Almost seven million authority control records have been loaded at INFOhio's Union Catalog and at the DASites participating in INFOhio's library automation program using DRA/MultiLIS. Authority Control standardizes search terms for author, organization or conference, uniform title, series, and subject headings. The old card catalog "see also" references are now much more specific. A subject search may direct to patron to related terms (RT), broader terms (BT), or narrower terms (NT).

INFOhio Authority Control Policies
The Union Catalog Task Force has established Authority Control Polices  which it suggests be adopted by all MultiLIS/DRA school libraries. They are intended to guide librarians, DASite Providers, and INFOhio Union Catalog staff in the cleanup and maintenance of authority entries. Please take a look at them and offer suggestions and/or comments.

1. Multiple thesauri
POLICY-- Only Library of Congress (LC) and Library of Congress Children (LCC) subject headings will be used at the Union Catalog.
RATIONALE-- Multiple thesauri result in duplicate headings, which is confusing to patrons. While many school librarians often prefer a Sears heading to a Library of Congress Children's heading, this preference can be accommodated via a cross reference from the more common term, often used by Sears, to the established Library of Congress term.

It was the consensus of the committee that the preference for Sears headings can best be accommodated in this way. Librarians who discover that an established Sears heading is preferred over an established LC or LCC heading should contact the Union Catalog Task Force co-chairs, who will create the cross reference in the LC/LCC authority record.

Although most school libraries cannot afford the Library of Congress Subject Headings, the INFOhio Union Catalog is a source of LC and LCC established authority headings, which librarians can utilize as a subject heading source. Periodically, unestablished headings will be extracted and sent to a vendor who will provide established MARC authority records for those headings. These will be loaded at both the Union Catalog and at the DASites.

Since the Union Catalog will be the provider of MARC authority records, it is highly recommended that all DASites and librarians adopt this policy.

2. LC subdivision "Juvenile Literature"
POLICY-- The subheading "juvenile literature" will be retained in LC subject headings. It will not be removed.
RATIONALE-- The presence of the subdivision "juvenile literature" can be useful in determining at the subject authority display which records are going to be appropriate for grades below high school. Because this subdivision is useful to some users, it will not be removed.

3. Duplication of LC and LCC headings.
POLICY-- Both authority headings will be retained. LC headings with the subdivision "Juvenile Literature" will be merged to the matching LCC heading. When both authorities appear within a single bibliographic record, the LCC heading will be retained as the preferred heading.
RATIONALE-- The (LCC) identifier as the source of the heading can be useful in determining at the subject authority display which records are appropriate for grades below high school. Because this is useful to some users, both authorities will be retained. To reduce the number of duplicate authorities, LC authorities with a subdivision "Juvenile Literature" will be merged to the matching LCC authority.

4. Contradictions between LC and LCC equivalent headings. i.e. headings accepted in one thesaurus are rejected in the other thesaurus.
POLICY-- The See reference will be changed to a See also reference in both the LC and the LCC heading, when both headings are deemed appropriate. Otherwise, LC authorities will be merged with LCC authorities. The LC authority will be removed so the conflicting heading will not be re-introduced.
RATIONALE-- The presence of both LC and LCC authority headings can result in conflicting "Use" references. (The term "use" replaces the old "see" cross-reference.) Headings are LC headings unless specified as LCC headings.

5. Foreign names
POLICY-- If no LC name authority exists, an authority for the Anglicized version of the name will be created with a "see from" for the native form of the name.
RATIONALE-- Since the Union Catalog is a database of MARC records for items used primarily in K-12 schools, name authorities that do not exist in the LC authority file and that must be created, will be created for the Anglicized version of the name with a See reference from the native form of the name.

6. Local headings
POLICY-- Local headings entered in the 690 tag will be stripped when imported into the Union Catalog.
RATIONALE-- Most local access needs should be accommodated via the MultiLIS subject keyword or document type field rather than the MARC record.

7. 653 tag used by Medianet sites
POLICY-- Per the INFOhio MARC Record Standards, tag 653 will be used by Medianet sites whose records reside in Bank 3 at the Union Catalog. This is an uncontrolled index term and will be stripped from records exported from the Union Catalog for importing into the local MultiLIS database at the DASite.