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HUD Adapts for Oklahoma City Workers Mon Sep 9, By JENNIFER L. BROWN, Associated Press Writer OKLAHOMA CITY (AP) - U.S. Housing and Urban Development officials are making special arrangements for employees too traumatized to move into the new federal building being erected across the street from where the old one was bombed. HUD employees who survived the April 19, 1995, terrorist attack can transfer to other states or perhaps work from a satellite office elsewhere in Oklahoma City, officials said. 'HUD has really taken unprecedented efforts here once we became aware of the concerns,' said Kelley Keeler, department spokeswoman. 'We want to work with each individual employee and find the best option for them.' The new building, scheduled to open next summer, will be across from the memorial to the 168 people killed in the truck bombing carried out by Timothy McVeigh ( news - web sites). Virginia Fredman, whose two best friends were among the 35 HUD employees killed in the bombing, said she avoids the memorial whenever possible and certainly does not want to have to walk by it every morning. 'That's the same as making us go to work in a graveyard every day,' she said. The stress of thinking about the move has sent five employees out on workers' compensation, said union president Jenny Parsley. She plans to retire before the move. 'Emotionally, it would just annihilate me,' she said. 'I just can't deal with the thought.' Some employees also have said that they are afraid terrorists might strike the new building. Several other federal agencies are also moving in, including the Food and Drug Administration ( news - web sites), the Agriculture Department and the Veterans Administration. But HUD employees have raised the strongest objections, and no other agency is making such far-reaching attempts to ease those fears. Keeler said only about 10 percent of the 105 employees — about half of whom worked in the Alfred P. Murr
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