Another unfortunate consequence of the
government shutdown:
With 16 staff employees being placed on furlough, Ted Stout, chief of interpretation and education at Craters, told KBOI 2News that no one was looking for 63-year-old Jo Elliott-Blakeslee Tuesday morning, but a handful of staff members will be back out in the challenging terrain in the afternoon resuming the search.
"It's pretty much just park staff that are continuing the search," Stout said. "But we're also faced with the government shutdown -- we've been busy with that."
Federal workers are not allowed to volunteer to do their jobs during a shutdown because U.S. law says they can't do any work that has not been allocated funding.
The search effort had already begun being scaled back due to rescue agencies being called back to their respective headquarters and poor weather earlier in the week. Only three staff members are at the park monitoring infrastructure resources.
IMPORTANT UPDATE:
Employees at Craters of the Moon National Monument in south-central Idaho have received an exemption from federal furlough requirements so rangers can continue to search for a Boise woman who has been missing for nearly two weeks. Sixteen of the monument's 19 employees were to be furloughed during the federal government shutdown that started Tuesday, but the park received permission Wednesday to keep 10 additional workers under “excepted” status during the search for 63-year-old Jo Elliott-Blakeslee. Elliott-Blakeslee's hiking partner, 69-year-old Amy Linkert, was found dead on Sept. 25. The women were last seen near Arco on Sept. 19. On Monday, Elliott-Blakeslee's family members asked for experienced hikers to help with the search. Park spokesman Ted Stout says the 10 rangers working the search are in top physical condition.