Government Documents

They are publications that originate in or are sponsored by a government agency at the local, state, national, or international level. This, of course, encompasses a huge amount of material.

This Library is a select Depository for about 45% of the publications available from the U.S. Government Printing Office. We are a depository for all State of Alaska publications, and for the Municipality of Anchorage. We also have some documents from other local governments in Alaska. We do not systematically collect from other states or localities; but we do coincidentally have a fair number of Lower 48 state and local documents found in some of our special collections, such as ERIC (Educational Resources Information Center). All the Alaska-related material can be found in the main library catalog, and will be on the shelves in the Alaska Collection. Beyond this, we have indexes for United Nations (U.N.) and Canadian documents, but few of the actual documents.

The most important documents will be found in the Joint Library Catalog which can be accessed through the Consortium Library’s webpage.  Most all of the documents received in the past 10 years can be found in this way.  Before that, we estimate that half of the older documents are listed in the catalog. 

If you do not find an older document in the catalog, please discuss the matter with staff.  Using the Joint Library Catalog will satisfy most student research needs.  A classic index of enduring value is the Catalog of U. S. Government Publications (CGP), first published in 1895, and now in electronic format via GPO Access (http://catalog.gpo.gov/F). This index will identify many thousands of documents not in our local catalog, and nearly anything you find in this index can be borrowed from another library for your use. 

Beyond the Joint Catalog and the CGP, there are many specialized government-sponsored and privately published indexes that can help, and we have many of them either in paper or online.  When you encounter difficulties, your best finding tool is the library’s reference and documents staff.  We can help sort through the obstacles until you reach your goal.

Our depository status goes back to 1961, when the government started sending what we requested from publications lists. Since 1973, when we moved into the Consortium building, we have greatly expanded our selections. With about 425,000 documents, we are the second largest collection in the state, after the Rasmuson Library at the University of Alaska Fairbanks. We obtain materials of research value to our students, faculty, and the Anchorage community. The documents librarian adjusts the subscription list once a year, in the early summer, and will be glad to receive your recommendations. In addition, we have made some major backfile purchases, including a microfiche edition of the Serial Set, which contains the reports and other documents of the Congress back to 1789. Another purchase is CIS U.S. Executive Branch Documents 1789 - 1909. Please review the list of Congressional Information Service (CIS) Publications in Alaska for more information.

The documents staff are in Rooms 211E and 211F, on the north side of the second floor in the old wing, near the skylight. If no one is there to help you, please go to the Reference Desk. Anyone on duty there has some fundamental experience with documents and can be helpful. The telephone numbers for documents service are 786-1874, 786-1974, or 786-1848.

Yes. Any local, state, or federal document not marked REF can be checked out on the same basis as other material. If the document is on fiche or film, you may read it in the Library or make copies in the Copy Room near the Circulation Desk.

Yes. Both the Alaska Resources Library and Information Services (ARLIS) and the Anchorage Law Library are federal depositories. Although collecting far fewer documents than the Consortium Library, they do specialize in more depth in some areas. Loussac Library (Anchorage Municipal Library) is a patent depository and has access to a computerized patent system from the U.S. Patent Office. Loussac also has a large microfiche collection of documents from other American cities.