August 29, 2023
Dear Bipartisan Leaders of the House Appropriations Committee:
Representing the Ivy Plus Libraries Confederation comprised of 13 academic libraries, we write to express our strong opposition to Section 552 of the House Commerce, Justice, and Science Appropriations bill, which would block American taxpayers from immediately accessing the results of the more than $90 billion in scientific research that the US government funds each year. We urge you to remove this language from the final bill.
As representatives of libraries at institutions with high research output, we support our researchers in achieving the highest impact possible for their research results. There is a need for the United States to invest in the infrastructure that is the critical foundation for a more open system of research that will result in better, faster answers to the problems of our time.
Immediate access to this research will advance discovery, spur the economy, and accelerate innovation across the state and our nation, helping to address our shared priorities. The result will be faster progress toward curing diseases, preventing pandemics, mitigating the impacts of natural disasters, and improving public wellbeing.
The policy guidance outlined in the Office of Science and Technology Policy’s August 25, 2022, Memorandum is the culmination of many years of steady progress towards making research more openly available. It provides a much-needed update to strengthen U.S. policy that will bring our country to equal footing with governments across the world that have established strong open access policies to promote their national innovation agendas.
We hope you will remove any appropriations language that bars implementation of this important Office of Science & Technology Policy guidance that guarantees taxpayers immediate access to the results of research they fund.
Sincerely,
Joseph S. Meisel
Joukowsky Family University Librarian
Brown University
Torsten Reimer
University Librarian and Dean of the University Library
University of Chicago
Ann Thornton
Vice Provost and University Librarian
Columbia University
Elaine L. Westbrooks
Carl A. Kroch University Librarian
Cornell University
Susanne Mehrer
Dean of Libraries
Dartmouth College
Joseph Salem
Rita DiGiallonardo Holloway University Librarian and Vice Provost for Library Affairs
Duke University
Martha Whitehead
Vice President for the Harvard Library and University Librarian
Harvard University
Elisabeth M. Long
Sheridan Dean of University Libraries, Archives, and Museums
Johns Hopkins University
Chris Bourg
Director of Libraries
MIT
Constantia Constantinou
Carton Rogers III Vice Provost and Director of Libraries
University of Pennsylvania
Anne Jarvis
Dean of Libraries and Robert H. Taylor 1930
University Librarian Princeton University
Michael A. Keller
Vice Provost & University Librarian
Director of Academic Information Resources
Stanford University
Barbara Rockenbach
Stephen F. Gates ’68 University Librarian
Yale University