16 January 1996 BENCHMARK NOTE To: All USGS Employees From: Director Subject: 16 January 1996 BENCHMARK NOTE To send E-mail to me or my immediate staff, please use one of the following addresses: SMTP: BENCHMRK@USGS.GOV Groupwise: INTERNET:BENCHMRK@USGS.GOV Banyan Vines: BENCHMRK CCMail: SMTP_MAIL BENCHMRK@USGS.GOV Please share this message with other employees. ---------------------------------------------------- WELCOME BACK. WE MISSED YOU. To say the absolute least, we have had a rocky start to calendar year 1996. First, the partial government shutdown was a real downer for everyone in the Survey. I understand the frustration of all of you and empathize with your strong desire to be back on the job and doing what you do so very well. Hopefully, there will not be a repeat of the three weeks of furlough, but unhappily, there are no hard and fast guarantees that it won't happen again. Our world is highly unpredictable these days. The two severe snowstorms that hit the East coast only exacerbated our inability here in Reston to get back to work. If any of you west of Ohio or south of North Carolina tried to contact headquarters last week, you soon found that our offices here in the East were closed for an additional four days owing to the weather. That's why this welcome message has been delayed until today. But, the bottom line is this: we are very glad to have you back and I know that we will all find a way to pick up the pieces and get moving again, in true Survey fashion. A bit of good news is that despite the snowstorm and shutdown, payroll for Pay Period 2 has already been processed and you will receive your paycheck on time this week! A special thanks to those who put in extra hours over the weekend to make this possible. I thought I'd devote the remainder of this issue of Benchmark Notes to some information on how the furlough affected the USGS. * While there were a significant number of USGS employees who worked to carry out the initial shutdown of operations, the number dropped to a smaller group of approximately 250 employees nationwide who were asked to work in support of protecting life and property. In addition, there were some employees who were "on-call" for emergencies, if, and when, they arose. * More than 30,000 citizens tried to call or write the USGS during the shutdown. Citizens from every state and many organizations continued to ask for your help. They had all the usual questions and concerns about water quality, earthquakes, maps and the thousands of other things we do and produce on their behalf. It will be a real challenge for us all to catch up with the growing backlog of inquiries and requests. I know that I can count on you to dig in and work your way through the pile until we can genuinely declare that we are back to normal. * At USGS Headquarters, volunteers from all the divisions are helping the mailroom personnel unload and sort a backlog of two 18-wheeler loads of mail. Here, as well, are a few of the stories and consequences of the furlough as they related to our operations. Most of these were communicated to the White House and the news media during the furlough period. * In New Jersey, 25 waste treatment permits issued by the state were on hold because the USGS was unable to provide the data on low flow of streams that is needed for the issuance of discharge permits. * In Oklahoma, permits for solid-waste land fills require a topographic map, earthquake hazard map and a floodplain map -- all products of the USGS, which were not forthcoming. * In South Dakota, more than 270 contract employees were laid off at the EROS Data Center in Sioux Falls. * In Colorado the skeleton crew on duty at the USGS National Earthquake Information Center was swamped with requests for information as a result of earthquakes in southern California and Nevada. * In Hawaii, the volcano observatory continued to monitor the current status of Kilauea, but with instrument failures that could not be addressed, surveillance of possible eruptions elsewhere was greatly decreased. * Some $4 million in USGS earthquake hazard reduction work did not go to small businesses, states and universities as planned. In addition, $5 million in water research funding support for about 1,300 students at more than 100 colleges and universities has not been released. * In Michigan, local telephone and power companies threatened to turn off power to our stream-gaging stations because funds were not available to pay utility bills. This held the possibility of eliminating the first line of warning for flood alerts needed by the National Weather Service in northern Michigan. * Nationwide, the USGS operates 3,500 stream stations that provide flood warning information to the National Weather Service and many city, county and State emergency management agencies. A small number of USGS employees were called back to make emergency repairs to some critical gages, but the integrity of the entire network could not be assured. In Iowa, for example, Doug Goodrich was asked to come back to work on Tuesday (Jan. 2, 1996) to service stream gages on the Mississippi and Iowa rivers. The Mississippi River gage is operated for the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and the Iowa River gage, for the City of Marshalltown, Iowa. The City needed the data to operate the City water treatment and wastewater treatment plants. * Small towns across the country felt the impact of our shutdown. In Rolla, MO, the USGS provides a weekly payroll of $385,000 in a town of only 15,000 people. In Sioux Falls, SD, the weekly $300,000 USGS payroll is vital to a town of 85,000 people. Although pay was eventually forthcoming, the uncertainty of the pay situation had a lasting effect on the local economies. Also in Sioux Falls -- as in many USGS facilities -- food and other services supplied by handicapped contract employees were affected. For example, Dick Cole and his family (he and his wife, both visually handicapped)lost their sole source of income when their jobs in the USGS cafeteria were shut down by the furlough. * Small businesses and private companies were caught in the squeeze. Contractors who provide guard services, for example, are mandated by law to protect life and property. Yet despite the mandate, the government had no funds to pay for these services. * The Federal Government lost $50,000 a day in the sale of USGS maps, but more important, thousands of citizens and public and private organizations were not able to obtain the basic mapping and cartographic data they needed to do their own work or to enjoy leisure activities. * More than 80,000 chemical analyses on 4,800 samples of the Nation's rivers, lakes and ground-water resources could not be made by the USGS during the first three weeks of the shutdown, leaving unanswered questions about changes in water quality and possible threats to human health and the environment that local, state and other Federal agencies depend on the USGS to detect and monitor. I'm sure there are many other stories that you may have heard. I would be most interested in hearing them, myself. They help define our relevance and societal value in dramatic ways. Please direct your messages to the addresses listed at the beginning of this note. There are still many, many questions of an administrative nature (e.g., accounting for leave, payments for services, and continuing resolution issues)that we are working with the Department to answer, and more information will be provided to you just as soon as it becomes available. In the meantime, and again, WELCOME BACK! YOU WERE MISSED! GENUINELY MISSED! Gordie