Government civilians offered ways to help Katrina survivors

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RANDOLPH AIR FORCE BASE, Texas (AFPN) --  In the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, many Americans want to do whatever they can to help those directly affected, and now government civilians have some opportunities to help in the effort.

The emergency leave transfer and the federal employee volunteer programs are two avenues civilian employees can take to do their part in helping hurricane victims.

Through the emergency leave transfer program, Air Force civilian employees may donate unused annual leave for transfer to fellow employees adversely affected by the hurricane.

Leave transfer recipients who need additional time off from work can then do so without having to use their own paid annual or sick leave.

"This is a great opportunity for each of us to help fellow government civilians as they need time to care for a variety of family issues as a result of Hurricane Katrina," said Greg Den Herder, Air Force Personnel Center executive director here.

Emergency leave donors may contribute up to 104 hours of leave in a leave year, but they cannot contribute leave to a specific person. Donated annual leave not used by emergency leave recipients will be restored to emergency leave donors.

Employees may volunteer to become emergency leave donors by submitting an Office of Personnel Management Form 1638 through their civilian personnel flight to the Air Force Personnel Center's civilian field activities office. The form must state the specified number of hours of accrued annual leave to be transferred from their annual leave accounts to the leave program.

In another effort to help hurricane victims, government civilian employees may also volunteer to help the Federal Emergency Management Agency's Hurricane Katrina efforts through the federal employee volunteer program.

"Air Force civilians are already providing outstanding assistance to those in need simply by doing their jobs," Mr. Herder said. "This program offers those people, whom supervisors can release, another way to serve in this effort to overcome the effects of Hurricane Katrina."

Potential volunteers must receive permission from their chain of command to participate. Those who volunteer will likely face difficult working conditions while being exposed to potential dangers to their health and well-being. Volunteers should also expect to be deployed a minimum of 30 days to locations affected by Hurricane Katrina as determined by FEMA.

Along with this awareness, supervisors must weigh the volunteer opportunity against costs to the unit. Volunteers' units will continue to pay salary and benefit costs, including workers compensation costs if volunteer employees are injured. FEMA officials expect to pay additional travel, overtime and training costs, but owning organizations must be prepared to cover those costs until reimbursement is made.

Interested civilian employees with their supervisors' permission, should contact their base civilian personnel flights for more information. (Courtesy of AFPC News Service)