Severe Weather Events: Mitigate Impact on Employees

Severe weather events (including hurricanes, tornadoes/extreme winds, flooding, wildfires, winter storms, and heat/drought) are increasing, driven by climate change. In 2024, the United States experienced 27 weather/climate disasters with losses over $1 billion each; more than 550 people died.

Your K-12 school, college, or university may immediately think about the effects of weather crises on students — but don’t forget your employees. Common problems extreme weather causes include employee leave or absence, compensation, and other impacts of campus closure.

Leave or Absence

Although family and medical leave laws don’t mandate giving employees time off for personal matters arising out of a natural disaster, such as salvaging belongings or repairing damaged homes, they would apply for resulting injuries or medical conditions. In addition, your institutional policies governing absences in these circumstances may be more generous.

• Consult an attorney about your legal obligations. The federal Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA) or comparable state laws may require you to provide up to 12 weeks of unpaid leave to employees who qualify. In the context of extreme weather, a serious health condition — including a mental health condition — of the employee or an immediate family member might trigger this requirement.
• Understand your current policies. Many institutions, like James Madison University and Colorado State University have emergency disaster leave policies allowing qualified employees additional leave in exceptional circumstances, including natural disasters that destroy or damage their homes. These policies also may address leave for employees who are called away from their regular jobs to provide emergency services during or after a weather disaster.

Some institutions, like the University of California system, have catastrophic leave sharing programs allowing employees to donate accrued vacation time to other employees who exhausted their own leave in defined circumstances, including after natural disasters.

If your institution has such a policy, review it carefully and understand the terms and limitations; policies typically exclude related expenses such as employee travel, food, and lodging. If you don’t have this type of leave policy, consider whether one is necessary.

Compensation

Severe weather events may impact your institution’s operations, including by forcing reduced operations or closure. The Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) requires employers to pay non-exempt (hourly) employees for hours actually worked, so if your institution closes in whole or in part due to a severe weather event, you don’t have to pay non-exempt employees for time they would normally work. However, you must pay most exempt (salaried) employees their full salary for any week in which they perform some work. Many states have comparable laws that may be more generous to employees, so ensure you comply with all applicable laws.

Encourage employees to file for unemployment benefits. Workers whose employment is lost or disrupted as the “direct result” of a disaster but who aren’t eligible for regular unemployment benefits may qualify for Disaster Unemployment Assistance.

WARN Acts

If your campus closes for an extended period because of severe weather, consult legal counsel about compliance with the federal Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification (WARN) Act, which requires employers with more than 100 employees to provide 60 days advance written notice of mass layoffs at a single site employing more than 50 people.

An exception for layoffs resulting from a natural disaster might apply only if a workplace is “destroyed.”

Some states (including Illinois and New York) have similar laws, which often give employees greater protection than the federal statute.

Other Action Items

In addition to addressing the employment-specific issues discussed above, being proactive in other ways helps your school and employees prepare for extreme weather.

Have you:  

• Reviewed your emergency response plan? It’s often wise to take an “all hazards” approach to emergency planning; including severe weather emergencies among many potential hazards offers multiple benefits, including increased flexibility and scalability in disaster response.
• Assessed your physical plant? Evaluate your school’s property for buildings or areas that may be especially vulnerable to weather events and consider actions to mitigate problems. For example, if your location is prone to wildfires, can you clear brush on campus or retrofit sprinkler systems in older structures? For flooding concerns, can you re-grade land near low-lying buildings? Do you have appropriate evacuation routes if you need to evacuate buildings?
• Conducted tabletop exercises or drills? Use tabletop exercises focused on severe weather events to rehearse your institution’s plans and assess readiness. UE’s library of tabletop exercises includes multiple climate-related crisis scenarios. Other sources for weather scenarios include the Texas School Safety Center and the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA). Adjust scenarios for your institution and ensure you adequately address employee-specific concerns. Also, state laws may require you to mandate periodic drills for certain weather events like tornadoes.
• Checked emergency alert systems? Periodically test your emergency alert systems; ensure you use multiple methods, including email, texts, and sirens or loudspeakers, to alert the campus community to severe weather dangers.
• Protected employee safety? The Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) regulates workplace safety, including in cases of severe weather. An employee injured in the workplace as a result of extreme weather may be entitled to workers’ compensation, but check your state’s rules.
  
  The aftermath can be at least as dangerous as the event itself. Workers cleaning up campus — who may be performing tasks very different from their usual jobs — are vulnerable to physical injuries (also possibly covered by workers’ compensation), as well as health threats like heat-related illness or cold stress. Some states, like Oregon and Washington, have or are considering workplace rules for heat illness. Advise workers and supervisors of the respective symptoms and how to respond and require them to take appropriate precautions.
• Reviewed your employee communications plan? Before extreme weather hits, evaluate your communication infrastructure and equipment, including contingencies for power loss. Also consider your communications strategy, emphasizing the need to express care and compassion for employees who experience property loss or emotional trauma while avoiding potentially misleading statements (such as promises about financial support).
• Planned for possible long-term remote work? If your telework policy doesn’t address weather-related emergencies, consider revising it as part of your business continuity or recovery protocols. Depending on damage, you may need to reduce on-campus operations, which typically requires designating employees whose campus presence is critical and implementing remote work for others.
  
  For employees unaccustomed to teleworking, offer tips on working remotely.
• Considered other types of employee support? Explore other ways to help your employees; for example, an Employee Assistance Program can offer counseling and emotional support to employees after a natural disaster. More directly, make campus facilities, such as libraries, dining halls, and gym showers, available for employee use around the clock. In addition to catastrophic leave sharing programs discussed above, consider (in consultation with legal counsel) establishing a special emergency fund to which employees can donate to benefit colleagues.
• Provided practical guidance to employees? Before severe weather strikes, distribute links or lists of helpful items like:
  • What to include in a disaster supply kit
  • Community resources, such as shelter locations for people evacuating and facilities like cooling centers in prolonged heat waves
  • Contact information for national disaster relief organizations like the American Red Cross and Salvation Army
  • Resources from FEMA, including possible housing assistance for people displaced by severe weather
  • Recommended individual disaster preparation for people with disabilities  

More From UE 

Assess Climate Impact on Campus  

Catastrophic Weather Events

Is Your Campus Prepared to Lend Assistance After a Disaster?

Additional Resources  

FEMA: Ready Campus