PRAIRIE CITY — Ryan McKnab liked his job as a wildlife biologist on the Malheur National Forest’s Prairie City Ranger District.

But now he’ll have to find a new place to work.

McKnab is one of the more than 100 federal workers with the Malheur National Forest, Wallowa Whitman National Forest, Umatilla National Forest and the Bureau of Land Management’s Vale district who reportedly lost their jobs over the Presidents Day holiday.

They were among thousands of probationary employees nationwide who have lost their jobs as part of the Trump administration’s efforts to slash the size of the federal workforce.

The Forest Service declined to say how many Grant County residents were part of the firings. McKnab said he’s heard that 20 employees from the Malheur National Forest lost their jobs over the long weekend.

Trouble filling the job

Before McKnab, the wildlife biologist position with the Prairie City Ranger District wasn’t an easy job to fill. The district had offered another candidate the position, but that person quickly realized Prairie City wasn’t a good fit.

“They felt the town (was) too small for them, and they just kept on driving,” McKnab said.

The job remained open until people who knew McKnab’s educational background and other qualifications asked him to put in for the position as a Schedule A hire.

Schedule A allows a qualified person with a disability to be hired without having to compete with other applicants.

Michael Fallings, a partner in the Austin, Texas, office of the Tully Rinckey law firm, represents federal employees in work-related grievances with the government. He said all government workers must meet the established qualifications for the jobs they seek — no exceptions.

“All employees selected for federal government positions have to be qualified,” Fallings said. The idea that some applicants get special treatment “is a bit of a misnomer that’s put out there in relation to some of the DEI policies and whatnot.”

Workers new to the federal government must complete a probationary period. During that time, the workers do not have rights to appeal an adverse action, such as removal from their job.

Federal agencies can seek to remove probationary workers without any notice. Schedule A hires are given a two-year probationary period as opposed to the one-year period given to those who had to compete with other applicants for their jobs.

McKnab was hired in July of 2023 and was mere months shy of being taken off probationary status before his firing.

McKnab said neither he nor his wife, former Grant School Board member Jessi Brunson, were surprised by his firing. As one of the millions of federal workers who received the “Fork in the Road” email from the Office of Personnel Management late last month, McKnab was already wondering if his job was in jeopardy.

“We follow the news, and we knew how likely it was. We told my kids, ‘Oh, it’s no big deal, like, I’ll get through this,’” he said. “They very quickly said, ‘Oh, yeah, OK.’ They know me to be successful and highly motivated and able to do anything I want to do.”

McKnab ultimately decided not to take the buyout the email offered, on the advice of legal counsel.

More work, fewer bodies

McKnab’s duties were mostly focused on wildlife habitat conservation and maintenance throughout the Malheur National Forest.

Helping to protect aspen trees, monitoring species that are low in number such as the western bumblebee and providing foraging space for small birds of prey known as kestrels were some of the things McKnab did while working for the Prairie City Ranger District.

McKnab said those efforts won’t necessarily stop with his firing, because Prairie City still has one wildlife biologist, but his absence will lead to more work for those who remain. With fewer people in the forest, McKnab said there is a chance that some projects just won’t get done.

“A lot of these disciplines of biology, aquatics, archaeology (and) fuels, they all need to check some boxes before timber harvests can happen, for controlled burns or whatever project is going to happen,” he said. “With less of us on the forest, a lot of projects in the forest are going to come to a standstill waiting longer for people to check all the boxes, and things are just going to come to a halt.”

So long to Grant County?

McKnab moved to Grant County with his family in 2018 and has been very active in volunteer work since his arrival.

A member of the Painted Sky Center for the Arts board, McKnab helped develop the youth arts program there. He’s also coached soccer and basketball and currently coaches the math club at Grant Union Jr./Sr. High School.

McKnab serves as the vice president of the Grant County Library Advisory Board and is the board’s liaison to the Grant County Library Foundation.

“I love how I can increase the quality of life for my kids by helping in the community,” he said. “Not just my kids, but all kids, and I try to make the community a better place to live.”

McKnab said his firing doesn’t necessarily mean he and his family will have to move out of the area. As a licensed teacher, he has another career path he can pursue, but there’s no guarantee he can find work in education.

McKnab said others who have lost their jobs may not be as fortunate as he is.

“We don’t have blue collar work here,” he said. “We have forest work, teaching and hospitals.”

What comes next

McKnab believes he was terminated improperly. While some fired federal probationary workers have been told they were let go due to poor performance, McKnab said his supervisor told him that wasn’t an issue in his case.

“He said, ‘There’s a chance you won’t be here long, but it’s not based on the work you do.’”

Fallings thinks McKnab is right. Even though probationary workers can be fired without notice, he said, their termination needs to be grounded in performance or conduct.

McKnab said he has responded to a request from his union for more information for purposes of building a court case in his support.

Following his firing, McKnab went back to his former workplace to turn in his computer and clean out his workspace and was met by supportive coworkers who told him his termination was unfair.

Fallings said cases like McKnab’s will make their way to the Supreme Court and are going to be a test of the executive branch’s power to fire federal employees at will. Under the law, Fallings said, the proper way to reduce the size of the government is through a reduction in force, also known as a RIF.

Fallings said he believes the Trump administration has not initiated a RIF because there are rules and procedures that make the process take longer than simply firing workers in an effort to reduce the size of the government.

McKnab said more firings are in the works for the Malheur National Forest. This time, the cuts will look more like a RIF and could impact tenured professionals as opposed to probationary employees.

“Our supervisor livestreamed into the Prairie City office today and told us that more is going to come,” he said. “He didn’t say reduction in force, but that’s definitely what he was implying.”