L.40, SEC.1. Amended by P.L.1-1999, SEC.7; P.L.84-2012, SEC.16; P.L.134-2012, SEC.22; P.L.171-2015, SEC.10.