You might refer management to the ICOM Code of Professional Ethics for
Museums (http://palimpsest.stanford.edu/icom/ethics.html0) article 4.3,
quoted below:

4.3. De-accessioning Policies and Procedures

     Where a museum has the necessary legal powers to dispose of an
object the decision to sell or otherwise dispose of material from the
collections should only be taken after due consideration, and such
material should be offered first, by exchange, gift or private treaty
sale, to other museums before sale by public auction or other means is
considered. A decision to dispose of a specimen or work of art, whether
by exchange, sale or destruction (in the case of an item too badly
damaged or deteriorated to be restorable) should be the responsibility
of the governing body of the museum, not of the curator of the
collection concerned acting alone. Full records should be kept of all
such decisions and the objects involved, and proper arrangements made
for the preservation and/or transfer, as appropriate, of the
documentation relating to the object concerned, including photographic
records where practicable.

     Neither members of staff, nor members of the governing bodies, or
members of their families or close associates, should ever be permitted
to purchase objects that have been de-accessioned from a collection.
Similarly, no such person should be permitted to appropriate in any way
items from the museum collections, even temporarily, to any personal
collection or for any kind of personal use.

--
Susan B.F. Wageman
Evaluation Manager                       [log in to unmask]
The Tech Museum of Innovation            408-795-6303
201 South Market Street                  fax: 408-279-7167
San Jose, California USA 95113           http://www.thetech.org

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