As 2025 was drawing to close, the Iowa Department of Administrative Services (DAS) finally issued its response to a petition submitted at the end of October that asked the department to reverse its decision to close the State Historical Society of Iowa (SHSI) research center in Iowa City. As expected, DAS rejected the request in a declaratory order issued on Dec. 30.
The Iowa City research center, which has been located in the downtown Centennial Building since 1956, closed its doors to the public, possibly for the final time, the next day.
The Dec. 31 closing date had been scheduled since SHSI, a division of DAS, announced in June it was closing the Iowa City facility, claiming it was a cost-saving measure needed to address an unexpected budget shortfall. At the time, State Archivist Tony Jahn said about 40 percent of the thousands of books, letters, photographs and other archival documents would be transferred to the Des Moines archives facility. Neither Jahn, SHSI nor DAS has offered a clear explanation of how the rest of the collection will be disposed of.
The decision by DAS to close the Centennial Building and disperse its archival collections was made with no public input, and without even consulting the SHSI board of trustees.
The 17 people who filed the petition with DAS are the same group of historians, archivists, family members of people who donated material to the SHSI with the understanding it was to be kept in the Iowa City facility, and other concerned citizens, who are suing DAS in an effort to stop the dismantling of the Centennial Building archives.
That lawsuit, Stromquist et al. v. SHSI et al., argues the closure violates the section of Iowa Code requiring SHSI to maintain an Iowa City research facility, state administrative rules and a legal settlement SHSI entered into in 1983. The lawsuit has support from numerous scholars and professional organizations, including the American Council of Learned Societies, the Society of American Archivists and the American Historical Association.
At the first hearing in the case on Oct. 14, Assistant Attorney General Kevin Protzmann, representing SHSI and DAS, argued the lawsuit should be dismissed, because the plaintiffs had not exhausted the administrative remedies available before suing. According to Protzmann, the plaintiffs should have begun by requesting a declaratory order from DAS.
“They jumped the gun by filing the petition,” Protzmann told the judge as he asked to have the lawsuit dismissed.
James Larew, the attorney for the plaintiffs, argued that time was of the essence and a temporary injunction was needed to stop the dismantling of the Iowa City facility and the possibility of damage being done to irreplaceable archival materials. SHSI was not following basic professional standards for moving archival collections or disposing of materials. Getting a declaratory judgment from DAS would take at least a month. Two weeks before the hearing, DAS began removing material from the Centennial Building, using incarcerated workers from Iowa Prison Industries, who were not given any training in how to handle delicate archival collections.
“The law does not require citizens to act in futility,” Larew said, rejecting the state’s argument that the petitioners must wait on a declaratory order from DAS while possibly irreparable harm was already occurring.
In his decision issued on Oct. 24, Judge Kevin McKeever rejected the state’s motion to dismiss and granted a temporary injunction stopping the removal of any more material from the Centennial Building. McKeever found that the plaintiffs were likely to succeed in the lawsuit seeking to overturn the decision to close the Centennial Building.
Chapter 8 of Iowa Code mandates that SHSI “shall … Maintain research centers in Des Moines and Iowa City,” and in his ruling, McKeever wrote, “The plain language of the statute does not appear to make maintaining a research center in Iowa City optional.”
The week after the injunction was issued, the 17 plaintiffs filed their petition with DAS. In its Dec. 30 response, DAS asserts there is no plain language in Iowa Code about SHSI maintaining “research centers in Des Moines and Iowa City.”
“The term ‘research center’ is not defined in Iowa Code ch. 8A,” DAS deputy director and general counsel Nathan Reckman wrote. Because it is not defined, DAS can substitute “an online research center” with a “digital collection of historical manuscripts, documents, records, reports, images, and artifacts” for the research center in Iowa City, according to Reckman.
The petitioners also cited another section of Iowa Code that states DAS may “accept gifts and bequests which shall be used in accordance with the desires of the donor if expressed.” Accompanying the petition were statements from family members of deceased donors of archival material testifying that that material had been bequeathed to the SHSI on the understanding that it would be kept at the Iowa City research center and made available to the public.
According to Reckman, those family members lack the standing needed to direct how the donated material is used. Only the deceased donors could do that.
Following the state’s administrative procedures, the petitioners will file an appeal of DAS’s decision in Johnson County District Court.
The Dec. 30 declaratory order wasn’t the only action DAS took last month to further its goal of eliminating the Iowa City research facility. On Dec. 9, the department filed a bill to be introduced in the Iowa Legislature when this year’s session begins on Jan. 12. The bill would strike the existing section about research centers in Des Moines and Iowa City, replacing it with, “Maintain a research center in Des Moines.”
In the “Explanation” section of the bill, DAS concedes it is currently required to maintain an Iowa City research facility: “Under current law, the department of administrative services must maintain historical resource research centers in Des Moines and Iowa City. This bill strikes the requirement that the department maintain such a research center in Iowa City.”
The DAS bill won’t be the only one addressing the fate of the Iowa City research facility introduced in the new legislative session. Rep. Adam Zabner of Iowa City and Rep. Dave Jacoby of Coralville, both Democrats, along with Rep. Bobby Kaufmann, a Republican from Wilton and the majority leader in the Iowa House, will introduce a bill to overturn DAS’s decision to close the Centennial Building.
In the meantime, the lawsuit against the closure continues and the temporary injunction remains in place. Although the public can no longer enter the Centennial Building, some of the Iowa City research facility’s material can be accessed thanks to an agreement between the University of Iowa and SHSI announced last month. SHSI said people would be able to request “select historical documents and images” that will then be made available through the UI Special Collections and Archives Reading Room.
“The agreement is similar to an interlibrary loan in practice, where requested materials will move from one repository to another upon request from a researcher or member of the public for a limited and defined period of time,” according to SHSI.
