What is the best way to capture video files to be used for distribution?

We are starting up with a new distributor, and I need to give them the authored DVD files of the films that they will be distributing. We have DVDs that have been made for every film, but for some of the films we have, which had been part of a television series, the versions that we have on DVD all have bumpers and blacks in the middle of them, so they are not useable. I don't know where the versions without blacks are, so it looks like I'm going to have to just go in and cut out the bumpers and blacks myself, and re-export the files.

Now my question to you, the good people of the Creative Cow community, is what is the best way to do this? We have DVD and Mini DV versions of these films (which were shot in SD), does it make sense to use the files off of the DVD, or re-capture the MiniDV tapes? Or is there another/easier way to deal with this that I've overlooked?

Any help would be greatly appreciated!

Yup - what Steve said. Always avoid having to re-edit or capture something off of DVD if at all possible.