On Friday, January 25, 2019, President Trump agreed to sign a short-term funding bill to end the partial government shutdown until February 15. The plan will have Congress pass a continuing resolution to extend funding for agencies, including EPA, that have been shut down since the end of 2018. No agreement on border wall funding was reached, but those negotiations will commence over the next three weeks. The over 13,000 EPA employees who have been furloughed, as well as the more than 750 employees who continued to work with no pay to protect life and property, will receive back pay, but it may be some time before many who have weathered this shutdown recover from the hardships they have endured. Shutdowns negatively affect the morale of EPA employees, and all federal employees, due to the uncertainty involved. They are disruptive, hurt productivity, and are a tremendous waste of taxpayer dollars. In response to the most recent shutdown and the potential for another should an agreement on border wall funding not be reached, EPN has created a fact sheet to explain the implications.
Read full fact sheet: Effects of a Government Shutdown at EPA
On Thursday, February 14, 2019, the House and the Senate passed a government spending bill funding EPA and other government agencies through September 30, 2019. Although the bill did not include the extreme cuts to EPA proposed by the administration, it only provided the agency with funding at the previous year’s level. In response, EPN produced a fact sheet explaining the ongoing demise of EPA.
Read the full fact sheet: FY 2019 Appropriations Act