Federal job cuts hit BPA, OSU experiment station

A federal judge in San Francisco found these probationary firings illegal on Feb. 27 but only mandated OPM to rescind directives sent to five agencies. There are an estimated 250,000 probationary staff throughout the government, and while other lawsuits move along, the impacts are already local.

‘Trying to keep the lights on’

“Now the [Trump] administration has exposed not just the Northwest — but frankly the entire West Coast — to an outage like that,” said Randy Hardy, referring to a 1996 blackout during his tenure leading the Bonneville Power Administration (BPA) that impacted 4 million people.

The BPA, which distributes one-third of the Northwest’s electricity and manages three-quarters of the region’s high-voltage transmission lines, lost 14% of its 3,100-person workforce due to federal cuts, according to Hardy. Over the past three weeks, about 230 employees opted for deferred resignation. The administration also revoked 90 job offers and fired 100 probationary employees, 300 fewer than originally slated.

Many line workers, the people who repair cables when trees fall and prepare them for wildfire season, are gone. Many power dispatchers, responsible for balancing systemwide inputs and outputs on a four-second-by-four-second basis, are gone.

“You can’t replace these people. It takes 20-25 years of experience before you’re really even qualified enough to become a dispatcher,” said Hardy, who’s spent over four decades in the power industry.

Though uncertain on the exact number, Hardy estimated BPA had about 60 power dispatchers between its Vancouver and Spokane control centers. Down even a dozen, he said the BPA could experience a “completely unacceptable” percentage of unplanned power outages, from less than one-tenth a percent to 1% or 5%.

BPA officials did not respond to Columbia Gorge News for comment and members of Congress reportedly haven’t been privy to specific details either, according to The Columbian. A few weeks ago, the Army Corps of Engineers, which operates several dams that produce BPA power, also submitted names of 157 probationary employees expected to be terminated from the Portland district.

“Bonneville is in critical mission mode where all they’re trying to do is keep the lights on,” said Zabyn Towner, the executive director of Northwest Requirements Utilities (NRU), a nonprofit trade association of 56 small, mostly rural publicly owned utility districts (PUDs). The City of Cascade Locks, Wasco Electric Cooperative, Klickitat PUD and Northern Wasco County People's Utility District are all members.

“Those are, historically, areas of the Northwest where it’s not profitable to provide electric service, and the New Deal addressed that by creating the Bonneville Power Administration,” said Towner. “They’re really hard to serve, they’re really expensive to serve.”

As NRU’s members depend on and consume about 37% of the electricity marketed by BPA, Towner’s heard concerns about the short and long-term effects of fewer skilled employees. These utilities could develop additional energy projects and diversify their portfolios, but the resources often simply aren’t there.

Even if Klickitat PUD, for instance, could build a new solar farm or dam, it’s no easy task connecting with BPA’s electric grid as a mountain of projects sit in what’s called the generation queue, waiting for review. According to Hardy, hooking up already takes five or six years, and now it’ll take one or two years longer absent new and probationary workers dedicated to cleaning out the queue.

Utilities may enlist some of BPA’s former employees, Towner said, but nobody benefits from a less reliable power supply, and smaller providers don’t have many other cost-effective options.

“Bonneville is completely self-funded through Northwest utility rates,” said Hardy. “The federal government is not going to save one dime by all these staff cuts, so the logic of this whole thing as applied to Bonneville is just completely cockeyed.”

In fact, Bonneville sends any surplus revenue to the federal government, and since customers will continue to finance the salaries of 230 workers who resigned, Towner noted the cuts put a larger burden on ratepayers. If Bonneville replaces any of those employees, customers will actually pay twice over, but qualified people probably aren’t jumping to join Bonneville.

“They’re not going to go back to the federal government,” Towner said. “Why would you want to work somewhere you might get fired tomorrow, or you’re being told that you’re not doing anything productive? That presents a huge problem for Bonneville and other power marketers, more generally, to recruit and retain people.”

Science at standstill

“I’m concerned about a lack of ability to do critical science to help our growers, and what impact that has for our whole community, especially one where agriculture is a big part,” said Brian Pearson, director of the Mid-Columbia Agricultural Research and Extension Center (MCAREC) in Hood River.

“It touches a lot of different businesses,” he continued. “I think as I drive through town — an irrigation supply store, or a fertilizer supplier — and how many different jobs are connected to the second biggest producer of cherries and pears in the nation.”

Similar to BPA, Pearson abruptly lost three probationary scientists from the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) who were part of a four-person team responsible for all post-harvest fruit research at MCAREC. These technicians studied how fruit ripens over time and ideal storage conditions. Now, several projects on mucor rot, a fungal disease affecting apples and pears that can survive cold holding temperatures, and other pathogens may not get completed.

USDA reinstated one scientist early last week, but the full-fledged post-harvest pathology program that MCAREC had only recently assembled remains fractured. Pearson said at least 21 scientists have been fired from Oregon State University’s network of extension centers, including MCAREC.

Agency-wide, about 4,200 hundred probationary employees no longer hold their positions, according to The New York Times.

“I welcome DOGE’s efforts at USDA because we know that its work makes us better, stronger, faster, and more efficient. I will expect full access and transparency to DOGE in the days and weeks to come,” said U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Brook Rollins in a press release. 

USDA terminated MCAREC’s employees via an email citing performance issues. While not their supervisor, Pearson disagreed with that assessment and questioned whether knowledgeable, talented scientists would pursue USDA jobs in the future.

“It was really chilling, as you can imagine. It upsets individuals. It kills morale. It leaves a lot of uncertainty going into the future,” said Pearson. “Their expertise is really critical to make sure the fruit is staying as top quality as possible getting to the consumer.”

He emphasized that MCAREC works for and with the community, providing dependable, publicly available information on challenges identified by growers themselves. Pearson also thanked the Oregon Sweet Cherry Commission and the Columbia Gorge Fruit Growers Association for being active partners through this process.

“One of the things that I love about this position, my career, is that I get to help people without charging them anything. We’re excited to help them and we rely upon that support, so having [fewer scientists] stands in the way of the thing that I really enjoy,” said Pearson.

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If you’re a federal worker who recently lost your job or would like to share what these past few weeks have been like, please email Nathan Wilson at natew@gorgenews.com. Columbia Gorge News plans to cover job losses at the United States Forest Service next.