4-25-11

It's definitely Spring in the office which meant one thing; SPRING CLEANING! So I came in and helped get out forms to everyone in the last 3 years who had participated in any Farm Bill Funding programs. This basically entailed searching through a lot of filing cabinets to collect all the emails I could find. Once I wrote the list and prepared it to be mailed out the next day, it was on to the cleaning. The NRCS shares an office with the RCD and when your boss has been there for 25 years, things definitely begin to accumulate. The "conference room" had become a storage room to signs used by the RCD and years and years of files. I worked with Angie and John to move the 10 ft long RCD sign into the room and then began the long process of going through paperwork. Apparently, after a certain amount of years, most the files from the NRCS are supposed to be shipped to storage somewhere on the east coast. So we had to be really careful on what we threw out. There was also a lot of strange things we found. There were weird publications, still relevant today, and waders, and even my boss' old modeling resume. Eventually, we found paperwork that was no longer required but was confidential. There are occasionally times where I see how working for the federal branch varies from any other job. I ended up on staple removing and shredding for the rest of the day. Clearly, this was not the most educational day or fun day, but it was necessary. It shows the need to stay organized especially when you are required to keep paper files. But mostly it was a history into this organization and the kind of work they have produced over the years. There was a lot pertaining to issues that are still occuring today and shows that environmental work is a continued process in educating people and encouraging them to become better stewards of the land.