I need to put it into perspective. I'm at a gov org.

Sounds like you need a meeting to discuss this.

Not joking - have a meeting, and whatever comes out, is binding. That'll make sure everybody shows up. :)

The problem is you need a champion from the top of the company, to give direction (and assign the needed people).

There is no "champion", nor a "top of the company". The building I work in houses multiple entities with the same org. And each entity has is own reporting chain. Next level up is vp of dev, opns, each client function. Up from that is where dev and opns merge.

Who should develop the plan?

Isn't that you? By definition?

I've always found $$$ to be the barrier in DR. Basically, you need the company to tell you *what* has to be recoverable, and in what time frame. Probably several scenarios - no point in taking orders if Manufacturing is under a volcano. :)

Should have phrased that a little better. Should have asked "When should the plan be developed?" For the existing systems, I am trying to put together plans. However, this org is bringing in new, mission critical, apps all the time, without planning for disaster. Mainframe opns is told to find time in the schedule, UNIX side is given new equipment and told to run. And some of the new UNIX apps are apps that are being moved down from the mainframe. My position is "before an app can be put into production, we should have the disaster plan written".

As to the scope, this site performs the payroll, hr and accounting services for the entire org. If we were to go down, and these services interrupted, the entire US would be affected.

What role did the hot-site play in planning and testing.

Full roll-over for the DR test.

I have managers trying to say that the hot-site should "learn" the applications and take an active role in the development of the test plans. (The hot-site is owned by the org.) My think we (the development staff) should create the plan, and that the hot-site should be able to recovery the system based upon our documentation.

Who should pay for the testing (App dev, Computer Opns, Client, etc.)

Oh, shit. You're in it deep.

The company should be - this should be a full line item from SOMEBODY up higher than those departments.

DR testing has been "overhead". From what I've been told, next FY the clients are being told to budget for it. I don't know the amount being requested, nor do I know if the client can "opt-out". Might be able to change the level of criticality. (How fast it has to be recovered.)

I was orginally contracted just to prepare the plans for the applications that had been tested. Then to write the plans for the apps to be tested. Now I, and the group I work with, have been tasked with planning the disaster tests for next FY (required by regulation to be tested annually) and yet the person wer work for does not have functional authority (only administrative authority) over the developer and operation personnel we need to work with. Therefore, we are stuck in the position "It's their responsibility....No, it's not, it's yours...."

/frustration....