As part of its sweeping reorganization plans, the Agriculture Department is telling at least some federal employees they have until the end of the month to decide whether they will pick up and relocate — or otherwise resign from their jobs.
Food Safety and Inspection Service employees who have been flagged for a reassignment received notice earlier this week from agency management, regarding an “updated management-directed reassignment acknowledgement.” The internal agency message, obtained and viewed by Federal News Network, sets a June 30 deadline for affected FSIS employees to make their relocation decision, which would then take effect at the end of September.
If employees do not want to relocate, the email said they must accept a separation offer by the end of this month. Employees who choose to decline the reassignment will be considered “involuntarily separated” as of Sept. 30 and may be eligible for severance pay.
FSIS employees who do not agree to resign, but who also do not report to their new duty station by Sept. 30, will be removed from their jobs “for failure to accept a reassignment,” the message reads. The employees will also not be allowed to appeal their reassignments to the Merit Systems Protection Board.
It’s unclear if the June 30 deadline applies to any other USDA components involved in the relocation efforts. USDA did not immediately respond to Federal News Network’s request for comment.
USDA has been embarking on a multi-part reorganization plan that involves relocating more than half of its D.C.-area workforce to hubs across the country by the end of this summer. The relocation plans affect staffing at FSIS, the Forest Service, Economic Research Service, National Institute of Food and Agriculture, and Food and Nutrition Service. About 90% of USDA employees already work outside of the D.C. area.
“Our goal is that this actually becomes even more effective because we’ll be out in the country with the very people that we’re serving, versus here in Washington,” Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins told lawmakers during a House Agriculture Committee hearing Thursday.
The secretary said the relocations across the country will be a “massive value add” for USDA research.
“We have some extraordinary researchers, but most of them don’t want to be in Washington, D.C.,” Rollins said. “The challenge is when you have decades of Washington, D.C.-located research, they’re doing extraordinary work, but you begin to lose out on the opportunity to have some of the brightest minds who may not want … to move to Washington, where it’s much more expensive to live and to do that research.”
Surveys from several USDA unions, however, paint a different picture. Internal polling conducted by the National Treasury Employees Union in May found that 80% of D.C.-area FNS employees would quit their jobs rather than relocate this summer.
Similar findings came from a May survey conducted by American Federation of Government Employees Local 3403, representing ERS and NIFA employees. About 76% of union members said they are not planning to relocate.
“It’s not going to work on this slapdash timeline. It gives no meaningful time for employees to relocate. It doesn’t take into consideration projects, building timelines or leases,” one federal union official, speaking anonymously for fear of retaliation, told Federal News Network. “It’s unreasonable to expect people to uproot their whole lives to move to a place that they may never have seen in a couple of months.”
The Forest Service is expected move its headquarters to Salt Lake City, Utah, shutter all nine of its regional offices, and keep just 20 of its 77 research facilities. The agency is offering separation incentives to staff ahead of the planned agency reorganization.
Most FNS employees will be required to relocate to other parts of the country as well, as the agency is shuttering its D.C. headquarters office and several regional offices. FSIS will relocate about two-thirds of its D.C.-area workforce to “mission-critical locations,” including Iowa and Georgia. Many D.C.-based employees at ERS and NIFA will be relocating to Kansas City, Missouri.
More than 15,000 employees left USDA last year, accepting separation offers through the deferred resignation program (DRP) and early retirement.
‘Lump-sum’ reimbursement model
As relocation plans get underway, a May 29 memo published by USDA authorized agency heads to use a different reimbursement process for moving costs — a “lump sum” payment model, rather than the traditional process of calculating individual employee moving costs.
Traditional federal reimbursement policies cover costs such as shipping household goods, moving employees and their families, tax allowances and other discretionary items like temporary storage. USDA’s “lump sum” model would provide a flat moving reimbursement rate for relocating employees, based on the department’s moving cost calculations.
The “lump sum” model will expedite reimbursement processing times, improve cost predictability and reduce administrative burden, USDA said in the memo.
“The traditional process requires extensive documentation and lengthy reimbursement timelines,” the memo said. “This lump‑sum payment covers relocation expenses and replaces the current system of reimbursing actual costs up to statutory limits.”
But officials from AFGE Local 3403 said the new policy in many cases could lead to lower reimbursement amounts for many relocating employees. Using a blanket cost calculation for all of USDA may mean some employees could end up spending thousands of dollars out of pocket in moving costs, the union said.
“A GS-15 moving from D.C. is going to have a much different time than a GS-7 moving from Iowa,” a union official told Federal News Network. “These are different circumstances and they require different care.”
According to AFGE’s estimate, the lump sum model could shift roughly $9,000 to $14,000 worth of moving expenses onto employees who are relocating from D.C. to Kansas City, depending on their household size and lease situation.
AFGE also called USDA’s moving cost calculations “outdated,” and pointed out that the lump sum model does not appear to include temporary housing assistance during relocations — something that is available under the traditional reimbursement model, and that some employees may need on a tight relocation timeline.
During Wednesday’s hearing, committee Republicans expressed support for the reorganization and downsizing efforts, saying it will move agricultural researchers closer to the communities they serve. But Democratic committee members including Rep. April McClain Delaney (D-Md.) raised concerns about the loss of decades of research, institutional knowledge and experienced staff.
“Is there a way to keep current facilities here with experienced staff, but yet still experiment with setting up other labs across the country?” McClain Delaney said. “Because in the end, it’s about keeping our research and results and impact for our farmers — and also protecting those who have given decades to USDA.”
Rollins, however, said the reorganization plans will improve USDA recruitment and increase interest from the broader research community in joining the department.
“I’m not here to say it’s been perfect or that everyone is so excited to move,” Rollins said. “But at the end of the day, the opportunity to move those core functions out into America — and have the research part aligned with real research universities, where we’re spending billions of dollars, I think that’s going to be a much better use of our taxpayer dollars.”
Federal News Network’s Jory Heckman contributed reporting.
If you would like to contact this reporter about recent changes in the federal government, please email drew.friedman@federalnewsnetwork.com or reach out on Signal at drewfriedman.11
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