IGS Library

Library

The IGS Library is one of the nation’s major collections in public administration, public affairs, and public policy. The library holds more than 400,000 volumes and is a depository for California local government documents.

Historical Bay Area Newspapers

The IGS Library has a unique collection Bay Area community newspapers in print, spanning the early 20th century through the mid-1970s. The following is a selected list of these newpapers, noting that runs are incomplete.

Many issues are available on-site and can be paged on-demand. Materials housed off-site at the Systemwide Shared Library Facility - North (SLF-N) need to be requested; allow 1 to 3 days for SLF-N requested materials to be available.

Please visit the IGS Library circulation...

A look back in time to understand our present: California local government publications from the 1976 Bicentennial

July 6, 2026
Paul D King

As the United States celebrates its 250th anniversary, it is the perfect moment to look back fifty years to the nation’s previous milestone: the 1976 Bicentennial.

Through the lens of the California Local Government Documents Digitization Collection, we can explore a range of the pressing issues that shaped local governance at the time. Across the...

Rails Across the Bay: Exploring a Forgotten Transportation Future

June 2, 2026
Kyra Eyerman

My role as a Digitization Technician here at IGSL involves manually digitizing local government documents page by page. At face value, government documents might appear trivial to the untrained eye, but in working with our collection I have been struck by the idea that all the little things that affect everyday life that we often take for granted in our cities, from the sounds we hear to the air we breathe, are the result of deliberate engineering and policy decisions, often made long before their full impacts were understood.

I was particularly captivated by the...

LoCALDig Project: One Million Pages and Counting!

May 5, 2026
Paul D King

As we approach summer, the IGS LoCAL Digitization Project is reaching a series of significant milestones. In just two years, the project has grown into a substantial digital collection, representing hundreds of cities and counties and capturing decades of local policy decisions. Few comparable archives of local government materials exist at this scale in a fully accessible digital format.

We officially reached our one millionth page digitized in March 2026! This page, from the...

California Local Government Pamphlets: Early Municipal Governance in Practice

January 9, 2026
Paul King

Rules (Including Classification) of the Civil Service Commission, City of San Diego, California
As...

Undocumented Immigrants in California: Evidence from Local Government Publications

February 26, 2026
Paul King
Undocumented Immigrants in California: Evidence from Local Government Publications

Undocumented immigration is among the most debated public policy issues in the United States. Estimates[1] from the Pew Research Center place the undocumented population at approximately 14 million nationwide as of 2023. California has long been central to discussions around undocumented...

Reading the Covers: Community and Change in Local Government Documents

April 10, 2026
Paul D King
Reading the Covers: Community and Change in Local Government Documents

As we digitize local government documents, certain cover designs begin to stand out. Many public documents follow a familiar pattern of cover imagery: text-heavy, highly formal, and primarily functional. However, in many documents produced after the late 1960’s, a different visual approach emerges: Children’s drawings, bright colors, scenes of families and neighborhoods, and other imagery that feel less formal and more approachable.

By the late 1960s, public attitudes...

Proposition 50: Redistricting

Proposition 50: Authorizes temporary changes to congressional district maps in Response to Texas's partisan redistricting. Legislative Statute. Additional Titles: The Election Rigging Response Act (2025-26 ACA 8) Use of Legislative Congressional Redistricting Map Amendment Summary

This measure was placed on the ballot by the State Legislature, see ...

November 4, 2025 Special Election

2025 Qualified Statewide Ballot Measure Proposition Endorsements Title Yes votes No votes Proposition 50 - Authorizes Temporary Changes to Congressional District Maps in Response to Texas' Partisan Redistricting 7,453,339 or 64.4% 4,116,998 or 35.6% Final votes counts are posted once the CA Secretary of State has certified the results, which can take up to...