Losses at the Forest Service

[Bigjay73]

Time will tell, nobody can predict either way at this point, mostly emotional speculation at this point.

 

[Flynarrow]

FWIW google tells me there are 35k forest service employees nationwide, so though 3400 is a significant number, it is in reality less than 10%. I will say right now, if the least productive 10% of employees that work at my organization were let go, no less work would get done, in fact, maybe more work would get done. Just saying.

Having spent a career in the agency I could not agree more. However most of the temporary and new employees are in on-the-ground positions or close to it. That is the work most citizens would recognize as needed and beneficial. They are the employees being terminated. And if this continues, the National Forest will look further neglected and that moves it in the direction of disposing of public lands. Some politicians, corporations and individuals are salivating at the opportunity.

 

[Gellar]

We have a lot of Forest Service workers and other branches of Federal government employees amongst us. My thoughts are with you and your family today. There are many different thoughts going through your heads right now and your families are in panic mode. Just remember that in the middle of difficulty lies opportunity.

 

[SAJ-99]

Not a gotcha at all, and it’s absolutely fair to point out. What kills me is the hypocrisy. When pipe fitters get laid off, it’s government killing jobs and affecting livelihoods. When the probationary FS employees get the axe, it’s lost in the mix they contribute to small town America just like the pipe fitters, the welder, the farrier and the teacher. They’re just “big government”.

I like to see the positives. Maybe the same guys who complain when MTFWP tells them to tighten the boot laces and hike a little deeper for that mule deer will find some perspective in telling the USFS employees to tighten the laces and work a little harder.

 

[Beignet]

I hope none of the pipeliners that got shitcanned by the last administration that were told "learn to cope" didn't end up taking a federal job and get double whammied. No, that's not a "gotcha" by any means, so please dont take it as such. But it is a real possibility. At which point I think they would probably snap, rightfully so.

Are you talking about Keystone XL? Kind of a false equivocation as the construction phasing would’ve been temporary jobs hired by multiple contracting firms. Heavy civil firms dont fire their employees when they lose a bid or a job. They just move onto the next one. Of the 11,000 jobs they planned to create, 10,400 were estimated to be seasonal construction jobs. They’d estimated that they’d need 50 employees to maintain the pipeline once finished, 35 would have been permanent. My source was an article in the Austin American-Statesman dated 1/22/2021.

Edit to say that it was a syndicated article that the aforementioned publication ran on their website.

 

[JAG]

I'm sorry for some of the people who lost their jobs, but I also see a bunch of FS employees on a fairly regular basis who appear to do nothing but drive around in the truck and play on their phones all day. I'm thrilled to see any federal agency have to defend its budget instead of getting rubber-stamped every year, or possibly even learn to run a budget.

I like the idea of having a government department have to defend their budget or explain why they exist. However, your point reveals a fundamental flaw in government budgets supported by tax income. Even if they are fiducially responsible, they are restricted from doing so. Here's how:

Government budgets and programs demonstrate their existence by showing how much money they spend. If they don't spend the money, they won't get funded next year. This disincentivizes prudent spending, rainy day funds, etc. If they are too careful with the money at the beginning of the year and have leftover cash, they hurry up and blow it on stupid shit so they can continue receiving funds.

As you know, business works the opposite way, and to your point, companies survive on prudent spending, management, R&D, paying down debt, acquisitions, etc.

 

[Nick87]

Heavy civil firms dont fire their employees when they lose a bid or a job. They just move onto the next one.

Losing a bid isn't the same as having a job cancel while the job is going. I'm slightly familiar with how heavy civil firms work and yes when they lose a job they lay off workers. Pretty much immediately. They don't just walk across the street to the next job.

Edit-
My source- 20 years of experience.

 

[elkduds]

Gonna be a great summer for would be poachers & illegal off roaders!

And a busy one for the monkey wrenching resistance.

 

[WesternCO68]

FWIW google tells me there are 35k forest service employees nationwide, so though 3400 is a significant number, it is in reality less than 10%. I will say right now, if the least productive 10% of employees that work at my organization were let go, no less work would get done, in fact, maybe more work would get done. Just saying.

If we were losing the least productive 10 percent, that would be one thing. Instead we're just losing everyone who has been at their job for under a year, regardless of their performance. A lot of those people are young, energetic field-going personnel, not wasteful overhead.

My forest lost a half dozen new timber sale prep personnel. They were hard workers who were willing to work long days in rough conditions, and they're gone now. That means less wood going to the local sawmills. When the mills close, they're going to blame the agency.

I'm a conservative, but this is a really bad move. The only way this makes sense is if the goal is to destroy the agencies in order to dismantle them completely.

As to the people who see lazy Forest Service people out in the woods, I don't have much to say about that. I've known people who got mad at us and called us lazy for taking a lunch break. There are plenty of FS people who are in the woods away from the roads where their work isn't seen.

 

[elkantlers]

My local forests were already short on LEO’s with multiple openings. Guessing those won’t be filled anytime soon

I read Law enforcement was exempt from the layoffs.

 

[elkduds]

I'm sorry for some of the people who lost their jobs, but I also see a bunch of FS employees on a fairly regular basis who appear to do nothing but drive around in the truck and play on their phones all day. I'm thrilled to see any federal agency have to defend its budget instead of getting rubber-stamped every year, or possibly even learn to run a budget.

Try real hard to see past the end of you nose. National forests and BLM lands are being defunded so they can be divested

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[TheTone]

I read Law enforcement was exempt from the layoffs.

You’re right but I bet it doesn’t help with recruitment or retention

 

[elkantlers]

You’re right but I bet it doesn’t help with recruitment or retention

It's definitely going to make people think twice before applying.

 

[Justabirdwatcher]

Well said

No, not well said. Anyone that assumes the newest employees are automatically the least productive (either in the short, or the long term) clearly has very little management or organizational experience. The idea that any 10% will do, is foolish and irresponsible. And here I thought we were trying to avoid foolish and irresponsible.

 

[Beignet]

Losing a bid isn't the same as having a job cancel while the job is going. I'm slightly familiar with how heavy civil firms work and yes when they lose a job they lay off workers. Pretty much immediately. They don't just walk across the street to the next job.

Edit-
My source- 20 years of experience.

I also work in a component of major infrastructure projects of the horizontal variety, bidding materials to heavy civil firms. When a project has been pulled everyone still gets paid for the work performed to that point. The union laborers on those jobs get reassigned pretty quickly.

The six firms awarded contracts on that project (all still thriving) never ramped up hiring as the project had been contentious from the get go. A TC Energy press release says the actual people on the project when it was halted was 1000. I believe they were all union jobs. Were they not able to find reassignment in such a high-demand trade in a reasonable amount of time?

Not arguing that having a project pulled isn’t a pain in the ass for a firm or diminish the impact it has on labor, but I’m not not convinced this was truly the attack on the working class that it’s often been made out to be.

Even if it were, two wrongs doesn’t make a right. Just because something crappy has happened to me before doesn’t mean I want it to happen to other people.

 

[mdhunter]

Broke and inefficient is ultimately a tough combination for a business or the government.

 

[Bonasababy]

How about the latrines? Yikes. Unfortunately all this is gonna further the land transfer narrative.

That's part of the reason for this.

 

[Bonasababy]

Theoretically, employees said to be exempt in the agency include wildland firefighters, law enforcement officers, meteorologists, and bridge inspectors.

That said, particularly in the fire side of things, none of it happens without support staff that were not exempted. I would make a prediction that if we have a bad fire season, both firefighting operations will not be as functional nor will the cost of those operations be reduced - because when the rubber hits the road contractors cost more than staff.

The vast majority of the Beaverhead-Deerlodge NF - my backyard and some of the heaviest hit elk hunting country in the state - does not have travel management. Due to this, many problems stem. Game Wardens cannot cite folks for driving down closed roads or trails, LEOs and Search and Rescue struggle to effectively function on the landscape, the Forest is ineligible for many grant opportunities dedicated to trail and road improvements, rogue motorized use and the pioneering of trails is rampant and expanding, and user experience suffers as does the resource. There's a long history going back to 2006 or so of the Forest saying it's going to be a priority, and then the can is kicked down the road.

I can hear the clinkin' now.

That said, the human toll - Montanans losing their jobs in my community - is really the one I am bothered by right now.

Rural economies across the country get a HUGE benefit from federal employees. Those that are out of a job sure won't be making any non critical purchases. I would imagine those that still have one won't either.

All over the country there are millions of people impacted by this purge.

 

[Bonasababy]

I also work in a component of major infrastructure projects of the horizontal variety, bidding materials to heavy civil firms. When a project has been pulled everyone still gets paid for the work performed to that point. The union laborers on those jobs get reassigned pretty quickly.

The six firms awarded contracts on that project (all still thriving) never ramped up hiring as the project had been contentious from the get go. A TC Energy press release says the actual people on the project when it was halted was 1000. I believe they were all union jobs. Were they not able to find reassignment in such a high-demand trade in a reasonable amount of time?

Not arguing that having a project pulled isn’t a pain in the ass for a firm or its labor, but I’m not not convinced this was truly the attack on the working class that it’s often been made out to be.

Even if it were, two wrongs doesn’t make a right. Just because something crappy has happened to me before doesn’t mean I want it to happen to other people.

Keystone--if resurrected--will RAISE gas prices for many of those living in midwest USA. Gas prices rose just the other day here. Gonna be a lot of people regretting their votes pretty soon here!

 

[Trial153]

Rural economies across the country get a HUGE benefit from federal employees. Those that are out of a job sure won't be making any non critical purchases. I would imagine those that still have one won't either.

All over the country there are millions of people impacted by this purge.

Only the suckers. The smart ones know where it’s at!!

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