What your clerk keeps, and for how long
Municipalities do not keep everything forever, and they are not allowed to throw things out when they feel like it. Both halves of that surprise people.
Every Clearwater municipality follows the General Retention Schedule issued by the Clearwater State Archives under Chapter 44. The schedule is not local policy. A town cannot decide to keep less, and cannot decide to keep more without saying so in writing.
Destruction on schedule is lawful and routine. Destruction ahead of schedule is a violation, and the State Archives investigates it.
Roughly what to expect
| What it is | How long it usually lives | |—|—| | Council minutes, ordinances, resolutions | Permanent | | Meeting agendas and notices | 3 years | | Meeting recordings, where the minutes are approved | 90 days after approval | | Budgets and audited financial statements | Permanent | | Invoices, purchase orders, receipts | 7 years | | Building permits and inspection files | Life of the structure | | Business and animal licences | 5 years | | Personnel files | 60 years from separation | | Job applications, unsuccessful | 2 years | | Election records, local | 22 months after certification | | Correspondence, routine | 2 years | | Drafts and working notes with no decision recorded | Until superseded |
This table is a summary for the public and is not the schedule. Clerks should work from the series numbers, not from this page.
Two things worth knowing
“Deleted” is not the same as “destroyed on schedule.” If you asked for something and were told it no longer exists, you are entitled to know which series it fell under and when it was disposed of. Municipalities log disposition. That log is itself a public record.
Email is not a category. An email is retained according to what it is — an email approving a change order is a contract record and lives seven years, while an email about the coffee fund is routine correspondence. This is the single most common misunderstanding in Clearwater local government, and it is the reason HB 1149 is being debated at all.
For members
The full schedule, the series numbers, the disposition log template and the 2027 revision crosswalk are in the members’ library.