The Forest Service is defending its plan to relocate its headquarters to Utah and shutter most of its research facilities, as part of a major agency reorganization \u2014 but intends to proceed with these plans with or without approval from Congress.<\/p>\n
Last month, the Agriculture Department announced that the Forest Service<\/a> would move its headquarters to Salt Lake City, Utah. In addition, the agency should shut down 57 of its 77 research facilities, as well as all nine of its regional offices.<\/p>\n Forest Service Chief Tom Schultz told members of the House Appropriations Committee that about 500 employees would have to relocate under the agency reorganization plan \u2014 about 1.5% of the agency\u2019s 30,000 workforce.<\/p>\n \u201cThe intent is not to push anyone out the door,\u201d Schultz told members of the subcommittee on interior, environment and related agencies on Thursday. \u201cThe intent, really, is to be thoughtful about how we do this, looking at where we don\u2019t have enough staff to support a facility.\u201d<\/p>\n ]]><\/p>\n The National Federation of Federal Employees, the union that represents Forest Service employees, estimates that about 6,500 agency employees would be affected by the headquarters relocation, and that 2,700 would be impacted by research center closures.<\/p>\n Steve Gutierrez, a former Forest Service firefighter, now a business representative at NFFE, told Federal News Network that employees impacted by this move would likely quit instead of relocate.<\/p>\n \u201cThey\u2019re being told to pick up their entire lives and move across the country, or move two to three hours away from their residence where they live now,\u201d Gutierrez said. \u201cNot everybody can pick up their entire life, move their kids out of school, buy a new home in another state, sell their home. That\u2019s a big lift for a lot of people, and not everybody\u2019s willing to do that, no matter how much they are dedicated to the service.\u201d<\/p>\n Schultz said the Forest Service isn\u2019t looking to shrink its workforce. Thousands of agency employees left last year by taking voluntary separation incentives.<\/p>\n \u201cAs we remove middle layers of management, the intent is not to RIF anybody or have a reduction in force. It\u2019s to find other roles and responsibilities, different reporting structures, but it is to ultimately move more resources to forests and districts where the work is being done on a daily basis,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n In addition, the agency\u2019s FY 2027 budget request would eliminate about 800 of the Forest Service\u2019s 1,110 research scientist positions.<\/p>\n Schultz said those researchers would likely find similar jobs in the private sector or at the state level, and that the \u201cstates would step up\u201d to provide funding for these positions.<\/p>\n ]]><\/p>\n \u201cR&D is zeroed out in the budget,\u201d he told lawmakers.<\/p>\n Gutierrez said many Forest Service researchers are already co-located at universities that sponsor them.<\/p>\n \u201cWe don\u2019t pay anything for them. They\u2019re free,\u201d he said. \u201cI don\u2019t think it\u2019s in the best interest for public lands.\u201d<\/p>\n Schultz said the reorganization plan would shutter some facilities that have fallen into disrepair, and that it would \u201cfacilitate research and researchers over maintaining facilities and facility managers.\u201d<\/p>\n Subcommittee Ranking Member Chellie Pingree (D-Maine) said lawmakers have been left in the dark about details of the reorganization.<\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019re getting some of our information off the website. We\u2019re the appropriating committee that has oversight on the budget. I feel like we shouldn\u2019t have to go watch the website every day to see if you\u2019ve made another announcement or something,\u201d Pingree said.<\/p>\n \u201cWe haven\u2019t seen this organizational chart, so I have no way to know that we\u2019re not going to lose a lot more employees, just as we did last year with the misguided DOGE effort,\u201d she added.<\/p>\n Schultz said the Forest Service would keep a limited number of employees in Washington, D.C., but that a majority \u2014 about 260 of the 350 employees in the national capital area \u2014 would have to relocate under this plan.<\/p>\n \u201cCould that number be a little bit less, a little bit more? Yes. Is it impactful to those families? Absolutely. Are we going to work with them to transition them and provide assistance? Yes, we would. We look at their individual circumstances. You bet. Are the unions there at the table representing those folks? Yes, they are,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n ]]><\/p>\n Under the first Trump administration, the USDA tried moving hundreds of employees at its two research bureaus to Kansas City. But more than half of the employees<\/a>\u00a0at the Economic Research Service and National Institute of Food and Agriculture who received relocation notices left the agency rather than move to Kansas City.<\/p>\n \u201cI saw what happened when we moved NIFA and ERS, and you just lose a lot of staff. Not everybody\u2019s going to move,\u201d Subcommittee Ranking Member Rep. Chellie Pingree (D-Maine) said. \u201cNot everybody is going to be able to move their family from Washington, D.C. to Salt Lake City.\u201d<\/p>\n USDA is currently planning to relocate more than half of its DC-based workforce to five hubs across the country<\/a> \u2014 Raleigh, North Carolina; Kansas City, Missouri; Indianapolis, Indiana; Fort Collins, Colorado; and Salt Lake City.<\/p>\n Schultz told the subcommittee that the Forest Service intends to move ahead with the reorganization, with or without approval from Congress.<\/p>\n \u201cWe have consulted with [the Office of General Counsel], and we have been afforded what they perceived to be a direction to do this, move forward, that the secretary has this authority,\u201d Schultz said.<\/p>\n Rep. Ryan Zinke (R-Mont.), former Interior Secretary under the first Trump administration, said he supported the reorganization. Under his tenure, the Interior Department moved the Bureau of Land Management headquarters<\/a> to Grand Junction, Colorado.<\/p>\n \u201cWhen you take your personnel and you bring them out West, the schools are better, the cost of living is better, the opportunity to have a house is better, and you\u2019re closer to where the actual forests are,\u201d Zinke said. \u201cMoving things out West, I think, is important, because most of the issues are in the West.\u201d<\/p>\n The FY 2027 budget proposal also doubles down on plans to merge the wildland firefighting capabilities of the Forest Service and the Interior Department into a single agency. Congress rejected that plan in a comprehensive spending deal for fiscal 2026.<\/p>\n \u201cCongress didn\u2019t go along with that, mainly because I don\u2019t know if it\u2019s a good idea or bad idea, but we had a lot of questions that were unanswered, \u201cSubcommittee Chairman Mike Simpson (R-Idaho) said.<\/p>\n