Four employees with the Pacific Tsunami Warning Center are challenging a decision to move them out of government rental housing in Ewa Beach.
The National Weather Service Employees Organization filed the complaint with the inspector general of the U.S. Department of Commerce, alleging the National Weather Service will lose more than $82,000 in employee rental income.
The housing near the center in Ewa Beach was built in the 1960s and has provided a "critical mass" of workers to respond to tsunami emergencies, said Barry Hirshorn, a spokesman for the National Weather Service Employees Association.
"It’s a slap in the face. For whatever reason, they’ve decided to dump us," said Hirshorn, a senior geophysicist with the center. "They’re also wasting taxpayers’ money."
Hirshorn, who has lived in his house for 16 years, said the employees pay a total of $130,500 annually in rent and utilities — money that would no longer be collected from them once the homes are vacated.
The National Weather Service plans to relocate the operations of the center to a new facility operated by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration on Ford Island in Pearl Harbor early next year.
NOAA spokeswoman Susan Buchanan said the tsunami warning center’s upcoming relocation will improve efficiency and provide scientists and staff with a modern workspace and tools.
Buchanan said on-site subsidized housing was necessary so forecasters could quickly respond to after-hours emergencies. However, the warning center has been staffed 24 hours a day, seven days a week since the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami, reducing the need for on-site housing.
The Weather Service originally entered into an agreement with the union that would allow employees to remain in the houses after the relocation, provided they continued to pay rent to the agency, the union said.
In July the National Weather Service informed the union it was reneging on this agreement and that employees would be ordered out of their homes April 1, according to the union.
"From a legal perspective this (is) absurd," said the union’s attorney, Richard Hirn.
"Rather than spending appropriated funds to pay for the employees’ housing, the National Weather Service is actually making a profit from the rental of those housing units. The employees’ rent actually helps fund agency operations."
