USDA Forcing 2,600 Employees to Leave Washington in Major Shakeup

Half of D.C. Staff Must Relocate by 2026

The Agriculture Department just handed relocation orders to more than half of its Washington-area workforce. About 2,600 employees must move to one of five regional hubs or find another job.

The department says the move will put workers closer to farmers and cut costs. Critics say it will gut the agency the same way a similar relocation did six years ago.

The last time USDA tried this, more than half the affected staff quit, and what happened next took years to fix.

Five Cities Will Host New Hubs

The relocated employees will report to offices in Raleigh, North Carolina; Kansas City, Missouri; Indianapolis, Indiana; Fort Collins, Colorado; or Salt Lake City, Utah.

These cities have lower federal locality pay rates than Washington, where the rate sits at 33. 94 percent.

USDA says employees will enjoy a lower cost of living and the chance to buy homes they could never afford in D. C.

The department expects no more than 2,000 employees to remain in Washington when the reorganization is complete.

The South Building Gets Abandoned

The USDA South Building was the largest office building in the world when it opened in 1936, until the Pentagon surpassed it. Today it has $1.3 billion in deferred maintenance and an average daily occupancy of less than 1,900 people in a building designed for over 6,000.

The building spans two full blocks along Independence Avenue and contains seven miles of corridors. USDA will hand it over to the General Services Administration, which could sell it or repurpose it for other agencies.

Beltsville Research Center Shuts Down

The Beltsville Agricultural Research Center in Maryland spans roughly 6,600 acres and has been described as the worlds largest and most diversified agricultural research complex.

About 500 employees work there, including scientists, and some 300 buildings are scattered across the campus. Beltsville scientists developed the Roma tomato in 1955, bred specifically for making pasta sauce.

The closure will take place over several years to avoid disrupting research, but long-term field studies cannot be moved at all.

Forest Service Loses Research Stations

The U. S.

Forest Service currently operates five regional research stations around the country, and four will be closed under the plan. All research functions will move to the USDA hub in Fort Collins.

The research budget has dwindled in recent years, and the number of research scientists at the agency fell by nearly 50 percent between 1985 and 2016.

Critics say moving a scientist who studies eastern forests to Colorado makes no sense when their research focus is thousands of miles away.

The 2019 Kansas City Move Was Disastrous

In 2019, USDA relocated two research agencies from Washington to Kansas City: the Economic Research Service and the National Institute of Food and Agriculture.

Both agencies lost more than half of their staff during the move.

One university vice president called it the brain drain we all feared, possibly a destruction of the agencies. As of September 2024, ERS staffing levels remained 15 percent below where they were before the relocation.

Reports Dropped and Grants Stalled

The loss of staff cut the number of economic reports published by ERS in half.

Within NIFA, the relocation led to delays and suspensions of grant programs, and land grant universities struggled as capacity grants that support basic research facilities were delayed by more than a fiscal quarter.

Four of five economists working on bees and pollination left or planned to leave. Ten of 12 economists working on trade and international development retired or departed.

One former administrator said it would take ten years to recover.

Experienced Workers Disappeared

By 2020, just 19 percent of NIFA employees had more than a decade of experience, down from over 50 percent before the relocation. The proportion of Black staff at NIFA declined from 47 percent to 19 percent.

About 80 percent of NIFA employees in Kansas City were new hires who joined after the move. A union leader said economists are not interchangeable, and specialized knowledge takes a career to acquire.

15,000 Already Left Voluntarily

Before the relocation orders even went out, USDA shed more than 15,000 employees through a program that allowed workers to sit on paid leave for several months before resigning.

One employee said the deferred resignation program had already turned the agency into Swiss cheese with vacancies from the local offices to the highest levels.

The voluntary departures included many experienced staff with irreplaceable expertise, and the full impact on programs serving farmers is still unfolding.

USDA Bets on a Tight Job Market

Deputy Secretary Stephen Vaden told Congress he expects more than a majority of employees to accept the relocation this time.

He said that given cuts made by other federal agencies in Washington, the job market is not what it once was, so employees may be more willing to move.

Vaden said the reorganization puts a thumb on the scale against future layoffs.

He would have to personally approve any reductions in force, which he suggested would only affect small numbers if employees decline to relocate.

Farmers and Lawmakers Push Back

The department received overwhelmingly negative feedback on the plan from employees, lawmakers, and stakeholders, who warned it could lead to a significant brain drain and disruptions to key farmer-support programs.

Unions said USDA failed to undertake cost-benefit or operational impact analysis and did not provide a rationale for choosing the five hubs.

Deputy Secretary Vaden told Agri-Pulse that all relocations would be completed by the end of 2026. The negative feedback is not expected to stop the plan from moving forward.

This article was created with AI assistance and human editing.

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