6 U.S.C. § 321a — Evacuation plans and exercises

(a) In general. Despite any other law, and subject to subsection (d), grants the Department gives to states or local or tribal governments through the State Homeland Security Grant Program or the Urban Area Security Initiative can be used to: set up programs to build and maintain mass evacuation plans under subsection (b) for a natural disaster, terrorist act, or other man-made disaster; get ready to carry out those plans, including building evacuation routes and stockpiling supplies and shelters; and run exercises testing those plans. (b) Plan development. When building these mass evacuation plans, each state, local, or tribal government must, as much as practical: set up command and decision-making processes for the incident; make sure different governments' plans and evacuation routes are coordinated together; identify main and backup evacuation routes and ways to move more people along them, like switching two-way roads to one-way evacuation routes; identify evacuation transportation methods, including mass transit, and coordinate plans for everyone, including people in hospitals, nursing homes, and similar facilities; create ways to tell the public about evacuation plans before and during an evacuation, especially people with disabilities or who are elderly, people with limited English, and anyone else who might struggle to get that information; and identify shelter locations and their capacity. (c) Assistance. (1) The Administrator can set guidelines, standards, or requirements needed to run this section and ensure good evacuation planning at the state, local, and tribal level. (2) If a state, local, or tribal government asks, the Administrator must help hospitals, nursing homes, and similar facilities build, maintain, and practice evacuation plans that fit into that government's overall plan. (d) Multipurpose funds. Nothing here stops a state, local, or tribal government from using grant money to prepare for a natural or man-made disaster unrelated to terrorism, as long as doing so also helps that government build its terrorism-preparedness abilities.