‘A reckless dismantling’: EPA employees and supporters march in Philly to protest cuts

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Environmental Protection Agency employees, retirees and supporters marched around Philadelphia’s City Hall Tuesday to protest attempts by President Donald Trump’s administration to reshape the agency.

They said planned funding and staff cuts could compromise fundamental functions of the agency to protect not only air and water, but human health.

“It’s a reckless dismantling,” said Brad Starnes, president of American Federation of Government Employees Local 3631, which represents EPA employees in Pennsylvania, Delaware and several other mid-Atlantic states. “We do vital work.”

EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin has said he wants to reduce the agency’s budget by at least 65%. He has also made moves to reduce the agency’s workforce and announced plans to roll back dozens of environmental regulations covering wetlands to power plants, a move former regulators say would reverse decades of environmental progress. 

In February, more than 170 EPA employees that the agency identified as working on “Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, and Accessibility and Environmental Justice” were placed on administrative leave. Fourteen of these employees were working on environmental justice in the agency’s Region 3, which covers the mid-Atlantic, Starnes said. Some have since returned to work, he said.

Later in February, the agency fired around 400 EPA employees with probationary status, meaning they were typically hired within the past year or two. A federal judge then ordered the agency and others to reinstate these employees, and an EPA official said most have returned on paid administrative leave. The Trump administration has appealed a similar ruling to the Supreme Court. 

The EPA employees’ union expects the agency to take further action to cut positions, but has not yet received details, Starnes said. The New York Times reported the agency plans to cut more than 1,100 scientists working at the EPA’s research office as part of a planned reduction in force.

“We have been targeted, as one of many federal agencies have, with potential reductions in our staffing levels, potential budget cuts,” said Andrew Kreider, a congressional liaison at EPA’s office in Philly and member of AFGE Local 3631. “We’ve had a number of organizations to whom we give grants, have those grants terminated without cause just because those grants don’t conform to the priorities of the new administration. … We’re already feeling impacts.”

Senate Democrats say the agency’s termination of grants focused on environmental justice was illegal and have demanded the agency provide more information about the grants and staff cuts.

Kreider worries EPA employees’ work to clean up contaminated superfund sites across the mid-Atlantic could be impacted.

“There are people who live right next to a superfund site dealing with potentially contaminated groundwater in their drinking water wells,” he said. “It’s our job to clean that up, and we can’t do it if we don’t have the people or the funds to do it.”

Starnes, who has worked at EPA for roughly three decades, worries cuts could undermine work in the mid-Atlantic region to address climate change, help communities upgrade water infrastructure, identify PFAS pollution and coordinate efforts to restore the Chesapeake Bay. 

PFAS, widely used in consumer products such as nonstick cookware and waterproof clothing, as well as in firefighting foam, have been linked to serious health problems, including some cancers, thyroid disease, developmental delays in children and other health conditions.

“These are services that provide value to the region,” he said. “The loss of our jobs, there’s more to the story than just us feeling sorry for ourselves … By taking us out of the mix, there is so much they will lose in the process.”

In an emailed statement, an EPA spokesperson said the agency’s staff cuts have been in accordance with President Trump’s agenda to eliminate DEI programs. 

“We are committed to enhancing our ability to deliver clean air, water, and land for all Americans,” the spokesperson said. “While no decisions have been made yet, we are actively listening to employees at all levels to gather ideas on how to better fulfill agency statutory obligations, increase efficiency, and ensure the EPA is as up-to-date and effective as ever.”

Gwen Pospisil, an attorney who worked on the cleanup of hazardous waste sites at EPA for 35 years before retiring in December, said cuts would move the agency in the wrong direction.

“The EPA does not have a huge budget in comparison to the rest of the federal government, and any kind of cutbacks are going to be hurting the work,” she said. “We don’t need to be going in that direction with anything. They need more resources to get all the work done that needs to be done.”