The Office of the Public Record Administrator requires that official public records meet minimum retention requirements prior to destruction, per the Disposition of Public Records Policy. If you have the official “record copy“, then you’ll need to determine how long you are required to keep a particular type of record by looking it up in the following state retention schedules:
Schedule 1: Administrative Records
Schedule 5: Higher Education Records
Schedule 6: Information Systems Records
Schedule 9: Library, Museum, Special Collection, and Archival Records
Schedule 10: Public Safety and Emergency Services Records
Users may also search for records across all state general record retention schedules at: https://atlas.ct.gov/Portal/pages/index.jsp.
PLEASE READ THE FOLLOWING:
In some cases, UConn has extended minimum retention requirements that surpass the state’s prescribed retention schedules. Notably, financial records that have a retention period on the state schedule of “3 years, or until audited, whichever is later” should be considered to have a University requirement of “7 years, or until audited, whichever is later,” from the date of the record, per request of the University Controller.
After both the state and any additional University retention periods are met, you must seek and receive destruction approval (see section on Destruction Authorization). Recall that the minimum retention and authorization requirements only apply to the official record copy. Convenience copies may generally be destroyed when no longer administratively valuable. Reach out for help in any stage of the process.
As stated on the retention schedules, no records may be destroyed if there are pending or active Freedom of Information (FOIA) requests; litigations; investigations; audits; or other cases, claims, or actions [OPRA, 2014].