EPA tells some scientific research staffers to relocate

[BumRushDaShow]

Source: The Hill

04/10/26 6:11 PM ET


The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is making some of its staffers relocate and reassigning an even larger share of employees as part of its efforts to reorganize its scientific research. The agency is reassigning a total of 124 staffers, 35 of whom are being asked to relocate.

The move comes as the Trump administration seeks to eliminate its Office of Research and Development and instead conduct scientific research in a new office housed within the office of the administrator.

An EPA spokesperson said via email Thursday that as part of the restructure, the agency “has issued reassignment notices to those employees who remain in the Office of Research and Development.” The spokesperson said that the restructuring includes “integration of scientific expertise” into its other offices.

A union representing many EPA employees criticized the relocation and reassignment notices, saying the relocation in particular could cause some staffers to leave the agency and hamper its ability to conduct scientific research. “It’s a pretty high likelihood that many of these people will just choose not to relocate and then have their jobs terminated,” said Justin Chen, president of American Federation of Government Employees Council 238.

Read more: https://thehill.com/policy/energy-environment/5826488-environmental-protection-agency-reorganizes-scientific-research/

[eppur_se_muova]

1. "a new office housed within the office of the administrator" where they are UNDER THE DIRECT CONTROL ....

of the administrator, who can be pressured by Trmp through his Interior Sec'y.

The whole point of this "reorganization" is to remove any obstacles to Trmp interfering directly with EPA policies. He wants to bypass Congress (and their constituents) completely, leaving himself free to pick and choose what policies will be eliminated (most of them), and what contracts will be issued to his "donors" (really his customers).

After all, the whole US Gov't is just Trmp's personal property, right ?

[BumRushDaShow]

2. I think he initially wants to use them

to repeal every Clear Air Act rule and then eventually abolish the whole thing, ignoring the law that created them (which was passed under a REPUBLICAN administration - Nixon)!

[eppur_se_muova]

3. Clean Water Act, "Superfund" Act, protection of endangered species ... **ANYTHING** that somehow or another ...

"obstructs" for-profit corporations from stripping the Earth bare of usable resources and scattering the resulting waste wherever they feel like it -- corporations are responsible *ONLY* to their shareholders, not to the rest of society, no matter how much damage they cause. (This is the "principle" behind the "Chicago School" of economics.)

[BumRushDaShow]

4. They figure they won't be around when the worst of their handiwork takes hold

But they may find that the catastrophe comes sooner than they think and their mega-yachts won't save the from the increase of Cat 5 hurricanes nor will their mansions survive "annual" "1000 year floods" or record wildfires (too big for their private fire-fighting forces).

[lonely bird]

5. Scientific expertise?

They wouldn’t recognize scientific expertise if it taint punted them into next week.

[IronLionZion]

6. EPA still exists?

They're hoping people will resign or be fired if they can't relocate. This is their plan to end EPA.

[COL Mustard]

7. We don't need no stinking R&D!

(Tip to Blazing Saddles)

[FakeNoose]

8. The EPA used to be formidable, long ago

It's because of the EPA that Pittsburgh PA now has clean air and water, and it's a nice place to live. In the old days of the steel mills burning coal (back before World War II) the air was so dirty that residents never saw the sun, they were living under a constant filthy cloud of smog.

Here's a typical daytime photo of Pittsburgh of the 1920s:


The EPA came in with fines and threats to the steel mills and other factories until they finally stopped polluting our air and our water. It changed the future of our city and Pennsylvania, and now it's a different place:



The EPA did this!

[BumRushDaShow]

9. One of my bosses was from Pittsburgh and he used to say

that anyone hanging laundry (particularly whites like sheets) would result in them all gray from the soot.

Over here on the other side of the state, back in the early part of the 20th Century, the Schuylkill River looked like this (1913) -



(from here - https://slought.org/resources/redemption_of_schuylkill)

And now the same area by the Fairmount Water Works today 2018) -



I have been on the Duquesne incline where you can see that picturesque view of Pittsburgh.