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I would ask the Bishop for permission to get the old clerks who should have shredded all this stuff to help you, but that's just me. Probably not authorized as they are not supposed to see the financial stuff any more.

A shredding sage update;

I asked the Stake Clerk about taking the discontinued Stake, documents to Office Depot.
He asked the FM group and was told that we are not allowed to take stuff to a third party and must shred everything in house.

The Stake Presidents 1st counselor was at this building on Sunday. He saw the huge pile (multiple Bankers boxes) and confirmed I could not take it out for shredding.

This is confidential stuff. Reports from the First Presidency about disciplinary actions with high council notes, full time missionary applications with medical information, old custodian payroll records with names and social security numbers. As well as Stake and the local church recreation facility financial records.

The Stake Clerk did offer to come by the building and help me shred (we've inherited multiple shredders from a ward combining, another wards relocation, and the discontinued Stakes office shredder).

Sincerely,
Woe is me

MurdockM wrote: ↑Tue Jan 28, 2025 1:18 pm He asked the FM group and they said we are not allowed to take stuff to a third party and must shred everything in house.

Hmmm. I'm not sure as FM has jurisdiction over that. Over the shredder you have, yes, but they are not in the Priesthood line of authority when it comes to these kinds of records. I'd be asking where is that written down.

MurdockM wrote: ↑Tue Jan 28, 2025 1:18 pm The stake Presidents 1st counselor was at this building on Sunday. (he was primary age in my ward when I was away on my mission ) saw the huge pile and confirmed I could not take it out for shredding.
His words, "So, you better get shredding".

I'd be asking - where is that written? I'd take up the counselor on his offer. The tune might change after the first box. <g>

Personally, I'm leery of turning over records where I'd have to go by faith that they will handle them properly. There are shredding companies that will do it right in front of you. Usually mobile ones. Keep in mind that not shredding carries risks too. Anyone with a key to that room can browse the files.

MurdockM wrote: ↑Tue Jan 28, 2025 1:18 pm old custodian payroll records with names and social security numbers. As well as Stake and local church recreation facility (Ensign Ranch) financial records.

Ok, that's going to be different. That's outside of what most units do and the retention rules (by law) could well be longer.

I did some searching in the Help Center. Retention of Records. Note the section "Confidential Records". Following the link on that page to File and Retain Expense Records, where I find:

For information about the use and retention of records and reports, clerks should refer to instructions from Church headquarters or the assigned administrative office.

I'd certainly call CHQ about the employment records as well as the recreational facility. The retention period for that could be closer to 10 years.

Just as I was closing some tabs from the research, I found the following:

2013.2 - General Records Retention and Disposition Schedule

And as a bonus: Church History Guides

Destroying documents in bulk, without industrial grade equipment, can definitely be a veryyyyyyy slowwwwww and tedious process.
Home/office shredders only handle a few sheets of paper at a time, easily jam, and overheat.
(One quickly gains appreciation for how fast that [unattended] multi-hour overwrite/wipe operation on a computer storage device really is, by comparison)

I'm not sure whether church policy permits record destruction to be outsourced. If it is permitted, I agree with @russellhltn that personally witnessing the document destruction (eg. shredding) is necessary vs. handing the box off to be shredded later. Stewardship of documents doesn't end until the documents are permanently destroyed.

Storing personal/confidential data (physically or digitally) carries responsibility and is increasingly becoming a landmine for organizations. Strictly follow the church's direction for data security and destruction.

For the future:
I imagine most physical documents in the church have moved to a digital format (managed by LCR?) If you still find yourself needing to store physical documents, I would recommend organizing them in the filing cabinent by year/month of their creation. Color code each folder/document label so you can see the document type just by thumbing through them. Regularly (each Fast Sunday?) check for documents that have expired per the church's current data destruction schedule and shred them on the spot.

It's nice to know we weren't the only ones who inherited decade+ old documents that needed attention

Our clerk was the only holdover when the rest of us newbies were called, and he was patient as we got settled with more pressing matters, and then finally prioritized data cleanup (in a smaller unit, it can be challenging just to keep your head above water, let alone make repairs to the ship). And it definitely took us a while. Almost as lengthy as the disposal, was the sheet-by-sheet review we decided to perform. There didn't end up being a lot of papers we retained, but we did find (sometimes randomly mixed into other groupings), a number of historical docs that we decided were worth keeping. A few we digitized and even made part of the unit history (building open house, building dedicatory prayer, etc), that nobody knew even existed. Other items like baptismal programs we gave to those members as keepsakes, and they were surprised and grateful for our efforts. And since I'm a bit of a history nerd, it was interesting to see some old church hq letters with different instructions, and consider how things have changed over the years...

It probably took us about a year to get fully through the shredding, and also the disposal of old manuals/booklets. We chose to simply ask the clerk to take a few minutes every time he was at church, and chip away in very small bites. Although daunting at first, when we just added a couple of minutes into each "church workday", it ended up not being overwhelming.

I should add, while I haven't found any evidence of a policy from Church Headquarters, it would be within a stake presidents or area authorities rights to make such a rule. But if I were being told that, I'd still like to know where the rule came from.