LEILA FADEL, HOST:
As the shutdown continues, much of the federal government's work remains on hold. We have reports now from three states about how this is playing out in their communities, even as a judge paused layoffs for some federal workers. Others who are not covered by that ruling remain out of work. That's true of a small team of federal health workers whose sudden elimination is causing stress in central Maine. Here's NPR's Selena Simmons-Duffin.
SELENA SIMMONS-DUFFIN, BYLINE: The federal government sends money out to nearly 4,000 clinics all over the country to pay for sexual and reproductive health. The program is called Title 10, and the Trump administration has fired the whole staff that ran that program, which is a problem for Title 10 grant recipients like Maine Family Planning. In Augusta, clinical services director Melissa Gray shows off the in-house lab.
MELISSA GRAY: If we're doing point of care testing, it would be like HIV. We can do rapid syphilis, rapid Hep C.
SIMMONS-DUFFIN: They also prescribe birth control, screen for breast cancer and more. Title 10 funding means they can give anyone these services regardless of their insurance or their ability to pay. Maine Family Planning was scheduled to meet with their federal Title 10 contact this week, says CEO George Hill.
GEORGE HILL: Didn't happen.
SIMMONS-DUFFIN: They didn't show up. And as it turned out, it wasn't because of a shutdown furlough. They'd been fired. Several staff members told NPR that all 10 members of the Title 10 staff were let go at the end of last week. NPR agreed not to identify them because they each fear professional retribution for speaking with the media. An HHS spokesperson told NPR the team was affected by the reduction in force but would not say what portion of Title 10 staff was fired. Brittany Fredrickson works on women's health policy at the nonpartisan health research organization KFF.
BRITTANY FREDRICKSON: Title 10 is a program that's been in existence since 1970. It was enacted by Congress under the Nixon administration.
SIMMONS-DUFFIN: She says it's not a complete surprise that Title 10 would be a target.
FREDRICKSON: When President Trump released his proposed FY 2026 budget, the Title 10 program was completely zeroed out.
SIMMONS-DUFFIN: And she says it was zeroed out in the House Appropriations draft bill this fall.
FREDRICKSON: So it was very clear that the administration would like to get rid of this program.
SIMMONS-DUFFIN: For now, grantees like Maine Family Planning should have access to their funding through the end of March. But there are no partners at the federal level, no one to answer their questions and no communication about what will happen to Title 10. Selena Simmons-Duffin, NPR News, Augusta, Maine.
FRANK MORRIS, BYLINE: And I'm Frank Morris in Kansas City. In the countryside, around here, huge combines are rolling over the land, bringing in the harvest.
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MORRIS: Steven Kalb is harvesting soybeans on a field sloping down to a forested creek near Baldwin City, Kansas.
STEVEN KALB: Well, harvest is going on, so best time of the year. Always the best time of the year, yeah, after seeing your rewards of what you did all year long.
MORRIS: Kalb can see the fruits of his labor piling up in grain bins, but how much money he'll make from this bounty is not clear. Farmers rely on weekly reports from the U.S. Department of Agriculture to find out how much food is being harvested, what buyers are paying and who the buyers are. Before the shutdown, the USDA was predicting a record large corn crop. But that bumper crop may or may not be coming in as predicted. It's hard to tell because USDA isn't publishing reports now.
KALB: Well, it just means uncertainty right now.
MORRIS: Farmers were facing a lot of uncertainty before the shutdown. China once bought one-third of the total U.S. soybean crop. Now, with the trade wars, it's buying none of it. And soybeans are selling at a loss. Corn is upside down too. Economists say most corn and soybean farmers will work all year just to lose money. Last year was the same. Normally in times like this, Missouri farmer Richard Oswald would take out a short-term loan from USDA to help cover his bills.
RICHARD OSWALD: I've literally done this for 55 years. It's been something that has always been there.
MORRIS: This year, it's not there because the USDA is closed. President Trump has promised farmers a bailout to help compensate for their trade war losses. But Pat Westhoff, an economist at the University of Missouri, says that kind of help can't happen during a government shutdown.
PAT WESTHOFF: Now, things aren't going to go forward until the government's open again, it appears to me. Continues the uncertainty that's been around for some time, obviously.
MORRIS: Westhoff says the shutdown has choked off the flow of money and information, leaving farmers struggling to pay their bills, struggling to plan for next year. Some won't make it. Farm foreclosures are rising. Most economists expect that trend to worsen this winter. For NPR News, I'm Frank Morris in Kansas City.
ANYA VAN WAGTENDONK, BYLINE: And I'm Anya van Wagtendonk standing outside the Forest Products Laboratory in Madison, Wisconsin. The lab is part of the USDA, so right now, it's closed. And hundreds of employees, federal forestry workers, are furloughed. That includes fire scientists who study prescribed burns in national forests all around the country. Those are purposeful fires set to manage wildfire risk and protect ecosystems.
UNIDENTIFIED FIRE SCIENTIST: Oh, man, this is prime prescribed burn season, actually, for a large part of the country.
VAN WAGTENDONK: That's a fire scientist from the lab who didn't want to share her name, saying the climate against federal workers is frightening and she fears threats against her and her family. But she'd been getting ready to head down to Georgia for a multiday burn that was years in the planning.
UNIDENTIFIED FIRE SCIENTIST: If the pause continues, I don't think we'll get those burns pulled off.
VAN WAGTENDONK: Most of the forestry workers here are members of a unit of the National Federation of Federal Employees union. Carl Houtman is the local president. He says the threat of further layoffs during the government shutdown hurts morale and affects things like national building codes, which are based on data from this lab.
CARL HOUTMAN: Yes, my job can be paused. But if it is eliminated, then it's going to have a very negative impact.
VAN WAGTENDONK: And work is already on hold for projects that manufacturers were counting on, like timber and paper companies. Nathan Bechle is a materials research engineer. He says that his work has improved the safety of wood products from baseball bats to the lumber holding up buildings. It's not the first time Bechle has left the lab during a shutdown, but he says this time has been more chaotic and he's had to have tough conversations with his family.
NATHAN BECHLE: My oldest son just had a birthday. And we certainly throttled how much we spent and the things that we were willing to do because we don't know what the current financial situation is.
VAN WAGTENDONK: Workers here are getting ready to miss their first full paychecks, but they still say they believe their work serves the greater good, and right now, it's hard to even contemplate another vocation.
For NPR News, I'm Anya van Wagtendonk in Madison, Wisconsin.
(SOUNDBITE OF DAL AND LEAH YEGER SONG, "THOSE DAYS") Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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