A Long Federal Goodbye Budget Crisis Leaves Mines Office In Limbo

Packing away decades of science, Spokane’s Bureau of Mines staff has worked all month trying to close its offices and terminate about 100 jobs.

But the same government that ordered the bureau closed won’t let workers finish the job.

Originally scheduled to die the first week of January, the bureau has been caught in a strange budget purgatory, said Rod Rosenkranz, deputy director of the western field office.

Essential government services have been propped up by a series of continuing resolutions while President Clinton and Congress grapple over the federal budget.

Each resolution deemed the bureau workers “exempt” from the temporary shutdown, forcing thousands of them who would otherwise be cleaning out desks to sit and wait. And wait some more.

Despite being penciled in for elimination, the workers were bunched together with other Department of Interior employees. The bureau is under the Interior umbrella.

“It’s made it really difficult for us here,” Rosenkranz said. “We haven’t been able to get anything approved. We can’t get rid of our property, we don’t know yet where we’re supposed to send our materials. Everything looks the same as last year here except that there’s a lot of boxes.”

A victim of budget politics from both the White House and Congress, the bureau got axed last year, ending about 130 jobs of the 170 workers spread over two offices.

U.S. Rep. George Nethercutt tried to save the bureau, but ultimately lost.

Some of the bureau’s mine safety research jobs should move to the Department of Energy. Another 30 workers could be hired under the department eventually, said bureau administrators in December.

But those transfers can’t happen either, Rosenkranz said. Under the resolution, the department can’t pay for the transfer costs, leaving dozens of Spokane workers in limbo.

“There are a lot of government jobs that are open for some of our workers,” he said. “But no one is going anywhere.”

Some bureau workers have already left for jobs in the private sector or have found other government work, but very few will find similar-paying jobs around here. “They’re going to have to move.”

The latest resolution that passed Congress late Friday will authorize money to allow the bureau to close, said Ken Lisaius, press secretary for Nethercutt. The resolution authorizes the Department of Energy to swallow the health and safety research aspects of the 85-year-old bureau.

A previous resolution in December had similar language, but Clinton vetoed it. However, Clinton vowed to sign the resolution passed Friday.

“We hope that by next Friday we can close down,” he said. “Then again we could be in the exact same situation this time next week.”

Emptying and cleaning the building will require thousands of hours of manpower. If and when the bureau closes, a skeleton staff of eight will continue to clean up, move things around and send off the bureau’s research to other agencies.

“There’s just a ton of stuff we have to do here,” he said.

, DataTimes The following fields overflowed: CREDIT = Eric Torbenson Staff writer The Associated Press contributed to this report.