HADLEY — The U.S. Fish & Wildlife Department Service’s Northeast regional headquarters in Hadley is proposed to close on Aug. 31 as part of the federal General Services Administration initiative to end leases for 164 federal office spaces nationwide, according to a list leaked by a government whistleblower.

On Friday, U.S. House Natural Resources Committee ranking member Jared Huffman, D-California, released a statement based on information from a whistleblower along with a list of Department of Interior offices proposed to close and their projected termination date.

It’s unclear how these closures will impact federal employees, including the estimated 200 employees in the Hadley-based office. None of this information had been communicated to elected officials, including U.S. Rep. Jim McGovern, whose district includes Hadley.

Unaccountable cuts are “happening in almost virtually every agency and department I know of,” McGovern said. For the Hadley Fish & Wildlife employees, “and for countless others who are impacted in other agencies, the fact that there’s no regard for the importance of their work is really offensive, and to go about making cuts and eliminating offices without even a thought to the people who work there is a rotten thing to do.”

Federal workers at the 72,000-square-foot Hadley headquarters, the only Hampshire County office on the list, oversee 79 wildlife refuges located in 13 states from Maine to Virginia, including the Silvio O. Conte National Fish and Wildlife Refuge, which includes land in Vermont, New Hampshire, Connecticut and Massachusetts, and the Great Thicket National Wildlife Refuge, which spans five New England states and New York.

The Northeast region of this federal department also protects endangered species, studies migratory birds from Maine to Puerto Rico, and disseminates federal funds to state wildlife refuges.

“The people we’re talking about here protect and conserve our wildlife,” McGovern said. “They protect our open spaces and our environment. These are essential public servants, in my view. What their government should be saying to them is ‘thank you,’ rather than this.”

McGovern said he plans to investigate and take action to hinder or derail the closures. He added that it’s unclear how much of this decision is legal.

Spokespeople for the Fish & Wildlife Service, a branch of the Interior Department, declined to comment on the matter.

“There’s no thought process to this,” McGovern said. “They’re just cutting positions, space and programming without even understanding what the purpose is.”

The leak comes as the Office of Personnel Management, which functions as a back office for managing the federal civil service, continues to fire probationary employees as part of the Trump administration’s efforts to reduce federal spending and target financial waste.

A total of 420 probationary employees were released from Fish & Wildlife two weeks ago, including 36 employees at the Hadley office, according to a federal employee who requested anonymity over fear of retribution.

“From my perspective, I do think there are probably some federal agencies that (the federal government) might be able to make more efficient, but the Fish & Wildlife Services is a tiny operation,” the employee said. “The entire Fish & Wildlife services has 8,000 employees. It’s really a bare bones operation already — to think about cutting further, I think the public will see it dramatically we will be closing natural wildlife refuges, and sadly the wildlife will be feeling it, too.”

The late U.S. Rep. Silvio O. Conte spearheaded the $8 million move of Fish & Wildlife’s Northeast headquarters from Newton to Hadley as the chief congressional sponsor. Reps. John Olver and Richard Neal continued the effort after Conte’s death in 1991 and the building opened in 1992.

“I am deeply concerned by the closure of the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Department Services office in Hadley,” said state Sen. Jo Comerford. “The havoc at the federal level is causing real pain and upheaval, as essential work and services are eliminated abruptly with no due consideration. I worry for my constituents who are affected. My team and I will work with state and federal colleagues to support our constituents in every way we can.”

Over the past two weeks, the Gazette attempted to contact the communications office at the Fish & Wildlife Service to discuss the firing of probationary employees there, but received no communication back. The few federal employees who responded to inquiries underlined stress and fear about the unstable work environment and the future of their jobs.

“We’re almost becoming accustomed to the adrenaline of not knowing if we will have a job tomorrow,” said a federal employees for the Natural Resource Conservation Services office in Amherst. “It’s insane to think about that people were coming into the office to an email, not even from an individual person, just a generic email that said ‘you’re fired,’ and then had to go tell their supervisor, ‘Hey, I was fired.’”

Both sources stressed the passion they and their coworkers have for their jobs and the mission of their respective departments. These positions are a dream for many people, the NRCS employee said, and employees remain committed to their jobs despite the “hostile work environment.”

“When you’re coming from President Donald Trump’s or Elon Musk’s prospective, their whole work is about profit margins and shareholder returns, so you cut ruthlessly to get margins up,” the Fish & Wildlife employee said. “That’s fundamentally different from what we do here. There is no profit margins. This about public service and a commitment to an important mission in this country. That idea that you can just constantly trim and maintain your bottom line, it’s a fundamentally flawed way of looking at public service.”

Emilee Klein can be reached at eklein@gazettenet.com.