Vento's campaign files document both his state legislative and congressional campaigns. The files are organized chronologically by election year, and are further arranged alphabetically thereunder by file title. Files within each election year typically include Vento's candidacy announcement, samples of campaign literature, endorsements by special interest groups, responses to special interest group questionnaires, fund-raising and financial records, news clippings and public relations materials, district voter surveys and analyses, Vento's legislative voting record, position statements, recordings of broadcast candidate debates, and sound and video recordings of campaign advertisements.

A few election years also include materials and information pertaining to Vento's opposition. The most notable of these include materials regarding complaints filed by Republican challenger Ian Maitland with the Federal Elections Commission in 1988 and 1990 concerning his allegations about unfair campaign practices.

A small set of financial disclosure reports that were kept together over various campaigns are filed together following the election year files. These materials include reports filed with the State Ethical Practices Board and the Federal Election Commission.

Includes daily schedules for both Vento's district office in St. Paul and his Washington, D.C. office. Each office had maintained duplicate sets. These sets were weeded during processing and only the latest version of any given date was retained. The schedules are arranged chronologically and are filed by office of origin thereunder.

Includes materials pertaining to Congressional delegations and to U.S.-European Parliamentary meetings.

The legislative profiles provide a brief summary of each of the measures that Vento sponsored and cosponsored during each legislative session. The profiles list House bill number, bill title, introduction date, committee referrals, and latest status of each measure. The profile for the 95th legislative session was prepared by the House Information Systems of the Committee on House Administration. Profiles for the 96th through the 103rd sessions of Congress were prepared by the Office of the Clerk of the Office of Legislative Affairs. Profiles for the 105th and 106th sessions are not included.

This file set contains printed copies of bills that Vento introduced or cosponsored. The bills are arranged chronologically by Congressional session and are filed by bill number within each session. Resolutions are filed within each session following legislative bills. Individual bills may be accompanied by legislative tracking reports, section-by-section analyses, excerpts from the Congressional Record of Vento's floor statements and extensions of remarks, committee testimony, Dear Colleague letters, correspondence, and press releases.

Arranged chronologically from 1977 through 1998 and topically between 1999 and 2000, this file set contains both Dear Colleague and Cosign letters. Dear Colleague letters were sent between members of Congress asking for co-sponsorship or support of particular bills. Cosign letters were variously addressed to the President, cabinet members, House speaker, committee chairs, or federal agency administrators and were signed by any number of members of Congress to express their opinion on particular policy or regulatory issues.

Some years are divided into folders containing those letters that Vento originated separate from those originated by other House members that Vento cosponsored or cosigned. Responses to these letters may also be included. Contents within folders may appear in reverse chronological order.

Correspondence with House legislative Counsel and constituents concerning proposed legislation that Vento intended to introduce during his first House term.

An incomplete chronological set of memoranda written by legislative aide Kirsten Johnson-Obey regarding upcoming floor debates, opposition bills, and meetings with constituents and lobbying groups. Some of the memoranda include Vento's replies. Additional staff memoranda are filed with the appropriate subject matter.

This portion of the papers represents Vento's tenure throughout the 95th to the 106th Congress on the Banking and Financial Services Committee. Assigned to this committee during his first term, Vento initially served on subcommittees responsible for consumer affairs, economic stabilization, and international trade. Beginning in his second term and continuing thereafter, Vento served on the Subcommittee on Housing and Community Development. During his third term Vento also began serving on the Subcommittee on Financial Institutions Supervision, Regulation, and Insurance. In 1995 he became the ranking member of this body, then known as the Subcommittee on Financial Institutions and Consumer Credit. These assignments focused on consumer protections and banking industry regulation. Recurring topics throughout the series include consumer credit, financial institutions and services, housing, insurance, and community development.

The papers in this section consist primarily of bill files that document the legislative process and political strategies associated with banking and financial services issues. Although the files were not kept in a manner that maintained distinctions between Vento's subcommittee assignments, the files are organized into topical sets that reflect these assignments as well as Vento's specific interests and responsibilities.

The first set most closely parallels those matters that came before the Subcommittee on Financial Institutions and Consumer Credit. Sets on housing and homelessness parallel Vento's work on the Housing and Community Development Subcommittee. Additional sets pertain to Minnesota projects and events, an Amhoist manufacturing facility in St. Paul, and oversight of the Resolution Trust Corporation.

The first three sets are arranged in chronological order by legislative session. Under each session the folders are arranged in alphabetical order by file title. Files were more typically titled after topical matters than particular bills because issues were often addressed under several proposals. Whenever possible, bill numbers were added to file titles. Files regarding Minnesota projects and events and the Resolution Trust Corporation Task Force are simply arranged in alphabetical order.

File contents include staff memoranda and e-mails, committee correspondence, government agency correspondence, bill drafts, printed bills, section-by-section analyses, public hearing transcripts and exhibits, issue briefs, budget analyses, amendments and subcommittee mark-up, committee reports, press releases, printed materials, background information, and news clippings. Large portions of the content represent the work of Vento's legislative aides. The staff members most closely associated with the Banking and Financial Services Committee were Steve Judge, Kirsten Johnson-Obey, Larry Romans, and Marc Smith.

Prominent issues throughout the first set include interstate banking regulation, information technology, financial services modernization, consumer privacy, identity theft, regulatory relief, and the Community Reinvestment Act. Many of the files relate to the large-scale failure of saving and loans associations during the late 1980s, particularly to the consequent passage of the Financial Institutions Reform, Recovery and Enforcement Act, the creation of the Resolution Trust Corporation, and the recapitalization of federal deposit insurance funds.

The Housing set spans the period from 1977 to 2000 and documents Vento's advocacy of affordable housing issues. Included are bill files regarding federal insurance and mortgage programs, public housing policy, community development appropriations, and the Real Estate Settlement procedures Act.

Files regarding Vento's work on homelessness begin in 1985 and continue through 2000. His concern for homeless issues was a natural extension of his work on housing matters. Information included within these files ranges from the reuse of government properties and insolvent thrift assets for shelter facilities to health care, hunger, education, employment, and poverty. These files document the successful passage of the omnibus Stewart B. McKinney Homeless Assistance Act in 1988 (PL 100-628) and its subsequent reauthorizations. Vento's staff touted this achievement as "the only social program passed during the Reagan era." Files from the 103rd Congress document Vento's chairmanship of the Speaker's Task Force on Homelessness, a study group organized at the request of President Clinton. The file on veterans provides information regarding Vento's leadership on issues unique to veterans of the armed forces. This file documents House passage of the Stand Down Authorization Act, a bill Vento introduced in 1997 that enabled the Veterans Administration to expand outreach assistance.

Subject files regarding Minnesota projects and events cover a broad spectrum of local housing and community development programs and projects. Files regarding Amhoist concern the company's decision to relocate its Twin Cities area manufactory to another state despite its receipt of community development grants.

Passage of the Financial Institutions Reform, Recovery, and Enforcement Act in 1989 established the Resolution Trust Corporation. This agency was formed under the management of the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation to liquidate the assets of insolvent savings and loans associations and to repay insured depositors. To oversee these activities, the House Subcommittee on Financial Institutions Supervision, Regulation and Insurance created the Resolution Trust Corporation Task Force and appointed Vento as its chairman. Files that resulted from Vento's chairmanship document the activities of the task force as well as the plans, operations, and oversight of the trust.

The General Issues focus on national economic, education, energy, health, labor, military, and political issues of enduring or emerging importance during Vento's congressional tenure. A few of the files pertain to particular bills, but, for the most part, the files represent a set of subject-oriented information. The contents include staff memoranda, correspondence, printed bills, and background information.

The files are simply arranged in alphabetical order by title. Topics include earth sheltered housing, ethanol, school violence, health care for the elderly, prescription drug costs, military technology, genetic engineering, organized labor, social security, tax code simplification, and tobacco. Issues particularly related to partisan politics include files on abortion, the balanced budget amendment, campaign finance reform, the Equal Rights Amendment, the impeachment proceedings against President Clinton, and the Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party.

This set of files was heavily weeded and only those that evidenced action or interest by Vento were retained. Files containing nothing more than background information or constituent correspondence were disposed. Additionally, case files that concerned third parties were also disposed.

Vento's files pertaining to International Affairs span the full term of his office but constitute only two and a half cubic feet. The issues documented by these files primarily concern U.S. humanitarian, economic, and military relations with other nations. Particular emphasis is on human rights issues and U.S. obligations to its Vietnam War era allies. While representing only a very small portion of Vento's papers these materials document some of Vento's deepest concerns and most significant achievements.

The files are arranged in alphabetical order by title. File titles typically correspond to the name of a country or region. Other files, however, such as those on drug control, immigration, or torture victims, have topical titles that concern affairs beyond any one particular nation. Contents within the files include staff memoranda, correspondence, bill drafts, printed material, and background information.

Files from the 1970s and 1980s appear to focus more on the role of U.S. economic and military aid than on human rights but all three issues are concurrent. Economic and military assistance matters are documented in files regarding paramilitary aid to rebel forces in Central America, peace in the Middle East, and the sale of fighter planes to Saudi Arabia. Vento's concern for human rights issues are particularly reflected in files concerning his resistance to Central American aid as well as in files about China's recognition of Taiwan, reparations to U.S. citizens of Japanese descent for World War II detentions, human rights violations in Poland, and apartheid in South Africa.

Information from the 1990s concentrates less on economic matters and more heavily on matters of social justice and human welfare. These files also reflect greater attention to the peacekeeping role of U.S. military aid. These themes are reflected in Vento's files regarding the Middle East and Israel, escalating trouble with sanctions against Iraq, and Vento's failed proposal to close the School of the Americas. Files regarding the Balkans pertain to a Congressional fact-finding mission that Vento directed in 1997 following the Dayton Peace Agreement. Information regarding China focuses upon open trade relations and human rights issues.

The largest, and perhaps most significant, portion of Vento's International Affairs files are those regarding U.S. relations with Laos and the Hmong people. These materials center on the plight of Hmong refugees from the Vietnam War, human rights abuses in Laos, and U.S. immigration and naturalization policies. Among the achievements documented by these files is the successful passage of H.R. 371 introduced by Vento in both 1997 and 1999. Enacted by the 106th Congress as P.L. 106-207, the Hmong Veterans Naturalization Act waived the English language requirement for the naturalization of immigrant Hmong veterans and their spouses.

The file on Lao-Hmong human rights provides information about Vento's introduction of H. Res. 169. Vento raised this resolution in response to the reported abduction of Houa Ly and Michael Vang by Laotian security guards along the border between Thailand and Laos on April 19, 1999. Agreed to on November 16, 1999, the measure condemned the Communist regime in Laos for its many human rights abuses and called upon the Laotian government to commit to internationally recognized rights and freedoms and to investigate the disappearance of Ly and Vang.

This set of subject files contains information concerning issues of particular concern to the state of Minnesota and to Vento's district. There are files pertaining to businesses and industries, buildings, bridges, flood management, public lands, power utilities, and Native American populations in Minnesota.

For files regarding particular housing and community development projects in the Saint Paul area, see the set on Minnesota projects and events within the Committee on Banking and Financial Services.

For files regarding the regulation and administration of public lands, forests, and waterways in Minnesota, see the set on Minnesota Resources within the Committee on Resources.

The Twin Cities Army Ammunition Plant (TCAAP) is a 2,370-acres site located in northern Ramsey County, Minnesota. Federal Cartridge Corporation built the plant in 1941 under a grant from the U.S. Army for the manufacture of small caliber ammunition. 16.5 billion rounds of ammunition were manufactured and tested at the site during the period between World War II and the Vietnam War until the plant ceased production in the late 1970s. Since then the Minnesota National Guard has used approximately 1200 acres on the east portion of the property for training purposes.

In 1978, the U.S. Army Toxic Hazardous Materials Agency prepared a report that described waste handling, treatment, storage, and disposal activities at the site. This report indicated that areas of the site had been used since its inception for the disposal of waste solvents, acids, caustics, heavy metals, and other production wastes. The state's Attorney General's office became aware of the report in 1981 and launched a series of investigations into hydrologic, geologic and contaminant conditions at the site. Findings showed that the soil, surface waters, and ground waters on the property were contaminated, along with private, municipal, and commercial wells in the nearby vicinity.

In 1987, the state was prepared to file a civil suit to establish liability for and recover damages caused by contamination released at the site. The potential defendants in the case included the United States of America, U.S. Department of Defense, U.S. Department of the Army, and private corporations, Federal-Hoffman, Inc., and Honeywell, Inc. The latter had conducted operations at the site since 1958. The state was also prepared to sue Federal-Hoffman, Inc. and Honeywell, Inc. for violations of the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act, Clean Water Act, and Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act. Before the case went to court, however, an out of court settlement was reached between the State of Minnesota, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, and the U.S. Army.

In the mid-1990s the Secretary of the Army and the General Services Administration began to consider plans for divesting Army ownership of the site. On August 30, 1994 at the request of the U.S. Army and the General Services Administration, Vento formed a committee to make recommendations for the future reutilization of the site. Members on the committee included local citizens as well as local representatives from business, economic development, homeless advocates, labor, environmental groups, school districts, city and county governments, the Minnesota National Guard, and state and federal agencies. The work of the committee resulted in a set of recommendations that have come to be known informally as "The Vento Plan." Recommended land uses included open space preservation of natural features and amenities, transportation, housing, retail, and business development.

On October 13, 2000, three days following Vento's death, the General Services Administration held a public forum in Arden Hills, Minnesota to share information and solicit recommendations for the TCAAP divestiture process.

Vento's files on the Twin Cities Army Ammunition Plant include correspondence, staff memoranda, maps, meeting minutes, public comments, surveys, reports, plans, press releases, printed materials, and news clippings. Much of the contents were created by other governmental bodies, including the cities of New Brighton, Arden Hills, and Shoreview, the Minnesota Attorney General, the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency and the U.S. Army, Environmental Protection Agency, Department of Defense, and General Services Administration.

The files are arranged in two chronological periods. The first set, spanning the 1980s, is concerned with groundwater contamination in New Brighton. The second set spans the 1990s and is concerned with the environmental clean-up and potential reutilization of the site.

Additional materials pertaining to the Twin Cities Army Ammunition Plant are available in the Minnesota State Archives as files kept by the Environmental Protection Division of the Office of the Attorney General.

Files corresponding to Vento's tenure on the House Committee on Resources constitute nearly 30 cubic feet and are the largest section within Vento's papers. Vento was assigned to this committee (then known as the Committee on Interior and Insular Affairs) during his freshman term and was first appointed to subcommittees on water resources, energy, and Alaska lands. Beginning in his second term and continuing thereafter Vento also served on subcommittees responsible for national parks, forests, recreation, and public lands. This section focuses on the issues brought before these subcommittees and on Vento's term as chairman of the Subcommittee on National Parks, Forests, and Public Lands from 1985 through 1994.

Contents within the files include staff memoranda and e-mails, committee correspondence, congressional correspondence, department and agency correspondence, bill drafts, printed bills, section-by-section analyses, public hearing transcripts and exhibits, floor statements, maps, issue briefs, budget analyses, management plans, amendments and subcommittee mark-up, committee reports, field inspection itineraries, press releases, printed materials, background information, and news clippings. Large portions of the content represent the work of legislative aides. The staff members most closely associated with the Committee on Resources were Dale Crane, Lewis Crenshaw, Steve Francisco, Rick Healy, Terry Klein, and Larry Romans.

The Committee on Resources section is further organized into two sets. The first set consists primarily of bill files that span the 95th through the 106th Congress. These files are arranged in chronological order by legislative session. Within each session the files are arranged in alphabetical order by file title. Files were typically named after a topic, geographic place or topographic feature than a particular bill because issues were often addressed under several different proposals. Whenever possible, bill numbers were added to file titles to aid researchers interested in particular bill files.

The second set contains bill and subject files regarding Minnesota resources. These files are simply arranged in alphabetical order with subsets pertaining to the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness, the Metropolitan River Corridors Study Committee, the Mississippi National River and Recreation Area, the upper Mississippi River, the Saint Croix River, timber wolves, and Voyageurs National Park.

Files that date from the period before Vento chaired the Subcommittee on National Parks, Forests, and Public Lands principally focus on energy, water resources, and Alaskan lands. These files document both the energy crisis of the late 1970s and the conservation goals of the Carter administration. Regulation of coal, natural gas, oil, petroleum, electric power, nuclear power, and nuclear waste are prominent and recurring topics.

Vento's interest in parks and public lands developed during his first term. This interest is reflected in files regarding the establishment of the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness, wild and scenic river designations for the upper Mississippi and Saint Croix rivers, and a highly controversial Alaskan lands proposal introduced by Morris K. Udall. Udall's proposal for preservation of 64 million acres in Alaska, H.R. 39, gave priority to wilderness and subsistence use over sports and recreational use. Conflict between wilderness preservation, recreational access, land development, and industrial use is a recurrent theme throughout Vento's chairmanship on the national parks subcommittee.

Files dated 1985 and thereafter focus on the bills that came before the national parks subcommittee. Many of these bills concern the addition, enlargement, and management of specific features, regions, and sites. Others concern agency budget appropriations, military land withdrawals, land transfers and exchanges, and subcommittee field inspections. Specific issues that arose while Vento was chairman included air quality; military and commercial use of air space; endangered species; oil, gas, and mineral leases; grazing leases; logging; spotted owl habitat; all-terrain vehicles, snowmobiles, and motorized watercraft; rights of way; and fire management.

Later files specifically related to Alaskan lands include the Exxon Valdez oil spill and amendments to the Alaskan Native Claims Settlement Act. In 1991 Vento and 130 other cosponsors joined Robert J. Mrazek of New York to introduce H.J.Res. 239, a bill to recognize the conservation leadership of Morris K. Udall and to provide for permanent wilderness status for the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. This resolution failed to pass the 102nd Congress and Vento subsequently resubmitted this proposal every session thereafter to no avail. In sessions following Vento's death, Edward J. Markey of Massachusetts continued to champion this bill.