Newly hired USDA employees will begin work in Kansas City on Monday as part of Agriculture Secretary Sonny Perdue’s decision to move two research agencies out of Washington. The USDA said it would use “an aggressive hiring strategy” to replace the 250 staffers who declined to move halfway across the United States on short notice.
“We are moving ahead with the relocation process,” said a USDA spokesperson when asked if the relocation would be delayed or abandoned in the face of huge staff losses. The Economic Research Service “specifically expects to onboard employees on July 22, the first day new and relocating employees can report to Kansas City.”
The USDA said it would have 100 employees of the ERS and the National Institute of Food and Agriculture in place in Kansas City by Aug. 1. A second wave of 200 employees would be in place by Sept. 1 and the final 247 workers by Sept. 30. The short timeline would preclude Congress from denying funds for relocation in the new fiscal year, which opens on Oct. 1. The Democrat-controlled House has passed legislation to keep the ERS and NIFA in Washington. The Republican-run Senate has not acted.
Perdue announced his selection of the Kansas City area as the new home for the agencies on June 13. The new location will save $194 million in rent and salaries over 15 years, according to the USDA. Perdue says it will be easier to recruit employees to work in Kansas City and that the agencies will be closer to “stakeholders” — although neither works directly with the public. Skeptics, including the Union of Concerned Scientists, see the relocation, along with repeated administration proposals to slash funding for the ERS, as an attempt to gut the agencies.
Staffers faced a deadline at the start of this week to say if they would go or stay. Some 145 said they would move and 250 declined. Nonresponses were counted as a refusal to relocate. Employees are free to change their minds until Sept. 30, when the relocation is complete. The USDA says it is moving 547 job slots for the ERS and NIFA to Kansas City and keeping 97 in Washington. Staffers spoke of a “brain drain” of retirements and resignations at the agencies this spring because of anxiety over the relocation. Employees who choose to move also face a pay cut because federal wages are based on office location.
It could take up to two years to secure and “build out” office space in Kansas City, said 19 Democratic senators and representatives in suggesting to Perdue that ERS and NIFA employees could stay in Washington or telecommute in the interim. Otherwise, the lawmakers said in a letter, the employees could inadvertently buy a home that turns out to be far from their eventual worksite.
Scott Hutchins, deputy agriculture undersecretary for research, is expected to face questions about the relocation during a Senate Agriculture Committee hearing on Thursday. Maryland Sen. Chris Van Hollen placed a “hold” on Hutchins’ nomination for undersecretary for research as part of his efforts to block the ERS and NIFA relocation.
Perdue has faced limited opposition in Congress to the relocation. The USDA already has a large commodity office in Kansas City.
The ERS, a self-described “honest broker of economic information,” analyzes agricultural, food, natural resources, and rural development issues, including USDA programs. NIFA awards more than $1 billion a year in competitive research grants.