Washington DC evacuation plan... for federal employees

[Declan McCullagh]

1. Government creates new Washington evacuation plan
By Jason Peckenpaugh

The federal government has created a new procedure for evacuating federal 
employees in Washington in the case of possible terrorist attacks on the 
nation's capital.

The protocol, which took effect in May, tells who can decide to evacuate 
federal employees from agencies and how the government will communicate the 
decision to employees and to city and state agencies that would be affected 
by a mass exodus of civil servants from Washington. It is an attempt to 
improve on the ad hoc process used on Sept. 11, when the Office of 
Personnel Management closed federal agencies without first notifying state 
and transit officials in the Washington area.

"Basically the only emergency plan that was available that this area had 
[on Sept. 11] was the snow emergency plan," said Scott Hatch, OPM's 
director of communications. The new protocol was designed to handle federal 
evacuations in Washington, but could be used to make evacuation decisions 
for civil servants in other cities, he said.

Full story: http://www.govexec.com/dailyfed/0802/080902p1.htm

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