Midwest Region: Systemwide Archeological Inventory Program Plan

Since its inception, the National Park Service (NPS) has had an important role in preserving and protecting the nation’s cultural heritage. Archeological resources, which are an important part of this cultural heritage, are present in most units of the National Park System, and many units have been created specifically to interpret and preserve archeological resources. Like all federal agencies, the NPS is obligated by the National Historic Preservation Act [Section 110 (a)(2)], Executive Order 11593, and Section 14 of the Archeological Resources Protection Act to identify, evaluate, preserve, and protect historic properties, including archeological sites. However, a 1991 Management Control Review of the NPS archeological program identified a critical high-risk material weakness in the basic inventory accountability of archeological resources on park lands. In short, the review indicated that the NPS simply does not know what its archeological resources consist of—their numbers, their locations, their significance—and consequently, NPS personnel cannot make informed judgments about their proper management. Under the National Archeological Survey Initiative, an NPS task force created SAIP, the Systemwide Archeological Inventory Program (Aubry et al. 1992), a long-term approach to the objective of inventorying archeological resources on park lands. The program is intended to provide a framework for systematic, scientific research that locates, evaluates, and documents archeological resources. The importance of the SAIP is that it emphasizes research within a cultural resources management framework. The purpose, structure, and requirements of the SAIP have been published (Aubry et al. 1992), and each NPS region is required to develop a regional plan to implement this program. This document represents the plan for the Midwest Region.