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Contingency plans in place in case of state government shutdown

Posted on Jun 29, 2017 By Site Admin

While the Washington Military Department is confident a budget for the 2017-2019 biennium will be approved prior to the July 1, 2017 deadline, the agency has been directed to continue to move forward with contingency plans in the event of a partial state shutdown.

The Office of Financial Management has directed all state agencies to develop contingency plans. See a summary of all state agency plans and related information.

In the unlikely event that a partial shutdown is necessary, the Washington Military Department has identified services it will have to suspend until the 2017–19 budgets are enacted. Some of those services are listed below. Note that all Washington National Guard operations will continue as normal.

Impacts to the Washington Military Department if a budget isn’t passed include:

Emergency Management:

  • Delayed response to any emergency or disaster.  Only Alert and Warning (2 per shift) staff will be available initially to respond.  
  • Slow and sporadic recall of employees to lead their Emergency Support Functions (ESFs) in the State Emergency Operations Center should there be a need to activate the State Emergency Operations Center.
  • The State 911 office (SECO) will not be able to pay network charges which will then fall to the counties causing some financial hardship immediately.
  • The SECO office will stop payments to all vendors which will delay the ESINet transition and incur more costs down the road.
  • The SECO office will not be able to respond and provide assistance with 911 outages and reporting.
  • No Response operations will be conducted (e.g., no AHAB siren maintenance, no WebEOC support to local jurisdictions, no State Level Search & Rescue program support provided)
  • All recovery assistance public assistance operations will be suspended.  This means all support to local jurisdictions with funding from the federal disaster recover public assistance funding from previous disaster declaration projects will be halted from the state EM level. 

Washington Youth Academy

  • Delayed or non-start of the Washington Youth Academy (WYA) class 17-2.

Military Department Facilities

  • Suspend hazardous materials waste pickup, spill response and reporting and environmental documentation in 37 NG installations in the 22 communities that NG facilities are located within. 

Public Records

If no state operating budget is enacted by July 1, the agency’s public records office will not be open for business due to a lack of budget appropriation and the resulting government shutdown. We are not able to process public records requests while the office is closed. When the office re-opens, more time will be needed to process requests because we anticipate there will be a backlog of pending requests, as well as new requests that may have been submitted during the shutdown.

This posting provides public records requesters with notification that additional time will be needed to process current and new records requests. This notice also serves as the five business-day acknowledgment of requests as described in RCW 42.56.520.

This posting is provided to give the fullest assistance to requesters (RCW 42.56.100). We hope to reopen soon. The estimates of time may be affected by the number of days the office is closed, as well as the volume of any pending backlog of requests or new requests submitted while shut down. As a result, the estimates and this notice may need to be adjusted accordingly. We will update this notice after we re-open, if needed. Please check back after we re-open.

Thank you for your patience. If you have questions after the office re-opens, you may contact the Public Records Officer at (253) 512-8110.

Scheduled appointments for records inspections

If public records requesters had scheduled an inspection of records at the office during the time the office is shut down, that appointment is hereby cancelled and will be rescheduled. Within 15 business days of the office re-opening, or from the date of the last communication from the agency (whichever is later), requesters will be contacted to reschedule their appointment. This is an estimate of time. The office anticipates it will inform requesters if this estimate needs to be revised.

Public records requests pending at the time of office shut down

Public records requesters who had requests that were being processed when the office was shut down (and which requests were previously acknowledged) are hereby notified that their requests will continue to be processed after the office re-opens. However, the office will need more time to process those requests. If requesters were awaiting further information or records from the office, they are advised that within 15 business days of the office re-opening or the date of the last communication from the office (whichever is later), requesters will be informed of the status of their requests or receive other information about their requests. This is an estimate of time. The office anticipates it will inform requesters if this estimate needs to be revised.

Public records requesters who had requests that were pending at the time the office was shut down (and which could not be acknowledged due to the closure) are hereby notified that this posting is their five business-day acknowledgment and estimate of further time to respond (RCW 42.56.520).

Those requests will be processed once the office re-opens. However, the office will need more time to process those requests. Within 15 business days of the office re-opening, requesters will be informed of the status of their requests and be provided a more detailed estimate of time or further response. This is an estimate of time. The office anticipates it will inform requesters if this estimate needs to be revised.

New public records requests submitted while the office is shut down

New public records requests that are submitted during the time the office is shut down will be designated as received on the day the office reopens. The office will provide additional information to these requesters on the status of their request and an estimate of further time the office needs to respond, within five business days from the date the office re-opens.

If needed due to the backlog or volume of new requests, this website notice alternatively serves as the initial five business-day acknowledgment under RCW 42.56.520, providing an estimated further response time of 15 business days of the office re-opening.