The General Services Administration is going to lease thebuilding for national archival storage, mostly for keepingpermanent documents regarding military and government employees.The building will have 2.3 million cubic feet of storage space,with the ability to stack records 29 boxes high, says Bryan McGrawwith the National Archives.

The plan for the new building started in 2007, when GSAofficials proposed the construction of two buildings, for a totalof 900,000 square feet, in the St. Louis area. The new facilitieswere to replace two million square feet of storage where therecords are now kept, at the Federal Records Center at 9700 PageAve. and the National Archives building at 111 Winnebago St.

However, the decision was made to instead shrink the St. Louisfootprint to the Dunn Road property plan, and also construct the400,000-square-foot National Personnel Records Annex building inValmeyer, IL, a few miles south of St. Louis. The annex wascompleted in fall 2008. "Instead of breaking up the records bymilitary vs. civilian, we decided to keep the temporary records inIllinois. They're called temporary because we eventually dispose ofabout 97% of the millions of records." The Dunn Road facility,however, will house the permanent paper records that will never bedestroyed," McGraw tells GlobeSt.com.