Transforming Paper Archives into Searchable Digital Records

Client Overview: Town of Olds

The Town of Olds is a central Alberta municipality delivering services to residents through a range of departments, each carrying long-standing records obligations. Decades of those records were held in physical form.

Retrieving information meant locating boxes, folders, and individual files by hand — a process that became slower as the archive grew.

The Challenge

A substantial paper archive limited how quickly staff could find and use municipal information. Physical files could not be searched, shared, or backed up the way digital records can, and confidential documents required careful handling every time they were retrieved.

Key challenges included:

  • Time spent locating and retrieving files from physical storage
  • No ability to search records by content
  • Handling and protection requirements for confidential documents
  • Long-term preservation of aging paper
  • Ongoing dependence on physical storage space and paper-based workflows

 

Our Approach

Segue Systems and Xerox Digital Services delivered a full records conversion program covering the Town’s municipal document archive.

Records were packed, labelled, transported, verified, and stored under controlled conditions at an Alberta imaging facility. Preparation removed pages from folders and binders, removed fasteners, and applied separators and QR codes where required for high-volume scanning.

Documents were imaged at 300 dpi in black and white or grayscale, indexed using box and folder information, and processed with OCR to add a searchable text layer. Automated image cleanup and visual inspection supported quality control, and electronic output was structured by box and delivered through secure file transfer.

At the close of the project, the Town could choose short-term storage, return of the original records, preparation for long-term storage, or approved confidential destruction.

Impact & Outcomes

Decades of municipal records are now available to staff as searchable digital files.

  • Historical records can be located without retrieving physical boxes
  • OCR makes record content searchable, not just file names
  • Sensitive documents are handled under controlled, auditable processes
  • PDF/A output supports long-term archival preservation
  • Reliance on physical storage and paper-based retrieval is substantially reduced
  • The Town has a digital foundation for further records-management modernization

Technology Used

Xerox Digital Services Enterprise Scanning
Optical character recognition (OCR)
PDF/A Archival Output

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