Whew. We were out in the middle of the sugar-woods, tapping trees when we got word this week that the frozen USDA-EQIP (United States Department of Agriculture Environmental Quality Incentives Program) funds for our maple project have been released. It’s been a bumpy ride for a few weeks around here, and I want to publicly thank all of our friends, family, customers and supporters for sending their good wishes, their correspondence with legislators and their offers of financial support. You are all amazing, and we appreciate our community more than you can imagine.
The frozen funds situation put us in a state of suspended animation, with whirling minds, bouts of anxiety and Plan B preparations. That our farm project is a “go” is indeed a blessing, and though I feel more secure as an individual farmer, l am not a happy farmer in the wider world of farmers and as a U.S. citizen who has played by all the rules. Only 2% of the funding in question at the USDA has been released thus far, with 98% of the funding for other USDA projects out there in the nation still on hold and being reviewed for “waste.” Millions of dollars earmarked for agri-research, food security and safety projects, farm conservation projects, food efficiency projects and all manner of projects to better our food supply are still in the deep freeze, let alone all the government workers losing their jobs across the span of government or “on the bubble” as Trump has declared.
When my daughter went to college, she had a professor who remarked to her during a chat that most of the best-paying and most-responsible science jobs were going to be in the government in the future. Lo and behold, over the last few decades, research in everything from health science to AI-science to agri-science to space science boomed, and federal government-sponsored jobs boomed and many of our brightest and most dedicated American minds joined government forces. Like us in our maple project, they trusted their government to hold up their end of the deal when they signed their employment papers. To have their livelihoods ripped out of their pockets while trying to pay off car loans, house payments or rents, student loans, bills for electricity, heat, gas and groceries, is inexcusable. What can you trust if you can’t trust your government to protect you and keep your personal interests in mind as well as the interests of the nation as a whole? Because what is a nation but a collection of the very individuals that pay the taxes that make it exist? I am addlepated and exasperated just trying to make sense of it all.
And it’s not just those employed by the federal government itself. Your job as a scientist, researcher, administrative assistant, project coordinator or eco-monitor may be through a private firm with government funding behind it, all of which is currently at risk. You may work at a farm research center in Iowa, a medical lab in Massachusetts, a college in New Hampshire, an art museum in New York, a park in Wyoming and your job be at risk — all at the “whim” of the current administration. We are going to see all sorts of unforeseen ripples and consequences to these cuts as agencies lose workers and we who rely upon the agencies meet delays and dropped projects. With potential cuts to Medicare, Medicaid, Social Security and other agencies we rely upon to take care of our elders and most vulnerable, we may see even more chaos and downshifting of funding to local levels, putting us ALL at risk financially as we struggle to do our societal duty in taking care of those who don’t have means to take care of themselves. Unacceptable, unconscionable, downright heartless and cruel.
I am not a fan of DOGE or the tactics employed by the President’s pet project and its heartless Administrator, Musk, nor am I a fan of the economic fallout that will be felt in the agricultural community with rising inflation caused by new tariffs and duties and depressed markets as our neighbors and market partners back off out of uncertainty and put production of food for ourselves as a nation at risk. As we lose our foreign markets and struggle even harder to make ends meet on the farms and ranches across the nation, we may well see many more small and moderate size farms throw in the towel. The break-things-first, put-things back-together philosophy of the current administration is disheartening. Farming is not easy, and it breaks my heart to see the government making it even harder to stay a farmer.
I am not a fan of anything politics of late, and worry about the ability of our amazing nation to hold it together during this period of mad chaos. I don’t have any answers, other than to urge everyone to contact your Congressional and Senatorial representatives to let them know of your concerns and to think of local plan B’s. Think about how we should go forward as a local society without federal government support in case the funding for our towns and counties is suspended. Think about how to look out for our neighbors without federal support. Think about how to preserve our person-focused agencies and protections without federal support. Think about how to take care of our elderly and vulnerable populations without federal support. Think about how to preserve our farms, our parks, our open and recreational lands without federal support. Think about how to support my rapidly-retiring Boomer generation without federal support. I don’t know where we’re going, as there is a snowstorm of uncertainty ahead. Hang on tight, as it bodes to continue as a bumpy roller-coaster ride for all of us.
