Continuity of Operations Planning for Small Airports (2016)

Below is the uncorrected machine-read text of this chapter, intended to provide our own search engines and external engines with highly rich, chapter-representative searchable text of each book. Because it is UNCORRECTED material, please consider the following text as a useful but insufficient proxy for the authoritative book pages.

42 CHAPTER SIX EFFECTIVE PRACTICES, TOOLS, AND TEMPLATES Airports that operate with a formal BCP/COOP suggest that smaller airports initiate continuity planning by starting small and keeping it simple. This will keep costs low and ensure that the plans are easy for staff to use. Over time, circumstances and experience will allow the plans to grow as necessary. Maintaining current and functional plans and practices is very important to the success of the business and operations continuity planning process. Many of the airports identified in this study review their BCP/COOP documents annually with stakeholders, typically in conjunction with emergency exercises and planning. They recommend involving all staff, depart- ments, tenants, and outside agencies who share critical roles in the process. Survey respondents and interviewees indicate that business and operational resiliency at small airports can be improved in a cost-effective manner. A small airport can develop a basic BCP/COOP by identifying potential disruptions, prioritizing functions, listing resources and how they can be applied to disruptive situations, and developing procedures that will enable the airport to maintain or recover essential functions. The survey respondents reported using a number of planning tools to address business continuity concerns (Table B36, Appendix B). While 33% of respondents indicated that their airport did not have a BCP/COOP, many used other tools such as checklists (48%), SOPs (46%), or templates to assist with continuity planning. A few airports have used or considered using ACRP Report 93 BCP software (5%) or commercial software tools available in the market, such as Gartner’s Magic Quadrant BOLD Tool (2%). CONTINUITY PLANNING TOOLS, MATERIALS, AND RESOURCES The most comprehensive resource for airport business continuity planning is ACRP Report 93: Operational and Business Continuity Planning for Prolonged Airport Disruptions (Corzine 2013). The report offers detailed guidance for airports or fixed-base operators on business continuity planning and includes a software tool that helps users develop a customized BCP. The Metropolitan Airports Commission is one example of an airport that is currently using ACRP Report 93 to update its BCP (chapter four, Case Example 2). The survey data, case examples, and literature review provide many useful examples of business and operations continuity planning tools, materials, and other resources. Many of these materials are reproduced in Appendices G through S and include sample BCPs and COOPs, planning worksheets, examples of continuity practices embedded in functional plans, SOPs, and other federal agency guidance documents. The tools, practices, and materials extracted from the case examples in this study can be adapted or scaled for use at small airports. Many of the survey respondents suggested that smaller airports look at what other airports are doing when they start to develop their own continuity plans and practices. Among the case examples, Minneapolis–St. Paul Airport, Ohio State University Airport, and Fort Lauderdale Executive Airport have BCPs/COOPs. These plans are included in Appendices K, L, and Q. Dallas/Fort Worth International Airport employs continuity of operations planning worksheets (Appendix J) to determine departmental continuity needs. Airports also reported using mutual aid agreements, checklists, and SOPs. Lakeland Linder Regional Airport does not have a formal BCP; however, it effectively addresses operational continuity through the use of NIMS principles and SOPs (Appendix S). Watsonville Municipal Airport uses a one-page document that lists initial response actions in all emergency situations (Appendix R).

43 The COOP template used by Seattle-Tacoma International Airport is shown in Appendix H. Appendices N, O, and P provide examples of how Savannah/ Hilton Head International Airport has incorporated business and operations planning elements into airport functional plans. This was an intentional practice that enabled the airport to apply continuity planning to plans addressing specific threats to the airport. A number of respondent airports used existing federal guidance and training programs for COOP development. MSP reported using guidance FEMA to develop its plan. The FEMA COOP templates can be accessed at http://fema.gov by search- ing “Planning and Templates.” FEMA also has developed a continuity assistance tool that local government jurisdictions can use to review their programs. An overview of the tool is provided in Appendix I. FXE reported using FEMA COOP training course IS-547.A, “Introduction to Continuity of Operations” as a resource. This train-the-trainer program assisted airport staff in the development of a COOP. OSU reported that working through the continuity planning process has been useful for the airport in addressing the continuity requirements in the Airport Improve- ment Program Grant Oversight Risk Model Policy (Appendix G). CONTINUITY PLANNING TEMPLATE A small airport BCP/COOP planning template is provided in Appendix T. The basic template incorporates the elements of a viable continuity plan for small airports and can be tailored to meet the needs of various size airports. The template was devel- oped from a variety of sources, including ACRP Report 93, a number of airport-based BCP samples, and a BCP developed for the New York City Small Business Service Agency (Benjamin Newman, personal communication, Jan. 4, 2016). CONTINUITY PLANNING CHECKLIST The results of the literature review, survey, case examples, and analysis of sample tools, checklists, and templates have been summarized in a checklist that can be used by small airports to help with business and operations continuity planning. The checklist is in Appendix U.