USDA employees facing relocation weigh whether to stay or go. Some are eligible for incentives either way

The Agriculture Department is making an ultimatum to thousands of its employees as part of its sweeping relocation plans — move to keep their jobs or quit.

USDA is embarking on a multi-part reorganization plan that includes relocating more than half of its D.C.-area workforce to hubs across the country by the end of this summer. About 90% of USDA employees already work outside of the Washington, D.C. area.

Employees impacted by relocation plans work at the Food Safety and Inspection Service, Forest Service, Economic Research Service, National Institute of Food and Agriculture, and Food and Nutrition Service. USDA employees outside the D.C. area are also receiving relocation notices.

USDA is setting different deadlines for employees at its component agencies to make their decisions.

Employees at the department’s National Agricultural Statistics Service have until July 8 to decide whether to accept their reassignment to St. Louis or one of the agency’s regional offices. NASS employs about 500 employees, most of them working as agricultural statisticians. The agency serves as an authoritative source of data on crop production, livestock, and farm finance. It conducts a census every five years to collect agricultural data on every county in the United States.

In a memo sent Monday, NASS wrote that employees who agree to relocate must report to their new office by Sept. 21. USDA wrote in its notice that employees may have the option to voluntarily report to their new location sooner than their official relocation date.

“NASS maintains a policy of effective, efficient and balanced utilization of human and other resources to achieve program goals. Based on program needs, management has decided to reassign your current position,” the agency wrote.

The decision isn’t an easy one for most impacted USDA employees. Internal union surveys show a majority of their members would rather leave the agency than relocate to keep their jobs. That’s what happened under the first Trump administration, when USDA tried to move hundreds of jobs to Kansas City. The department’s research agencies dealt with major staffing shortages that took years to resolve.

But regardless of their choice, employees at NASS are eligible for financial incentives. According to the notice obtained by Federal News Network and conversations with those impacted, NASS employees who agree to move and commit to working in their new office for two years will receive a relocation incentive. The notice, however, doesn’t offer much detail about what employees would receive.

A USDA spokesperson didn’t provide any additional details about the relocation incentive, or whether employees at other department components will be eligible to receive one.

“The secretary continues to work methodically and thoughtfully to deliver on the president’s mandate for better accountability to the American taxpayer,” the spokesperson said in a statement. “Each mission area is mindful of the critical functions it delivers and the customers it serves, and each announcement and implementation plan is reflective of that.”

The memo also states that NASS and all components under USDA’s research, education and economic mission area will offer buyouts and early retirement to employees who received relocation notices. The Forest Service told employees earlier this month that it will offer Voluntary Early Retirement Authority (VERA) and Voluntary Separation Incentive Payments (VSIP) to staff impacted by its relocation plans.

Employees at the Food Safety and Inspection Service, which is relocating about two-thirds of its D.C.-area workforce to “mission-critical locations,” including Iowa and Georgia, were told last week they must decide whether to relocate or quit their jobs by June 30. The National Institute of Food and Agriculture sent relocation notices to non-bargaining unit employees on Monday. But bargaining-unit employees have not yet received their notices.

One NIFA employee, who spoke on condition of anonymity for fear of retaliation, told Federal News Network that they are “actively seeking another job, but said they have not yet decided what they will do.

“If I can get a job that meets my needs, then I will quit the federal government, even though I don’t want to,” the NIFA employee said. “My family can’t afford for me to be unemployed. If we have to move, we will. We will leave behind family and friends and a life we love.”

USDA Deputy Secretary Stephen Vaden told lawmakers last summer that department leaders expect fewer employees will refuse to move this time around, because mass layoffs across the federal workforce have made the job search more challenging in the D.C. area.

“I think many of them will choose to come, because given cuts made by other federal agencies here in Washington, D.C., the job market isn’t what it once was here,” Vaden told the Senate Agriculture, Nutrition and Forestry Committee last June.

The NIFA employee said many of their colleagues were hired as remote employees and are now being asked to move to cities “a lot of us have never visited and have no ties to.” They said the lump-sum relocation program “won’t cover our actual costs.”

“Now I have to evaluate how much money we’d lose by moving, versus how long I might be unemployed if I quit,  and figure out what my best options are,” the NIFA employee said. “I didn’t expect, going into public service, or really with any position, to have to pay out of pocket just to keep my job, but that’s what’s happening.”

Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins told lawmakers during a House Agriculture Committee hearing last week that 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 USDA unions, however, suggest employees are less willing to relocate. Internal polling conducted by the National Treasury Employees Union in May found that 80% of D.C.-area Food and Nutrition Service employees would quit their jobs rather than relocate this summer. Another survey conducted by the American Federation of Government Employees Local 3403, representing ERS and NIFA employees, found that about 76% of its members are not planning to relocate.

NASS employees who agree to move and commit to working in their new office for a year will be partially compensated for relocation expenses through the department’s new “lump sum” reimbursement model. AFGE said the new reimbursement model is less generous than what USDA offered to employees who relocated under the first Trump administration.

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. USDA said its new “lump sum” model will expedite reimbursement processing times, improve cost predictability and reduce administrative burden.  But AFGE officials say the new policy could mean some employees end up spending thousands of dollars out of pocket in moving costs.

“Moving or relocation expenses incurred by you in connection with this reassignment will be paid by the agency in accordance with the relocation lump-sum program,” NASS wrote in its notice. “Exact entitlement is determined on a case-by-case basis, but with the lump-sum program, employees receive a single lump-sum payment, calculated using employee-specific data, to cover relocation allowances.”

Between January 2025 and January 2026, USDA lost about 20,000 employees, according to federal workforce data published by the Office of Personnel Management. Since the start of the second Trump administration, USDA components impacted by upcoming relocation plans have lost 30% to 40% of their staff.

If you would like to contact this reporter about recent changes in the federal government, please email jheckman@federalnewsnetwork.com, or reach out on Signal at jheckman.29

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