News Talk 94.1/AM 1600 Where The Upper Cumberland Talks
Putnam County is hiring a document imaging company to scan deeds dating back to 1854.
Putnam Register of Deeds John Sanders said that he had begun research on hiring outside help since he took office in November. Sanders said the scanning is primarily out of concern for the condition of over 100-year-old books.
“It’ll be a whole lot faster, our staff has actually been working on back scanning for several years in this office,” Sanders said. “And it’s just a slow process for them to be able to do that and so this will speed up the process.”
Sanders said that once the project begins US Imaging will bring veterans to work around the clock in 12-hour shifts. Sanders said that the company will also enhance the record images to be even easier to read than their real-world counterparts.
Sanders said that it was impossible to scan the books without delicate care because of the way they are bound. Sanders said that after researching several companies, he chose US Imaging because they offered to do work on-site. He said that it was important to him to not move the records out of concern for their fragile condition.
“We’ve all heard stories of people traveling with books or records like that and then potentially something gets lost of damaged or misplaced,” Sanders said. “It was just important to us to find someone to come on sight and do that so that we didn’t have any problems with our books being out of the courthouse.”
Sanders said that they are looking to begin scanning the records sometime before January 1st, 2024. Sanders said the process itself is expected to take 8 months at the most because of the amount of records.
“We’re looking at 103 warranty deed books and each book contains around 680 pages,” Sanders said. “It’s a pretty big job, it’s pretty intense for anybody to do.”
