State governments are increasingly requiring state and local emergency management offices to maintain lists of persons with special needs who may require assistance in disaster situations. In addition, federal courts are beginning to apply the Americans with Disabilities Act. to emergency planning. This study characterizes special-needs households that are located in the vicinity of a chemical weapons storage site in Alabama. For this study, a special-needs household is defined as a residence having at least one person with physical or mental problems, a transportation dependence, or a child who is home alone at limes and requires assistance from outside the family or current circle of relatives, friends, and neighbors to take specific protective actions. The special-needs households were identified throngh a myriad of collection methods, including random sampling, saturation mailing/self-registration, targeted distribution/self-registration, agency and support provider lists, and referrals. Attitudes toward specific protective actions and an assessment of the ability of the special-needs household to take those actions were also sought out. Approximately 9 percent of the community's households were identified as containing persons with special needs who require assistance during emergencies. The study also identified the highly perishable nature of special-needs population records maintained by emergency management agencies. During a data verification process conducted 3 months after the data collection effort concluded, almost half of the previously identified 3,294 individuals with special needs had their situation change or could not be reached for verification. Concurrently, 1,090 new persons with special needs identified themselves as needing assistance. Recommendations are made to the emergency planning community for addressing the support needs of special populations.

of the FluNami 2007 Trusted Agents Committee for helping to plan the exercise and keep it on track;

Developments in the Chemical Stockpile Emergency Preparedness Program (CSEPP) are progressing rapidly. Although we have attempted to provide information that is accurate as of the date of publication, we expect that as a result of the dynamism of the program, many changes will occur in areas discussed in this report. It should be noted that this report, which has been developed under the CSEPP, is a concept paper and is not intended as a complete technical plan. This individual report is one of a number of documents under development for the CSEPP that will address issues and provide information for recovery, reentry, and restoration in the event of a chemical agent accident or incident. vii ACKNOWLEDGMENTS This report was developed mainly under the auspices of the former Reentry/ Restoration Subcommittee of the Chemical Stockpile Emergency Preparedness Program (CSEPP) Joint Steering Committee prior to the recent restructuring of the CSEPP.

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