Feds Can Donate Leave to Louisiana Flood Victims

Federal employees who want to help fellow workers affected by the storms and flooding in Louisiana can donate their unused annual leave.

President Obama on Tuesday directed the Office of Personnel Management to establish an emergency program to facilitate the transfer of leave among federal employees and provide guidance to agencies. The program would permit employees in the executive and judicial branches to donate their leave to other employees in their agency or in another agency, allowing federal workers hit by the disasters in Louisiana to get time off from work without having to use their own paid leave.

Obama issued the same memorandum after the 2013 storms in Oklahoma and Superstorm Sandy in 2012. Former President George W. Bush used the emergency leave transfer program after Hurricane Katrina in 2005. Click here for OPM’s rundown of benefits that may be used during extreme weather.

On Friday, the Thrift Savings Plan announced that it will ease the process of making financial hardship withdrawals from retirement savings for storm victims in Louisiana.