DC museums to close too

Trump government shutdown also affects National Zoo and galleries

WASHINGTON: Museums and galleries popular with visitors and locals in the nation’s capital will close starting midweek if the partial shutdown of the federal government drags on.

So will the National Zoo and a lively ice rink near the National Mall.

The attractions have stayed open by using unspent funds, but that money is also about to run out.

Museums and galleries under the Smithsonian Institution umbrella will close starting Jan 2, the Smithsonian said on its website.

That includes the zoo, as well as the National Air and Space Museum, the National Museum of African American History and Culture, the National Museum of Natural History, and several galleries, including the National Portrait Gallery.

Smithsonian facilities are open on New Year’s Day.

The National Gallery of Art will close starting Jan 3, a spokesman said.

That includes the iconic West and East buildings as well as an ice rink in the National Gallery of Art Sculpture Garden that is a favourite with families.

National Gallery of Art facilities are usually closed on New Year’s Day.

The shutdown is also affecting national parks, although unevenly.

Some remain accessible with bare-bones staffing levels, some are operating with money from states

or charitable groups and others are locked off.

With no resolution in sight, the shutdown is forcing hundreds of thousands of federal workers and contractors to stay home or work without pay.

The Environmental Protection Agency will keep disaster-response teams and other essential workers on the job as it becomes the latest

agency to start furloughing employees in the government shutdown.

Spokesman Molly Block says the EPA will implement its shutdown plan at midnight Friday.

That will mean furloughing many of its 14,000 workers.

Florida Senator Marco Rubio applauded a decision by the Trump administration to reverse new

guidance issued by the Department of Homeland Security that prevented the Federal Emergency Management Agency from writing or renewing National Flood Insurance Program policies during the current government shutdown.

He said it was important that people could continue to get and maintain their flood insurance. — AP