The Trump administration’s mass firings of federal employees are being felt especially hard in rural communities across Oregon. While the potential impact to the state’s employment rate won’t be known until late March, workers who recently lost their jobs are already feeling the effects.
Erin
Erin Phillips was a fish biologist with the U.S Forest Service. On Feb. 15, she got a call from her supervisor, followed by the same generic termination letter sent to thousands of probationary federal employees. “I am losing health care," she said. "I lost my FSA (Flexible Spending Account) that I paid into, my pension that I was one year away from getting. And my probation would have been done in May.”
Phillips isn’t a rookie. Since 2019, she’s worked in the Forest Service, steadily ascending to her dream job at the Middle Fork Ranger District in the Willamette National Forest. “Our primary objective was to protect our listed species on our district which is bull trout and spring Chinook salmon,” she said.
Phillips is 28 years old with a degree in marine biology. She lives in Thurston with a roommate who also lost his job during the DOGE-driven firings. Now, she worries about affording housing while she seeks unemployment.
“I feel like the rug was ripped out from underneath me and there’s no certainty from here on out about where I would end up and what I’ll be doing. I would love to have a job that I cared about as much as I cared about this job,” she mused.
Phillips wonders aloud who will protect the threatened species on the Middle Fork now? And she insisted that in numerous habitats, the people who like to fish will feel the impacts too.
Sam
It used to be that a U.S. Government job came with a sense of security. That’s what Sam thought when he moved from Pennsylvania to rural Lane County last year for a Forest Service job.
“Developed Recreation: it’s taking care of bathrooms, trailheads, day use areas, cleaning toilets, scrubbing poop off the floor, preparing trails, digging rocks out..."
It's basically, grueling, manual labor. But Sam loved his permanent-track position with the Middle Fork Ranger District. Then on Feb. 14, he got the generic termination letter and a call from his supervisors.
“Everyone who got terminated got the same form letter that states that you’re being terminated for poor performance,” Sam explained.
“And my Rangers are on the phone [saying] ‘we’re gonna read you this line that’s on the letter.’ And they did. And then they said, ‘we want you to know that it’s no one's belief that that’s true. Your performance is excellent. But this is coming from way over any of our heads.’”
We’re only using Sam’s first name because he fears reprisal if he ever tries to get his job back.
Last week, a U.S. District Judge issued a temporary restraining order to stop the Trump administration from proceeding with mass federal firings. But, the National Federation for Federal Employees, a union that represents about 110,000 blue and white collar government workers across the United States, stated last Friday that probationary employees with the U.S. Forest Service aren’t covered under the restraining order, because they’ve already been terminated.
Sam said he really needs a job. Just before he was fired, he and his fiancée bought a house in Oakridge. He said he knows at least 5 former colleagues who had done the same. "It’s mostly Forest Service employees these days. That’s who I see investing the most in the future of this town."
Sam said half of the Developed Recreation staff and the entire Trail Crew on the Middle Fork were terminated.
“The impact for mountain-biking tourism and recreation tourism is definitely gonna be affected by that," he said. "For the general, all-purpose trails that people like to recreate on, they’re going to notice a difference this summer, for sure.”
After so many job losses, Sam’s pretty sure Oakridge isn’t the only place left reeling.
“I imagine other small rural towns with a Forest Service office or a BLM officer or a National Park on their border—for those small communities, it’s the life-blood,” he said.
Unemployment
According to the Oregon Employment Department, the highest share of federal government jobs are in rural counties. State economist Gail Krumenauer said the agency is still crunching the numbers with respect to federal job losses.
"Depending on the timing and the type of separation that’s occurred, we could start to see the first effects in the data—the February employment data and unemployment data that are released on March 26,” Krumenauer said.
Oregon does have a “solvent and healthy trust fund for unemployment," she said.
“So we do have confidence that when folks do lose their jobs at no fault of their own and do become eligible for unemployment insurance benefits, that they would be able to have the funding,” she said.
Unemployment in Oregon has been relatively low over the last year, hovering near 4%. Krumenauer said employment reports in the coming months will indicate any change in the rate.
Melanie
The McKenzie River Ranger District in the Willamette National Forest lost an unknown number of employees last month. A source with knowledge of the firings told KLCC that 11 people in the district lost their jobs, although KLCC has been unable to confirm this through official channels.
Locals said good paying jobs on the McKenzie River are scarce, especially since the 2020 Holiday Farm fire.
Melanie Stanley is a Blue River business leader who’s active with fire recovery efforts. She and her family are currently rebuilding their grocery/liquor store that has operated since 1945.
“We’ve been trying to rebuild it and the community around it and this new ‘hitch in the giddy up’ is not going to do anything to help in the rebuilding process," she said. "It’s gonna change our community dynamic again with the loss of these jobs.”
Stanley said in her rural, remote community, everybody knows everybody. She pointed out that, along with EWEB and the public school, the U.S. Forest Service is the largest employer.
“We all know the people who are being let go," she said. "We all know the families. And the hardest part for all of us is a large number of the families that are dealing with this are also fire families.”
“Fire families” are those who lost homes and property in the fire. Stanley said she fears the recent job terminations could cause some to be unable to afford the homes they just rebuilt.
"Recovery is a long process and every hit that we get just makes it longer,” she said.
And, she adds, if families have to relocate to find work, that could cause the McKenzie School District to lose students—another serious blow to this small, mountain community.
