Editors' Note: What's "The Buzz?"

We're starting a new occasional segment in NOAA's NWS Focus today, and we're calling it "The Buzz." The Buzz will offer information to fill in the gaps of water cooler topics. In this issue we look at retirement age changes. What's on your mind that you're not getting enough information about? Tell us the buzz you're hearing, and we'll try to get more information for you.

National Aeronautics and Space Administration Flight Director John Shannon recently lauded the efforts of the NWS Spaceflight Meteorology Group (SMG) in helping to ensure the safe return of the Space Shuttle Endeavor and its crew.

"The efforts of [SMG staffers] Richard Lafosse, Tim Garner, and Doris Rotzoll during the launch and landing of STS-111 were exemplary," said Shannon. "They continued the
tradition of outstanding support that has been provided over the years by your staff. Having these three involved in the Go/No-Go decision process significantly adds to the safety of manned spaceflight."

Weather support proved to be important to this mission. "Showers, thunderstorms, and low cloud ceilings in the vicinity of the Kennedy Space Center forced two days of delay in the shuttle landing," said Frank Brody, SMG Meteorologist-In-Charge. Thunderstorms persisted on the third possible landing day at Kennedy Space Center, so NASA's mission control center in Houston directed the shuttle to land in California. Endeavor successfully landed at Edwards Air Force Base in California on June 19, 2002.

The NWS Spaceflight Meteorology Group, housed at the NASA Lyndon B. Johnson Space Center in Houston, TX, consists of 8 NWS meteorologists, one Consolidated Space Operations Contract (CSOC) meteorologist, and an administrative assistant. SMG is contracted by NASA to support the manned spaceflight program and is funded through a reimbursable agreement between NASA and NOAA/NWS. The current SMG staff has over 70 years of combined Shuttle landing weather support experience.

Visit the Spaceflight Meteorology Group's home page at http://www.srh.noaa.gov/smg/.

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NWS Briefs All Hazards Warning Advocacy Group on Warning Strategy Development

Thirty experts on public warnings reviewed the Office of Homeland Security's Homeland Security Advisory System and explored the potential all hazard common warning terminology during a recent workshop at the Federal Emergency Management Agency's facilities in Emmitsburg, MD.

Hosted June 19 through 23, 2002, by the Partnership for Public Warning (PPW), the workshop explored common terminology for use in warnings for all hazards both natural and technological. PPW is a public-private partnership of the nation's top emergency warning experts who have the goal of "assuring the right information is delivered in a timely manner to people at risk from disasters, technological accidents, and acts of terrorism."

The NWS was recognized at the workshop as the leader in providing warning information to the public, said Don Wernly, Chief, NWS Program Performance and Awareness Division. NWS staff at the workshop explained how the NWS used social science research to develop its warning strategy. Workshop participants agreed the Office of Homeland Security created a commendable, color-coded threat level classification system. The group also provided recommendations on how to improve the system to make it a true warning system.

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CFO/CAO Explains Benefits of Better Financial Management System

NWS managers will soon have a greater capability to improve cost-effectiveness of operations using a new cost management system to relate costs of services to performance. The new system, due to be in place by October 1, 2002, at all NWS Financial Management Centers, will build upon support systems to provide managers up-to-date financial information to monitor status of budget funds.

"Policy, program and operating officials and their staff need relevant, timely, accurate and useful information for strategic and day-to-day decision making," said NWS Chief Financial Officer/Chief Administrative Officer Ted David, who is overseeing the development of the new financial management capabilities.

David said the new financial system, will give managers an ability to relate performance to resources devoted to particular functions. The NWS will also be able to identify best practices in financial management and enable other offices to emulate the best practices.

"For example," David said, "we may have some NOAA Weather Radio transmitters with annual operations and maintenance costs of $17,000, and other transmitters with operations and maintenance costs of only $5,000 per year. The cost management system will help NWS managers analyze reasons for differences and appropriate strategies to bring higher costs sites more in line with the lower cost sites."

David recently wrote an article which explains the financial information needs of policy, program and operating officials. The article, published in the Spring 2002 issue of the Journal of Government Financial Management, explains how new financial information tools will give decision makers up-to-date information for analyzing the relationship between results from programs or services and their costs. Published by the Association of Government Accountants (AGA), the quarterly journal is read by a membership of 18,000 government financial managers.

Click here to read David's article, posted with the permission of the AGA. Copyright 2002. All rights reserved.

The Buzz:
FERS Employees--A Speed Bump on the Road to Retirement?

If you're in the Federal Employees Retirement System (FERS) and a baby boomer looking to retire in the next few years, you might have missed a little-noticed change in the minimum retirement age (MRA) required for retirement eligibility. Thirty years of service and 55 years of age is the minimum, right? Not exactly! This still applies to those employees in the Civil Service Retirement System (CSRS). However, for FERS employees, this "magic formula" began changing this year, paralleling the scheduled gradual rise in the age for receiving unreduced benefits under Social Security.

Here's how it works, according to Rita Kaizen of the Retirement and Benefits Unit of the NOAA Human Resources Management Office. "Beginning in 2002, the MRA climbs by two months per year until it reaches 56 in 2009, where it will remain through the year 2020. Beginning in 2021 it will resume rising by two months per year, until it reaches 57 in the year 2026."

You can determine your MRA by referring to a table provided by the Office of Personnel Management web page. What the table shows is that if you were born before 1948, your MRA remains 55. For those born in 1948 or later, the MRA increases accordingly. For more information on retirement benefits, check out the Human Resources web page or call Rita Kaisen or Robin Johnson at (301) 713-0544.

Employees first hired after December 31, 1983, are automatically covered under FERS and Social Security. Generally, employees hired before 1984 are members of CSRS unless they elected coverage under FERS during the 1987 or 1988 open season authorized for making such choices.

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Enrollment Period Begins for Selecting Long Term Care Insurance

Earlier NOAA's NWS Focus stories on long term care were run on June 1, 2001, and March 29, 2002.