The Impact of Changes at Federal Agencies on Continuity Plans

By Walter Lawn

Liberty Valley Chapter member Walter Lawn offers the following advice

regarding the potential impact of government actions on your continuity plans

Recent changes to staffing and policy at Federal agencies may call for out-of-cycle reviews of your continuity plans.

For example, the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) announced in June that it will no longer receive overnight microwave imaging of tropical storms.[1] This could reduce the accuracy of certain information, particularly the location of the storm’s eye, and its intensity. If this information is less reliable, are there parts of your hurricane response plans that should be changed? For instance, you might default to securing a facility before nightfall, instead of waiting for updates the next morning.

In another weather-related example, reporting on the recent flooding in Texas indicated that reductions in local National Weather Service (NWS) staff may have hampered coordination between forecasters and local emergency management officials.[2]

To ensure that your continuity plans remain current:

If your plans rely directly on Federal services, such as NOAA, NWS, or the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS):

• Verify your contacts.
• Determine if service levels are currently degraded.
• Talk to your contacts. Try to get an honest and balanced assessment of where changes to reliability may occur, and how likely that is.
• If your only contact with an agency is through its web site, do some research. Mistrust both bland statements that nothing will change and sensational stories predicting complete failure. Dig.
• Review your plans and processes that rely on these services to determine if any changes are required.

If your plans rely indirectly on Federal services, such as through a situational awareness service:

• Have a good, tough talk with your account rep. Find out if they anticipate any significant changes in the quality of their underlying data sources. If they do, ask what plans they have to address them.
• Based on that discussion, decide which of your plans and processes require review.

[1] https://www.nytimes.com/2025/06/27/climate/hurricane-monitoring-data.html?unlocked_article_code=1.VE8.rGlV.2soyhwUm18Gp&smid=url-share

[2] https://www.nytimes.com/2025/07/05/us/politics/texas-floods-warnings-vacancies.html?unlocked_article_code=1.VE8.PT_R.CA7yFouswV2J&smid=url-share

Walter Lawn was formerly Disaster Recovery Planning Manager for the Americas at Marsh McLennan. In that work he relied heavily on both NOAA and NWS for information about evolving weather-related threats in the U.S.