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Collections Policy

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USE OF COLLECTIONS

12. Loans. Materials from the research and exhibit/education collections may be loaned to or borrowed from other natural history museums, universities, and other appropriate public institutions for research and/or exhibition purposes. Objects shall not be lent to or borrowed from individuals except under exceptional circumstances and then only on the recommendation of the Curators / Collection Managers in charge. A record of all incoming and outgoing loans shall be maintained as part of the permanent records of the Museum.

13. Incoming Loans. Incoming loans shall be accepted only for purposes of research or exhibition under the following conditions:

  1. Incoming loans are to be requested and processed only by the Curators /Collection Managers in each division.
  2. Indefinite or long-term loans shall be accepted only when authorized in writing by the Director or his/her designee on recommendation of the staff.
  3. Incoming loans shall not be accepted if they do not meet the same standards set forth in Section 4--Ethics of Acquisition and 5--Laws Governing Acquisition above.
  4. While the loans are in our care, they will be handled, conserved, stored, and exhibited, as required by the lending institution or otherwise accorded the same professional care as if they were part of the Museum's collections.
  5. Objects sent to the Museum for forensic identification by law enforcement agencies constitute a special class of loans. Because they may be used as evidence in court cases, access to forensic objects must be limited to those Museum staff members directly involved in their identification so as not to jeopardize legal chain of custody. When not being examined, forensic evidence objects shall be stored in locked cabinets or other secure facilities.

14. Outgoing Loans. The Museum lends objects to qualified institutions for scholarly research and exhibition subject to the policies and practices consistent with each of the Museum's collections. However, the following conditions pertain to all outgoing loans:

  1. Before lending to individuals, the Curators / Collection Managers in charge must make every effort to seek an institutional affiliation or endorsement for that person.
  2. Objects requested by students require written faculty or institutional endorsement and will be considered the direct responsibility of the faculty member or institutional representative endorsing the request.
  3. Loans shall not be transferred by the borrower to any other institution or individual without prior written approval of the Curators / Collection Managers in charge. Exhibits & Public Programs may not transfer objects loaned from the Museum's research collections to another institution for exhibition without prior written approval of the Curators / Collection Managers in charge of the collection.
  4. The maximum duration of any loan shall be one year, but shall be subject to renewal at the discretion of the Curators / Collection Managers in charge.
  5. Objects shall not be loaned for destructive analysis except as provided in Section 16--Destructive Analysis below.
  6. The return of objects sent for forensic identification shall comply with the legal chain of custody procedures required by the law enforcement agency involved.
  7. Shipment of outgoing loans shall comply with labeling and permitting requirements of all applicable state and federal laws and international treaties, including the United States Endangered Species Act, the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act, the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora, and the UNESCO Convention of 1971. Domestic and international shipments of specimens in ethanol shall be made according to the Small Quantity Exceptions Provision of the U.S. Department of Transportation 49CFR 173.4, and the Excepted Quantity Provision of the International Air Transport Association.
  8. Loan of primary Types (e.g., holotypes) is at the discretion of the Curators / Collection Managers in charge and if loaned, must be sent/received only by traceable shipping method (e.g. UPS, FedEx).
  9. Outgoing loans from genetic resource collections shall require a signed agreement from the loan recipient that stipulates limits on intellectual property rights and commercial use of the genetic information derived from the loaned material, see 17--Commercial Use of Museum Objects below.

15. Access to Collections. During normal operating hours, the collections shall be accessible for legitimate research and study by responsible investigators, subject to procedures necessary to safeguard the objects and to restrictions imposed by limitations of space and facilities, exhibition requirements, and availability of appropriate curatorial staff.

Access to anthropological collections by representatives from Native American tribes and other indigenous peoples shall be available upon request and shall be subject to the same restrictions as research access.

16. Destructive Analysis. Since aspects of destructive analysis are related to Section 24--Disposal research involving destructive analysis is a specialized use and requires prior written approval of the Curators / Collection Managers in charge. The Museum's legal, professional, and moral obligation to maintain its collections for the public good extends even to destructive analysis.

Specialized uses of museum materials for destructive analysis include genetic and geochemical analyses, and anatomical and histological studies. Collections frequently affected by such requests for destructive analyses shall develop guidelines for destructive analyses, and include these with their loan forms when appropriate. Museum collections that have the specific goal of serving as repositories of genetic resources (e.g. frozen tissue collections) and, as such, routinely handle requests for destructive analysis are expected to implement loan request procedures that help balance current needs for access to those genetic resources with the value of preserving those materials for future use. However, destructive analysis of materials archived in genetic resource collections is not considered exceptional and all efforts should be made to honor requests that will likely yield significant scientific contributions.

When destructive analysis is appropriate, every effort should be made to limit destruction to less than the entire specimen and to return the remains so that they will continue to be available for research and education, as well as serve as a voucher of the specimen sampled.

Requests for destructive analysis must detail the specimens or materials required and the procedures to be conducted. Any remains from the analysis continue to be the property of the Museum unless other provisions are specifically allowed in writing (by the Curators / Collection Managers in charge) prior to destruction. In cases involving the dissection of biological specimens, the undestroyed component parts shall be returned to the collection along with associated identifying tags or marks. The data resulting from the destructive analysis shall be reported to the appropriate research collection and will be maintained with the records associated with the materials analyzed. At the discretion of the Curators / Collection Managers in charge, arrangements may be made to divide duplicate histological slides, genetic isolates or other similar preparations between the researcher and the collection.

17. Use in Exhibitions. The Museum places original, reconstructed, and duplicated objects from the collections on public exhibition. These objects remain the curatorial responsibility of the research collections from which they originated, and shall be treated in a manner consistent with the policies stated above. If the research Curators / Collection Managers in charge reasonably determines that exhibition will damage the objects, or is damaging the objects, from the research collection, the situation shall be remedied immediately. Such remedy may entail removal of the objects from exhibition with written approval of the research Curators / Collection Managers in charge and the Chairperson of Department of Natural History after consultation with the Head of Exhibits and Public Programs.

18. Commercial Use of Museum Objects. . The Museum collections normally are not available for commercial non-educational use. However, at the discretion of the Curators / Collection Managers in charge and with approval of the Director or his/her designee, objects may be made available for reproduction for commercial sale. The Curators / Collection Managers in charge and other Museum professionals shall be the judge of quality control, selections, and marketing with approval of the Director or his/her designee. Such commercial use shall be consistent with this collections policy. Copyright for reproduction of Museum objects shall remain the property of the Museum or the University of Florida Foundation, Inc. on behalf of the Museum (as dictated above in Section 2-- How Natural History Objects and Collections are Acquired) Outgoing loans from genetic resource collections shall require a signed agreement from the loan recipient that stipulates limits on intellectual property rights and commercial use of the genetic information derived from the loaned material. This agreement shall be consistent with the collections policy and with any other such use limits established by the collecting permits used to acquire the loaned material for the genetic resources collections.

PRIVATE COLLECTIONS

19. Conflicts Of Interest and Ethical Constraints. If a Curator, Collection Manager, technician, research assistant, student working in the Museum, or other Museum employee were to maintain a private collection in his or her professional field of interest, the temptation would be great to put particularly valuable objects in the private collection rather than in the Museum collection. Because of this potential conflict of interest, Museum employees are prohibited from having private scientific collections, or objects of scientific interest in collections that are in their professional field of interest.

Collections of natural history objects of primary scientific interest and associated field notes made by professional Museum employees with the use of Museum funds, direct or indirect, complete or partial, in the broadest sense, within the field of the persons employed, shall be Museum property, except as limited by conditions of the collecting/research permit. Similar collections made by other Museum employees outside their professional field of interest, and/or outside the areas in which the Museum has active interest or maintains curated collections, is permitted with the Museum reserving the option of first refusal. No authority shall be granted the Museum to restrain or restrict the principal investigator's use of his or her own field notes. Should the principal investigator leave the Museum staff, a complete archival copy of the field notes shall be left with the Museum.

Personal collections, where permitted by the above policy, may be amassed by Museum employees only through compliance with applicable state and federal laws and international treaties.

These restrictions also apply to anthropological type collections and synoptic collections in natural sciences. However, if a person leaves the Museum, such collections may then be made available to his or her new institution.

Objects in private collections made before association with the Museum, or before 18 September 1979 (when the U.S. ratified the UNESCO Convention), are exempt from the policy in this 'conflict of interest' section.

The private collections policies set forth in this section do not apply to volunteers, or to non-paid associates and courtesy appointments. However, such volunteers and honorary colleagues are prohibited from adding to their private collections any objects acquired as a result of their association with the Museum. This 'conflict of interest' policy shall be carried out with the best interests of the Museum in mind, recognizing the commitments of the Museum to the State of Florida and the professional interests of the individuals.

Any dispute arising from this section shall be resolved by the Collection and Space Committee, in consultation with the Department of Natural History Chair and the Museum Director.

DISPOSITIONS

20. Legal and Ethical Constraints. The Museum acts as custodian of objects for the broader benefits of society. This, at times, requires permanent removal of objects from the Museum. Such removal, i.e., transfers or disposals of objects involving even their physical destruction, is protected by FS § 240.515. The Museum's legal, professional, and moral obligation to maintain its collections for the public good extends even to dispositions. When dispositions are appropriate, every effort should be made to transfer objects to other museums or public institutions where they will continue to be available for research and education. See also Section 16--Destructive Analysis above. Such transactions must not profit individuals or private institutions. A record of all transfers and disposals shall be maintained as part of the permanent records of the Museum.

All of the provisions for disposition shall be consistent with the ethical and legal constraints set forth in Section 4--Ethics of Acquisition, 5--Laws Governing Acquisition, and 11--Curation, above. No transfer or disposal shall be made of any objects held by the Museum in trust [Using the word bond makes it sound like there is money involved and there should not be]. The deaccessioning of human remains and cultural objects for repatriation to Native American tribes is a specialized form of transfer mandated by federal law in the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act (NAGPRA). The Museum is committed to compliance with this legislation and has formed a Repatriation Advisory Committee to oversee the implementation of the federal regulations. As there is no statute of limitations associated with NAGPRA, this committee will be a permanent agency within the institution.

In addition, the Museum must comply with Florida laws dealing with unmarked human burials as set forth in Florida Statutes § 872.05 which requires, "...that all human burials and human skeletal remains be accorded equal treatment and respect based upon common human dignity without reference to ethnic origin, cultural background, or religious affiliation."

21. General Policy on Dispositions. Objects in the collections should be retained permanently if they continue to be useful to the purposes and activities of the Museum; if they continue to contribute to the integrity of the collections; and if they can be properly stored, preserved, and used. Upon the recommendation of the Curators / Collection Managers in charge, objects may be disposed of by formal deaccessioning when the above conditions no longer exist, or if it is determined that such action would ultimately improve or refine the collections, upon compliance with all legal requirements.

22. Recommendation of Curator Each object being considered for deaccessioning must meet the following criteria as evidenced by the Curators / Collection Managers in charge based upon one or more of the following:

Such deaccessions shall be made by transfer or disposal.

23. Transfer. Permanent transfers of scientifically or educationally valuable Museum accessioned objects may be recommended by the Curators / Collection Managers in charge in compliance with the statutes and regulations of the State of Florida. Except in extraordinary circumstances they shall be made only to other non-profit public institutions. Transfers to private individuals shall be made only when the Curators / Collection Managers in charge can demonstrate a benefit to the collection or Museum, and only after approval of the Director or his/her designee.

All objects or collections with a fair market value reasonably expected to be in excess of $5,000.00 shall require prior written approval of the Director or his/her designee before transfer from the Museum.

Some objects in the Museum's archaeological collections were acquired from United States federal agencies with the legal obligation to curate these objects in perpetuity. Before the Museum can dispose or transfer any such objects from federal agencies or any other collections that may have similar obligations/commitments/restrictions, the appropriate agency must agree in writing to the deaccessioning.

24. Disposal. Over the years, as standards of object documentation change, as the collections grow and objects suffer deterioration, biological and anthropological objects that formerly were a significant part of the research and exhibit/education collections may become surplus. Removal or culling of such objects from the research and exhibit/education collections is a continual and routine process. Special provisions are made in Florida Statutes § 1004.57(1) for the disposal of nonessential vertebrate fossils (see Appendix II).

Often these objects from the scientific collections are used in the Department of Exhibits and Public Programs education programs. If such objects are not needed by the Museum's public education programs, the Curators / Collection Managers in charge of the research collection may give them to appropriate educational institutions for use in teaching activities, or if no alternative exists, they may be discarded completely or destroyed. Such objects for disposal shall have all identifying marks and numbers removed from them and the disposal shall be noted in the appropriate research collection records by the Curators / Collection Managers in charge, offered first to the Department of Exhibits and Public Programs, and then disposed of in accordance with these guidelines. Objects shall not be given or sold privately to Museum employees or their relatives or representatives.

25. Sale. The collections are generally not for sale. In rare instances where specimens are to be disposed of because they are not appropriate for the collections, yet have substantial monetary value, a division may petition to allow the sale of specified specimens. Such sales will be limited to items that do not meet the collection's priorities for acquisitions, lack scientific value, and whose sale does not represent an ethical compromise. Decisions to sell such items will be made jointly by the relevant Curators / Collection, and needs to be approved by the Collections and Space Committee. In such cases, disposal of these collections may occur through sale of the collections. In accordance with the legal and ethical standards set forth by the Florida Museum of Natural History, the American Association of Museums, and standards in the field, the proceeds from any sale of collections will be used to purchase new collections, to acquire new collections by other means (e.g., collecting expeditions), or to improve curation of existing collections.

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