BLM employees who buck relocation out West must leave by early next year

Bureau of Land Management (BLM) employees who choose severance over accompanying the agency as it moves out West will have to be out of their job by Jan. 31 of next year. In an email to BLM staff, acting Director William Pendley said eligible employees may begin applying for early retirement or voluntary separation incentive payments as early as next week. “Once approved, your separation from federal service must occur no later than January 31, 2020,” he wrote in an email to staff obtained by The Hill. The email is just the latest sign that BLM will be proceeding with its controversial relocation despite objections from lawmakers, including a group yesterday who asked appropriators to block funding for the move. BLM’s relocation plans would move the majority of the agency’s D.C.-based staff to various offices across the West, leaving just 61 of its 10,000 employees in the nation’s capital...MORE