From military to parks, U.S. workers brace for shutdown

By Sue Ogrocki, AP

Justin Castro, a National Park Service employee at the Oklahoma City National Memorial, faces an uncertain future if the government shuts down.

EnlargeCloseBy Sue Ogrocki, AP

Justin Castro, a National Park Service employee at the Oklahoma City National Memorial, faces an uncertain future if the government shuts down.

About 800,000 federal government workers would be affected by a shutdown. From the Statue of Liberty and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) to military families that depend on paychecks, government furloughs as a result of a shutdown would have a major effect on everyday life.

The threat to U.S. troops' paychecks has rattled military families and others sympathetic to young soldiers, sailors, air crews and Marines fighting distant wars. The military issue has escalated the political feud in Washington.

On Friday, Republicans and Democrats clashed over the budget as President Obama canceled a trip to Indianapolis and spoke in separate phone calls with Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and Speaker John Boehner.

Boehner said spending cuts — not social issues — were blocking a deal to prevent a shutdown at midnight. Reid said the only hang-up was Republican demand to cut a federal program that provides women's health and family planning services.

The House approved a resolution by Republicans to fund the military through the end of the fiscal year. But the White House threatened to block it, calling the measure a "distraction from the real work that would bring us closer to a reasonable compromise."

In Iraq on Thursday, Defense Secretary Robert Gates told troops that if the government closes their next paycheck would be for half the normal amount and they wouldn't receive a check at all the following pay period, if the shutdown continued. Gates told them they could expect to get paid eventually for all of their work.

Krystel Spell, 29, of Spring Lake, N.C., is a military spouse who runs the website Armywife101.com. She has been flooded with questions from visitors to her website.

"We hear so much, 'We support our troops, we support our troops' … but the very backbone, the people that are protecting us, aren't going to get paid," she said. "Everybody said this isn't a political thing. This is people's livelihoods."

Marine Maj. Andrew Hesterman, 42, of Scotts Valley, Calif., who returned from Afghanistan a week ago, said he has heard troops voicing concern about a shutdown for about two months.

"You've left your wife and kid at home to fend for themselves, sort of," Hesterman said. "It makes you think that this employer can't take care of me while I'm away, so why do I want to work for them? It's tough on all servicemembers, especially the younger, less financially stable guys."

"We rely on the government for our paycheck," said Megan Bilotta, 32, a military spouse with 7-week-old twins who has been cutting back on expenses like eating out in preparation for a possible government shutdown. "We're a one-income family now that we have children, and if we don't get paid, I don't know what we're going to do."

More than 100 federal employees facing no paychecks protested outside a federal building in Chicago this week with signs that said, "Don't Punish the Public" and "Banks got bailed out, we got sold out."

"I've sent an e-mail to my mortgage company asking if I can delay payment for the next month, and gotten no response," said Julie Sidlo, one of the protesters and an Environmental Protection Agency accountant who endured the last government shutdown in the 1990s. "I don't know if I can file for unemployment," adding that she has set money aside for several weeks.

The shutdown would mean the IRS would not process paper tax returns, U.S. citizens in foreign countries could get passports only from their embassies in emergencies, and dozens of schools that the Bureau of Indian Affairs oversees could be closed, said former BIA assistant secretary Carl Artman.

"There would be a significant financial impact on our daily operations and the (tribal) council would have to make some tough decisions," said Robert McDonald, a spokesman for the Confederated Salish and Kootenai tribes in Montana. "Our director of social services is very concerned about the services he could provide."

Officials on the Navajo Nation, the country's largest Indian reservation, said the tribe receives two-thirds of its money from the federal government to support jails, police force, social services and other programs.

The tribe said it would have enough money to run those programs for about a month, but anything longer would be more difficult.

Justin Castro, a park service worker at the Oklahoma City Bombing National Memorial, said "not having a check means not paying rent and not paying bills that need to be paid."

All National Park sites, including the Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island in New York Harbor, which draw 5 million visitors a year, would close. Ferries that run to the islands from Lower Manhattan and from New Jersey would be suspended, and most of the 140 park service employees on the island would not report to work — except for one.

"I can assure the American people, Lady Liberty is never alone," said Darren Boch, park department spokesman. "But it will be lonely without 10,000 people walking around at her feet."

As many as 15,000 people a day visit the Statue of Liberty, said Elizabeth Carmody, marketing director for Statue Cruises, which operates the ferries to the islands. Tickets to go inside the statue and up to the crown — which are limited — are already sold-out for Saturday and Sunday, Carmody said. Shut-out customers can get a refund of the $13 ticket price or take a sightseeing cruise of the harbor instead.

But the cruise line is scrambling because its ticket offices are located inside Castle Clinton, the historic fort owned by the park service that is located in Manhattan's Battery Park. If the government shuts down Saturday, so does Castle Clinton, and the company won't have access to its offices.

Carmody said the company plans to move the ferries so passengers can board without walking through the fort, and sell tickets on the dock.

"(Friday) we're packing the boats up with tables and cash registers and cash," Carmody says. "We've been trying to figure out Plan B."

About half of all employees of the Department of Health and Human Services would be furloughed if the government shuts down. The department includes the CDC, the Food and Drug Administration and the National Institutes of Health (NIH), and they must have staff on hand to deal with imminent threats to human safety or property.

The CDC will continue to monitor diseases on a limited basis, but much of that work is done by local jurisdictions and hospitals, which will continue to collect information and report it to the federal agency. If necessary, the CDC could call furloughed employees back to work to deal with pressing public health problems, such as an illness outbreak. But such CDC activities as disease prevention and health promotion would be put on hold during the furlough.

During a shutdown, the FDA would still deal with public health emergencies related to pharmaceuticals or medical devices. And although random food inspections would be curtailed significantly, the agency would continue food safety activities such as monitoring foods imported from Japan and other countries.

At the NIH as well as the CDC and FDA, workers will continue to care for lab animals. However, research will be put on hold, including seven studies scheduled to begin next week at the NIH's main campus in Bethesda, Md.

In addition, ongoing studies will not admit new patients. As of late Thursday afternoon, it wasn't clear how a government shutdown would affect NIH websites, hotlines and clearinghouses.

The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, or CMS, is also part of the Health and Human Services Department. CMS can dip into the Medicare trust fund in case of a shortfall in discretionary dollars, although an unexpectedly long shutdown would drain it. States have already received their federal Medicaid funding for the third quarter of the fiscal year, which runs through June, so there shouldn't be any immediate issues with that program.

Around the country:

•Located on the threshold of Zion National Park, the town of Springdale, Utah, would essentially go dark if the government shuts down. About 80% of Springdale's annual budget comes from sales tax — most of which is generated by national park visitors, said town Manager Rick Wixom. "I'm the last in and the first out," said Steve Johnson, night host at Springdale's Bit and Spur restaurant "I probably wouldn't be working for a while."

•Fifty eighth-graders from the Albert D. Lawton School in Essex Junction, Vt., are hoping a shutdown can be avoided, or at least that it ends quickly. The group is planning to head by bus to Washington during their spring break, April 16-21.

"The students have been fundraising all year," said history teacher Peter Gustafson about the $800-per-person trip, which includes visits to the White House, Mount Vernon, the Smithsonian, Pentagon and other key spots.¶

Contributing: Martha Moore in New York City; Rita Rubin in McLean, Va.; Ed Kociela, The (St. George, Utah) Spectrum; Terri Hallenbeck and Mike Donoghue, The Burlington (Vt.) Free Press; the Associated Press

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