3. Importance of Uniformity. In today's national economy, uniformity of the policies and practices of the filing offices will reduce the costs of secured transactions substantially. The International Association of Corporate Administrators (IACA), referred to in subsection (b) [Maine cite subsection (2)], is an organization whose membership includes filing officers from every State. These individuals are responsible for the proper functioning of the Article 9 [Maine cite Article 9-A] filing system and have worked diligently to develop model filing-office rules, with a view toward efficiency and uniformity.

Although uniformity is an important desideratum, subsection (a) [Maine cite subsection (1)] affords considerable flexibility in the adoption of filing-office rules. Each State may adopt a version of subsection (a) [Maine cite subsection (1)] that reflects the desired relationship between the statewide filing office described in Section 9-501(a)(2) [Maine site 9-1501, subsection (1), paragraph (b)] and the local filing offices described in Section 9-501(a)(1) [Maine cite section 9-1501, subsection (1), paragraph (a)] and that takes into account the practices of its filing offices. Subsection (a) [Maine cite subsection (1)] need not designate a single official or agency to adopt rules applicable to all filing offices, and the rules applicable to the statewide filing office need not be identical to those applicable to the local filing office. For example, subsection (a) [Maine cite subsection (1)] might provide for the statewide filing office to adopt filing-office rules, and, if not prohibited by other law, the filing office might adopt one set of rules for itself and another for local offices. Or, subsection (a) [Maine cite subsection (1)] might designate one official or agency to adopt rules for the statewide filing office and another to adopt rules for local filing offices.

PART 6

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