TREASURY INSPECTOR GENERAL FOR TAX ADMINISTRATION
Office of Audit
EMERGENCY PREPAREDNESS AT INTERNAL REVENUE SERVICE
FACILITIES NEEDS TO BE IMPROVED
Issued on September 17, 2008
Highlights
Highlights of
Report Number: 2008-10-148 to the
Internal Revenue Service Chief, Agency-Wide Shared Services.
IMPACT ON TAXPAYERS
The Internal
Revenue Service (IRS) relies on a suite of plans to protect employees and
visitors in IRS facilities in the event of an emergency. However, plans used by the IRS to respond to
emergencies were not always complete or subject to regular exercises or tests
to ensure readiness. As a result, TIGTA believes
that in the event of an actual emergency such as a terrorist attack or natural
disaster, these deficiencies could result in delays in safeguarding employees
and visitors and in beginning efforts to recover critical business processes
such as collecting tax revenue, processing tax refunds, and responding to
taxpayer inquiries.
WHY TIGTA DID THE AUDIT
This
audit was initiated as part of an overall TIGTA strategy to evaluate the
adequacy and viability of the emergency plans that the IRS has in place. The overall objective of this audit was to
determine whether the IRS Incident Management Plan and Occupant Emergency Plan
are adequate tools to address incidents and emergencies at IRS facilities.
WHAT
TIGTA FOUND
Incident
Management Plans and Occupant Emergency Plans are insufficient to ensure that the
IRS can quickly respond and react to emergency situations affecting people,
buildings, and services.
Incident
Management Plans did not always include information necessary for a timely and
effective response to an emergency. For
example, these plans did not always identify primary and backup Emergency
Operations Centers, identify Incident Commander alternates and backups for
other key incident management staff, or include a general description of IRS
business functions located at the site.
This key information is needed to avoid confusion, duplication of
effort, and a breakdown in communication and coordination if the IRS had to react
to an emergency. Incident Management
Plans were not regularly tested.
Occupant Emergency Plans were also not regularly tested. For buildings where evacuation testing was
performed, information regarding key test results (e.g., whether employees were
evacuated in a timely manner, disabled employees were properly evacuated,
employees properly reported to assigned assembly areas, and alarms functioned
properly) was generally not recorded. In
the event of an emergency, properly tested Occupant Emergency Plans can reduce
the threat to the safety of IRS employees.
WHAT TIGTA RECOMMENDED
TIGTA recommended that the Chief, Agency-Wide Shared
Services, 1) revise the Incident Management Plan template and associated
procedures to better emphasize requirements and require that all Incident
Management Plans be periodically reviewed to ensure that they are complete and
accurate, 2) develop procedures requiring that all large IRS sites perform Incident
Management Plan exercises on a routine basis and document the results, and 3)
continue efforts to implement a checklist to record the key results of Occupant
Emergency Plan evacuation testing and to develop a methodology for tracking the
completion of this testing.
In their
response to the report, IRS officials agreed with the recommendations. The Chief, Agency-Wide Shared Services, plans
to 1) revise the Incident Management Plan template and procedures, 2) develop a
multi-year testing, training, and exercise strategy, and 3) continue to improve
the process for monitoring evacuation tests.
READ THE
FULL REPORT
To view the report,
including the scope, methodology, and full IRS response, go to:
http://www.treas.gov/tigta/auditreports/2008reports/200810148fr.html.
Email Address: inquiries@tigta.treas.gov
Phone Number: 202-622-6500
Web Site:
http://www.tigta.gov