Workers on Guam who have kept the invasive brown tree snake out of Hawaiʻi were recently spared from losing their jobs in a federal cut — but are now being forced from the facilities where they work.
The U.S. General Services Administration has ended the lease for facilities on Guam where about 60 contracted U.S. Department of Agriculture Wildlife Services employees work to keep the invasive snake off departing planes and ships.
“Those facilities house the entirety of the brown tree snake program. And it's not just personnel, but it's the vehicles, it's the equipment — it's everything to do the operations. And so I know they're scrambling over there to find space or spaces that can at least hold the vehicles and the equipment and even some of the personnel,” said Chelsea Arnott, the coordinator for the Hawaiʻi Invasive Species Council.
It’s the latest twist for those employees, who have been caught in the federal government’s whirlwind efforts to reduce spending and services nationwide.
Last month, the workers were told that their one-year contracts would not be renewed.
Then the government reversed that decision, saving their jobs and what Hawaiʻi invasive species experts say is vital work to keep the invasive brown tree snake away from the islands, where they could have a devastating ecological and economic impact.
Though a significant part of that reversal, according to some, was in part because the brown tree snake employees provide a safety role at Guam’s airports by reducing the number of strikes between birds and airplanes.
Others noted that they provide a nationwide service by preventing brown tree snakes from reaching not just Hawaiʻi, but other parts of the U.S.
