Investigation into Bermuda Archives: statistics

• The Ombudsman launched her investigation in November after receiving six complaints about barriers to access at the Archives in the first half of 2008 — four from researchers and two from donors.

• She and her staff interviewed 111 people for the inquiry, made up of 62 local and overseas Archives users, 26 former and current staff, 14 senior civil servants and nine donors and non-users, including several experts.

• 76 percent of interviewees cited poor policies and guidelines as barriers to accessing material held at the Archives.

• 72 percent of users and staff experienced problems with research tools.

• 58 percent of users reported 'people' challenges of some form.

• 63 of 88 users and staff had concerns about the lack of a credible general catalogue and inadequate finding aids.

• 60 percent of users and staff praised director Karla Hayward's knowledge of the collections.

• 34 out of 62 users complained of her unhelpfulness and/or partiality.

• Almost 100 percent of those interviewed felt the director believed she was doing her best.

• There have been 13 grievances and complaints from six Archives staff in the past ten years.

• The Archives had 1,440 users in 2007, compared to 1,390 in the fiscal year 1999/2000.

• The public records held there date back to 1615.

• Private collections make up about 15 percent of the entire repository.

• It is believed that about 85 to 90 percent of the Archives' users are tracing family trees or working on college papers.

• The Ombudsman's report on the Archives — Atlantica Unlocked — cost $55,000 and took the best part of eight months to produce.