Will federal workers be able to attend the upcoming NAB Show?
Perhaps not all of those who had planned to attend.
It appears that FEMA-IPAWS personnel won’t be going to Las Vegas due to the so-called “sequestration,” a total of more than $40 billion in across-the-board federal spending cuts within the remaining fiscal year.
One member of that office posted a message to the SBE EAS list serve that “at this time,” FEMA won’t have a presence at the show. Radio World hears that means FEMA won’t have a booth and no one can travel to the event, including those scheduled to be session panelists.
Asked whether that’s likely to change, a source said not at this late date.
There is an emergency alerting session at the planned for Wednesday, April 10. So far, NAB still lists FEMA’s Wade Witmer as a panelist. Apparently talks are going on with NAB about how he could still take part electronically.
There’s no word yet on how the budget cuts would affect travel for the FCC personnel scheduled to speak in Las Vegas: RW has reached out to the agency about that.
During the Senate FCC oversight hearing Wednesday, Chairman Julius Genachowski said he has “serious concerns” about the effects of the cuts, since the agency is at its lowest employee level in some 30 years. We’ve reported the FCC’s portion of the cuts is $17 million, or 5% of its total $340 million budget.
