The federal shutdown is causing confusion and anxiety for staff at the Boston office of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.
Despite most non-essential federal workers being furloughed, the EPA told staff to continue working this week, and employees say they’re not sure if they’re being paid.
“Right now, what’s happening is that we’re not following our ‘lapse of appropriations’ plan, which says that something like 90% of people are furloughed,” said Lilly Simmons, president of AFGE Local 3428, which represents EPA employees in the region. “We are not furloughed right now. We’re working. I don’t know how they’re doing that.”
And it’s not clear, Simmons said, when those EPA employees will be paid.
“We don’t know if we’re gonna get our next checks on time — if our mortgages are going to go through. It’s the beginning of the month. I have that on automatic, so I’m hoping for the best there,” she said.
Simmons said in the 2018 government shutdown, employees were told the agency had funds to cover their work for two weeks.
“They have not told us that this time.” she said. “They have said, ‘well, check your email and see if we have money to work today.’ So you can’t even plan for two weeks like we did in 2018. It’s day by day.”
One staffer, who asked not to be named due fear of retribution, told GBH News that there’s been confusion over which of the agency’s policies to follow.
“We’ve been told to bring our laptops home every day and check for updates on the shutdown and whether we have carryover funds or not,” the EPA staffer said. “Taking our laptops home and using them for work is expressly forbidden based on newly imposed telework policies -- unless you are on approved telework, which we are not. This direction combined with what [Office of Management and Budget Director] Russell Vought said about conducting mass firings led employees to worry that if they check their laptops at home they’ll be fired for violating the telework policy.”
The EPA staffer went on to describe the confusion as “another example of an administration that has no ability or intention of running the government efficiently.”
“Chaos reigns due to either incompetent or careless leadership and, whatever the case may be, it’s embarrassing that after eight months the Trump administration hasn’t figured out the basics of running a government -- like how to manage and communicate an agency’s budget,” the staffer said.
In a written statement, an EPA spokesperson said the agency is operating according to its “lapse plan.”
That plan says of 15,166 EPA employees, all but 1,734 should be furloughed.
That’s not what’s happening, Simmons said.
“Congressional Democrats have chosen to shut down the government,” the EPA spokesperson said in the written statement. “If they want to re-open the government, they can choose to do so at any time.”
EPA employees say statements like that, and emails the agency sent to staff blaming the shutdown on Democrats, are a violation of federal law that prevents federal workers from engaging in partisan activity.
“It’s alarming that this Administration would so openly violate the Hatch Act by making partisan political statements on government equipment,” another current EPA staffer told GBH News, on condition that their name not be used in this story.
“In stark contrast, EPA staff were suspended or even terminated for so-called ‘conduct unbecoming’ after opposing this Administration’s environmental policies in their personal capacity, on their own time, with their own resources,” this staffer said. “Yet political appointees feel free to weaponize official government resources for partisan gain. It raises serious questions—where does the lawlessness end, and how far are they willing to go?”
Federal employees are given annual trainings on the Hatch Act, Simmons said.
“We are not allowed as government employees to speak in a partisan manner to the public or even each other at the workplace,” she said. “Saying things like ‘it’s their fault’ or ‘it’s this party’s fault’ is inappropriate. We are all working for the government for the benefit of the American people. So these messages are blatantly illegal ... It’s demoralizing that at the highest levels of our government, they don’t have the high standards that we have in the rank and file.”
