keeping your head… …above water. thursday, august 25, 2005
TRANSCRIPT
Keeping Your Head…
…Above Water
Thursday, August 25, 2005
Alert Line Sticker
Emergency Hotline
Emergency WebsiteThursday, August 25
Friday, August 26, 3 a.m.
Hurricane Katrina weakens to T.S. Katrina following landfall
Friday, August 26, 9 p.m.
Saturday, August 27, 10 a.m.
“In response to Hurricane Katrina's shift to the west, Tulane University will close as of 5 p.m. today, August 27. Classes will resume on Thursday, September 1. Tulane employees should report to work on Wednesday, August 31…..”
Saturday, August 27, 1 p.m.
New Student Convocation
Sunday, August 27, 2 a.m.
Tulane Evacuees at Jackson State
Tuesday, August 30
What Happened• All students safely evacuated
• The President, our Chief Financial Officer and senior communications officer were on campus and the rest of senior team was scattered with no communication and no office
• 6,500 displaced faculty and staff and 13,000 students and 520 displaced medical residents
• University closure for the Fall Semester
• Hospital closures
What Happened• City closure until October, 2005 and reopened with
only fundamental services
• Animals and perishable biological materials in flooded buildings
• Extensive damage to university facilities
• Extensive research losses
• Personal losses of responders
Key Elements of the University Response and Recovery
• Presidential leadership and innovation
• Communication with students, faculty and staff by the web
• Senior leadership team sets up office at the Tulane University School of Business in Houston, Texas
• The Higher Education Community comes to the rescue. Tulane students enroll in 600+ universities
Key Elements of the University Response and Recovery
• Employee registration--93% registered online within two weeks
• University continues to pay full-time employees from August 2005 through December 2005
• The University call center logged 12,600 calls from September 14, 2005 through January 13, 2006.
Disaster Recovery and Continuity Operations for the Legal Staff
• Education: academic credit for students enrolled at other universities around the country, financial aid and tuition payments, and recruitment strategies for faculty and students
• Employment: layoffs, retention plans, payroll, worker’s compensation, employee benefits, FLSA - overtime, vacation, sick leave, FMLA, ADA, OSHA, Warn Act
• Litigation: court filings deferred
Disaster Recovery and Continuity Operations for the Legal Staff
• Research: interruption of research, extension of existing grants, waiver of programmatic and financial reporting obligations, permission to submit delayed grant applications, indirect cost recovery, re-establishing an institutional review board and on-going human subjects clinical trials, institutional animal care and use committee and on-going animal studies, contact with Office of Human Subjects Protection, FDA, Office of Laboratory Animal Welfare, NIH, NSF
Disaster Recovery and Continuity Operations for the Legal Staff
• Healthcare providers: displaced employed physicians providing services in other states, medical records, liability coverage
• Medical Residents: placed in residency programs at other institutions, CMS reimbursement, accreditation and match
Disaster Recovery and Continuity Operations for the Legal Staff
• Federal Emergency Management Administration: project worksheets and documentation required for FEMA recoveries
• Insurance: analysis of insurance policies with respect to coverage, forensic accountants for documentation and valuation of damages
Disaster Recovery and Continuity Operations for the Legal Staff
• Bonds: review bond covenants, disclosure statements, make payments as scheduled, limits for debt and post-disaster borrowing, and potential impact on bond ratings
• Contracts with vendors and on-going capital projects: review vendor, architect, construction contracts for termination or force majeure clauses
Disaster Recovery and Continuity Operations for the Legal Staff
• To achieve financial stability, the University implemented a sweeping reorganization including the eliminating educational programs, consolidation of schools and termination of faculty.
• Legal issues: employment claims, teach out programs, accreditation, endowment reviews, and athletic program reductions
Disaster Recovery and Continuity Operations for the Legal Staff
• Campus rebuilt by January 2006 reopening
• Rented a cruise ship to house faculty, staff and students
• Chartered a K-12 school near the Tulane campus
Campus Information Sessions
Students Retrieve Their Stuff
Encouraging Returns
• 10,000+ students back for Spring ‘06
• 87% of the full-time students returned
• 85% of the freshman class returned
• 3,700 faculty and staff back at work
Lesson Learned
• Better integrated with city emergency services---Use of Tulane for housing first
responders---Re-entry for essential personnel at
earliest possible date---Senior leadership added to city communications network
Lessons Learned
• Campus technology and communications
---added text messaging service
---moved back-up servers to Philadelphia
---communications personnel all have broadband cards and internet phone accounts
Lessons Learned
• Take matters into your own hands and don’t hesitate to make the hard decisions
• Provide immediate and decisive legal advice
• Stay laser-focused on survival, recovery and renewal and never lose sight of the future