| New York State Library |
The New York State Library accepts unsolicited materials on a restricted basis, generally only in the following categories:
The New York State Library will not accept any donation which has special conditions as to retention or treatment.
Exceptions to either of the above statements may be made in special circumstances. Approval for accepting such donations must be obtained from the Principal Librarians in Public Service or Collection Acquisition and Processing, or from the Director.
In the case of large collections offered by local New York State agencies, legislative offices, and local governments, New York State Library staff will visit the donor and assess the collections before they are accepted. If the donor is outside the Capital District, the New York State Library will search lists of the items offered or will accept appropriate collections.
The New York State Library does not generally solicit gifts or respond to offers (printed or electronic) from other libraries. Consideration must be given as to how the offered material will fill a gap in the collection or complement the Library's holdings.
Serial gift subscriptions must be approved in advance by the bibliographic selection staff, with the understanding that the titles will be purchased when the gift subscriptions lapse.
Gift materials are received in the Acquisitions/Gifts Unit or, in the case of government documents, the Documents Unit of CAP. The CAP units are responsible for routing appropriate non-duplicate materials to the bibliographic selection staff in the Public Services Unit for decisions about retention, location and disposal.
Master microfilm of newspapers is routed to the Preservation Unit to duplicate service copies. Service copies of newspaper microfilm are processed in the Acquisitions/Gifts Unit.
For donations of manuscripts, rare books, maps, and special collections, see the "Manuscript and Special Collections Development Policy" in section IV of this Policy.