Federal Funding Cuts Bring Fear, Turmoil to East Lansing Fish & Wildlife Office
A purge on federal spending has caused anxiety about potential layoffs, a $1 spending limit for work credit cards and concern around funding for partially completed projects in a local U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service office, according to an employee who spoke with ELi.
President Donald Trump’s administration has said the changes made through the recently created Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) are meant to make the government more efficient and save taxpayer money. The federal employee who spoke with ELi said the changes are causing their office to run less efficiently.
“Pat” works for the United States Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS), which has an office at 2651 Coolidge Road in East Lansing. “Pat” spoke with ELi on the condition of anonymity, worried about the ramifications of publicly stating their concerns.
The rapid pace changes have been put upon the office’s roughly 40 employees has been jarring, Pat said, leaving many FWS workers wondering if their careers are at risk.
“We’re all waiting for the next thing to happen,” they said. “There’s a fear of uncertainty and we don’t know if we’ll get a notice over the weekend that we’re getting fired.”
Pat said that a second round of RIF notices (reduction in force) recently went out, meaning that within 60 days of the notices being released, the federal government can carry out mass layoffs or office closures.
“A significant number of people are taking [the notices] as fact,” they said. “They’re leaving or retiring early and it’s [leading to] a major loss of institutional knowledge.”
The spending cuts threaten the office’s ability to carry out its work protecting Michigan’s natural world.
“People work with endangered species and with private landowners to do restorations on private land,” Pat told ELi. “Migratory bird management, the Great Lakes Restoration Initiative (GLRI), coastal projects…there are a wide variety of things that go on in that office.”
Most staff are biologists, according to Pat, while there are a handful of administrators and assistants.
“Across the board,” Pat said, “the people who work in the office are dedicated to continuing to do their jobs. People work for the fish and wildlife service because they believe in it.”
Ending a policy that allowed employees to work from home seems especially ineffective to Pat, who explained that because the job requires working off-site so often, it ends up increasing travel time for some employees.
“We all knew telework policies would change,” they said. “It’s over with no consideration to a person’s job [or] duties. We were productive as hell. We were doing our jobs.
“We don’t spend days working [in the office] with our coworkers, [we work] with researchers and universities and landowners and biologists. When that policy was changed with no consideration [of those who] drive a significant amount away from their family and it puts them on the road. It’s less efficient and done without any regard for what we actually do.”
FWS employees also had a $1 spending limit placed on their work credit cards, Pat said.
“[We] can’t purchase supplies, office equipment, [or] field work equipment,” Pat said. “They claim it’s for efficiency and accountability. The amount of steps we had to go through [before] to use our credit cards…there was no fraud.”
Pat said ongoing projects are paused with no information about when or if they will resume. Some projects involve partners, who expect to be reimbursed by the federal government for their work. Pat said FWS informs those individuals and organizations that the money is still technically promised, but they don’t know when they’ll have the opportunity to pay out.
Pat was reluctant to highlight specific programs that may be defunded but mentioned a project that would enhance the habitat for freshwater mussels. 43 species of freshwater mussels call Michigan home, five of which are endangered. The mussels play a critical role in cleaning Michigan’s waterways, filtering out algae and harmful pollutants.
A large project the FWS works on is the Great Lakes Restoration Initiative, a multi-billion dollar collaboration between federal agencies, tribes, universities, local governments and more. The GLRI has enjoyed bipartisan support from politicians and private landowners. Funding for the work of protecting the Great Lakes and its 11,000 miles of coastlines have already been appropriated, Pat said.
Much of the work on GLRI projects has been paused and employees are unsure when or if it will restart. As of Thursday, April 10, Pat confirmed that many GLRI projects are still paused, but things are slowly starting to open back up. However, funding approval is much harder to obtain.
Partnerships with private landowners to restore grasslands, wetlands and pollinator habitats have also stopped.
“People don’t understand how much the federal government does behind the scenes,” Pat said.
The East Lansing FWS office lost one employee when the administration fired probationary federal employees, however they are unsure if that employee will return because of legal challenges against the order firing probationary employees. A court briefly overturned the order but earlier this week an appeals court said the Trump administration may resume firing probationary employees, according to NPR.
“Every new administration makes a change because they want to make their footprint on what’s happening,” Pat said. “This is not that. This is a lot of what’s coming down is not through your agency and department. You exist in your chain of command [and] this stuff isn’t coming from the normal chain of command.”
Pat was quick to point out that their office and branch of the federal government isn’t experiencing this alone.
“[It’s] happening to every agency out there,” they said. “The broad strokes being taken are affecting everyone under the guise of being efficient and saving money – but it’s going to cost more in the long term.
“What’s important for folks to know is that what’s being done, it’s not done with any rational reasoning. It’s a completely obvious attempt to reduce the effectiveness and ability of the government to do work for the citizens. There is no benefit to what they’re trying to do.”