Environmental Protection Agency employees based in Philadelphia spent their lunch breaks Tuesday marching around City Hall in an attempt to raise awareness about the potential for massive cuts under President Donald Trump’s administration.
Grants have been canceled, and some staff have been placed on leave and barred from returning to their offices, according to EPA workers who participated in the demonstration.
“The cuts to EPA services will affect people right here in our city, nearby, all over our region,” said Leah Martino, of South Philadelphia, an environmental engineer and permit specialist in the agency’s water division. “It doesn’t matter if you’re in a red state or you’re in a blue state. EPA protects all Americans.”
A $1 million award from the EPA to the City of Philadelphia to help limit flooding in the Eastwick neighborhood and reduce the impact of urban “heat islands” was one of local dozens of contracts terminated in recent weeks, Andrew Kreider said.
“There are communities already losing money that EPA had committed to provide them,” said Kreider, a congressional liaison who has worked at the agency for 28 years. “That is not typical. That is not something that happens when presidential administrations change.”
On March 10, Trump’s EPA administrator, Lee Zeldin, announced he had canceled more than 400 grants worth $1.7 billion, in collaboration with Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency.
A couple days later, Zeldin said the agency would move to roll back dozens of environmental regulations in order to “lower the cost of living by making it more affordable to purchase a car, heat your home and operate a business.”
White House officials have also stated that they intend to reduce EPA’s spending by 65%.
“All signs point to potentially massive impacts on EPA, whether it’s reducing our workforce, or cutting our budget or continuing to eliminate these programs,” Kreider told Metro.
Hundreds of employees are based out of the agency’s offices at Four Penn Center, which serves as headquarters for EPA Region 3, covering Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland, Washington, D.C., Virginia and West Virginia.
Kreider said the Trump administration put about a dozen staff members who work on his floor on administrative leave earlier this year. Later, the agency deemed some of those employees as necessary and brought them back, he added. Others continue to be paid but have been told to remain home.
A few people he works with who were still on their probationary period were fired but offered their jobs back following a court order, Kreider said.
“We all really care about our jobs, and everyone wants to do the work,” Martino told Metro. “So we just want to be allowed to do the work.”
EPA retirees and supporters showed up to Tuesday’s march, which was organized by a group of employees in conjunction with AFGE Council 238, a labor union. Similar protests were held in several of the agency’s other regional hubs.
The demonstration is part of a wave of activism against the Trump administration, driven in part by members of the federal workforce whose positions are being threatened by DOGE.
“I don’t think anybody voted for President Trump because they like toxic air or poisoned water or contaminated land,” Kreider remarked. “You don’t make America great by making it more polluted.”
