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Is The Fish and Wildlife Service Office Threatened With Closure?
march 13, 2025 by jim fuglie, posted in uncategorizedIt’s beginning to look like the rumors on the street are true: The Trump-Musk-Burgum administration is setting the wheels in motion to close the North Dakota office of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.
I’m told that about half a dozen “probationary” employees—those who have worked for the federal agency for fewer than six months—have already been fired, and that the owner of the office building in which the FWS employees work has been told the agency wants to cancel its lease in October.
In my opinion, that would be one of the most foolish and mean-spirited things the current administration has done in its first two months in office.
I know one of those employees who’s been fired. I won’t say their name, because I don’t want to jeopardize their chances of being rehired if things change, but I can describe the profile of those who are out of work now. They’re young, college-educated wildlife professionals, some of whom relocated from states far away, uprooted their families, came here and bought houses, helped their spouses find jobs and their kids find schools, and now they’re out of work.
Some people who often know more than a little about things like this tell me that there are a whole bunch of nervous people, about 40 of them (minus those who have already been fired), who work in a building out in northeast Bismarck, who might not have a job, or a place to go to work, by the end of the year.
They are federal employees, who work for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. I’ve been told that the people they work for are attempting to cancel the lease on the building they work in. It’s a nice, modern building, owned by a fellow named Pete Brendel, or by Pete and members of his family. The address is 3425 Miriam Avenue, near the corner of Divide Avenue and Bismarck Expressway, just south of the Interstate.
Pete’s not talkin’. Nor is anyone else. Here’s the lease. $35,000 a month. And the building could soon go empty. It’s a darned nice building.
I went to the Fish and Wildlife office a couple days ago and asked one of the employees if it was true that the Service was canceling its lease on their office building. “I’m sorry, I’m not allowed to comment on that,” was the response. “You’ll have to call the regional office.”
I got the name of the Regional Director, Matt Hogan, and his phone number. 303-236-7920, if you’re interested. I’ve called it three times in the last three days. Each time, the telephone receptionist told me he was in a meeting, but she would give him a message that I called.
He hasn’t returned my calls. Yet. I’m guessing he’s not returning any North Dakota phone calls these days.
Dang!
I’ll tell you what I know from various people. The Fish and Wildlife Service has told the building’s owners they want to cancel the lease before the end of the year. I think the lease runs longer than that, but I am not sure.
I’ve talked to enough people, off the record, who have talked to other people who seem to know what is going on, so I’m not afraid to share with you what I’ve learned. There is genuine fear that the Trump people are trying to shut down the FWS office in Bismarck.
Here’s the irony in that. The Fish and Wildlife Service is part of the United States Department of the Interior. You know who runs that office. A fellow named Doug Burgum.
Would Burgum really let that happen? North Dakota is a critical state for the Fish and Wildlife Service. Our state is often called “North America’s Duck Factory,” because we’re smack-dab in the middle of Prairie Pothole Country, and also because we’ve taken advantage of that by creating a giant network of National Wildlife Refuges.
North Dakota has 63 National Wildlife Refuges, more than any other state. Many of them came about because of a WPA dam-building effort here during the “Dirty Thirties.” The WPA built 114 dams on streams and creeks on farmer’s land, to provide water for livestock. Like a lot of boys my age, I grew up jumping over those little dams at sunup and shooting mallards.
But not all of them. FDR created a program to purchase easements from some of those farmers and create refuges for wildlife. The program not only saved wildlife, but saved a lot of farms during those drought years. And those refuges survived to today.
Combined with Wetland Management Districts, containing hundreds of Waterfowl Production Areas, the Fish and Wildlife Service in our state manages more than half a million acres for wildlife.
Some of the bigger refuges—Audubon, Lostwood, J.Clark Salyer, Upper Souris, Chase Lake, to name a few—have headquarters buildings and staff which manage the smaller refuges in their area. You can look at a list of the refuges here. I don’t know how many employees the FWS has in North Dakota, but they’re not just wildlife managers, there are also Federal Wardens who work alongside North Dakota State Game Wardens to enforce the law. And Chase Lake National Wildlife Refuge is home to one of North America’s largest nesting colonies of American white pelicans – nearly one-third of the continental population of these birds nest at that refuge. The nesting colony fluctuates year to year anywhere from 4,000 to 35,000 birds.
The FWS employees here are not just critical to North Dakota hunters and birders. Outdoors enthusiasts all along the Central Flyway are beneficiaries of their work. Here’s a description of their work, from their website:
“Our staff coordinate with Federal, State, Tribal, private, and non-governmental organizations and agencies as well as private landowners within North Dakota and surrounding States; frequently functioning as planners, negotiators, coordinators, and conservation advocates in an effort to fulfill our natural resource mandates.
“The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service Office in Bismarck, ND may be unique in the Service in that it includes not only the Ecological Services program, but also Partners for Fish and Wildlife, Wetland Acquisition Office, the Habitat and Population Evaluation Team, Office of Law Enforcement, Missouri River Fish and Wildlife Conservation Office, and an archeologist for North Dakota. Having all these divisions collocated is recognized within the Service as an outstanding asset of the North Dakota Office.”
I don’t know what would happen if the Fish and Wildlife Service closed its office here. I just know it’s being talked about. But not by people who are in charge. Because of so many closed lips, I’m pretty suspicious. Especially because of what we’re reading about and hearing about what’s going on in Washington D.C. these days. If I learn anything more, I’ll let you know.
