Almost 80,000 items seem to be missing from the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library and Museum, according to an audit by the National Archives inspector general, the Los Angeles Times reported on its website Wednesday night.

The library, which is located in Simi Valley deposits 50 million pages of Reagan’s presidential documents, over 1.6 million photographs, a half a million feet of motion picture films and tens of thousands of audio and video tapes as well as personal papers collections and documents from Reagan’s eight years in office as governor of California.

"The audit was connected to an investigation into allegations that a former employee stole from the Reagan collection of gifts from foreign leaders and dignitaries but sloppy record-keeping has hindered the probe," Inspector General Paul Brachfield told the Times.

"We have been told by sources that a person who had access capability removed holdings. But we can't lock in as to what those may be," the inspector said in an interview, the Times reports.

The problem might be led to a lack of supervision and a “near universal” security breakdown that may have left the artifacts vulnerable. Moreover, a number of library volunteers said that they were called this summer to start a massive inventory but they were afraid that this project would take years until is finished.

National Archives representative Susan Cooper told the Times that the agency is working now on solving the case. She also added that many presidential libraries benefit from an unsatisfactory number of employees because of insufficient funding.

"Our resources are spread pretty thin. We are trying very hard to ameliorate this situation. We are looking at these recommendations and trying to put them into play," Cooper said.

"This report is a wake-up. These papers, records and other items have historical value and should be safeguarded for the education and benefit of future generations of Americans," Sen. Charles E. Grassley said in a statement for the Times, referring to the danger that lays in the superficial supervision.