FOX44 - Burlington / Plattsburgh News, Weather & SportsStormy Future For the Weather Service?

Stemming off of the latest 2013 fiscal budget proposal by the Obama Administration, the National Weather Service is facing some strong cuts.  As it stands the budget for the NWS will drop from the current $911 million to an FY2013 amount of $872 million.  The four-percent decrease would cut roughly 100 jobs in the NWS's Information Technology Officers in all regional weather offices nationwide.

Each NWS office across the country has an IT Specialist/Programmer or "ITO."  They are meteorologists that make sure things are running correctly and are called upon if something goes wrong.  Since they are meteorologists, they sometimes fill in to do forecasting.  Sometimes they are even called upon to release warnings during severe weather events.

Dan Sobien, the President of the National Weather Service Employees Organization says, "NWS service assessments on the historic 2011 tornados and the 2010 Nashville flood event commended offices for having ITOs on station during the event to help with weather and IT issues."

He goes on to comment, "The ITO position is crucial to the lifesaving work of weather forecast offices.  These are the guys who ensure our technology is working and our forecasts are accurate. Without an ITO on site, responses will be slower and lives will be lost during extreme weather events. This is an alarming move backwards when it comes to protecting the public."

"Seriously, with all of the money government wastes, are we going to cut the people who are integral to the tornado warning process?" asked Sobien. "I think if the federal government can afford $39 million for the Blue Angels and $325 million for marching bands, it can afford $15 million to provide its citizens warnings of severe weather. It may not be this year or next, but if these cuts go through, the nation will see another Katrina-like event, and it could have been entirely preventable."

Looking back at 2011 it was an incredible year in terms of weather.  Disasters topped unbelievable numbers, there were a record amount of tornadoes in the south, Irene walloped our area, and it goes on.  It is a very tough time to make cuts because they have to be made somewhere.  There is a lot of reaction from different organizations, government sectors, and other categories that face budget cuts.  If this does happen I do believe the NWS will make it work and continue to provide the great service they do.  It's tough because 95% of the time we as meteorologists are on standby.  That 5% though when something pops up all of a sudden, is why we're here to try to protect as many lives as possible.

-Meteorologist Steve Glazier

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