The uncertainty fueled by the Trump administration’s wave of funding and hiring freezes is now being felt by Maine farmers.
Those who have signed agreements with the U.S. Department of Agriculture are nervously awaiting word on whether they will get their promised funds, or be on the hook for thousands of dollars of projects that are already well underway.
At Farmer Kev's Organics in West Gardiner, the fields are frozen over and covered in snow, but there’s plenty of activity inside the farm's 18 greenhouses.
"We do a lot of greenhouse stuff this time of year with respect to winter greens, so things like spinach, Swiss chard, kale," farmer Kevin Leavitt said.
Tucked back behind Leavitt's greenhouses is the new solar array- designed to produce just enough energy to cover the cost of his electricity needs, about $1,000 a month.
"We were really pushed into this because a couple years ago, with the hikes and electricity costs, we were really nervous that we were going to see a lot of susceptibility to those increases," he said. "And so we were looking for ways to kind of lower our costs, hedge our bets."
Leavitt installed the solar with the promise of a $45,000 grant from USDA's Rural Energy For America Program. And now that the grant has been frozen, he could also lose the loan he took out to finance the project. That means he'd be on the hook for the total cost, about a $150,000. Meanwhile, Leavitt said construction is complete and contractors are waiting to be paid.
"And so things are just kind of going down the chain, each person is gonna start feeling the consequences of this action, where we can't get funds," he said.
Leavitt's not alone. In Brunswick, farmer Seth Kroeck is holding off on further work until he sees what happens with the freeze. He's already spent $6,000 on two grant projects worth a total of $90,000 over four years. The two grants are for mulching his wild blueberries, and assorted planting in his vegetable fields to attract beneficial insects.
"It's not massive, but we will have to find a way to pay for it," he said.
Kroeck said he doesn't want to end up any deeper in the hole. He said when the USDA didn't have clear answers for him about the frozen payments, he reached out to Maine Congresswoman Chellie Pingree's office.
"What's going on right now at the USDA is absolutely outrageous," Pingree said.
Pingree said she is hearing from farmers worried about losing their livelihoods to these sudden expenses.
"It's got my blood boiling, and I know it's got a lot of farmers in the state of Maine very concerned about how they're going to make ends meet," she said.
And Pingree, who sits on a House agriculture subcommittee, said her office hasn't been able to get clear answers from the USDA either.
"So there's a lot of unknowns out there, and it's beyond outrageous the impact this is already having in Maine, and will have on food prices, will have on farmers ability to keep their farms in business, and the long-term impact on climate change and so many other things that we're worrying about," she said.
It's particularly challenging for farmers to cover these expenses in the early spring, said Sarah Alexander, executive director of the Maine Organic Farmers and Gardeners Association.
"Many folks don't have as much income coming in," she said. "It may be they're getting ready for the season, and they have to spend a lot of money to buy seeds and supplies and inputs to get ready."
Alexander said farming relies on the certainty of contracts.
"When you have a contract in hand to do the work and you expect that if the other signer of that contract is the USDA that they're going to follow through with that, just like they've done year after year after year," she said.
Alexander said MOFGA itself is in the same position- it has over a million dollars in grant funding from the USDA on the line for 14 different contracts- most of which are administered to farmers.
As Seth Kroeck of Crystal Spring Farm in Brunswick awaits word on his USDA grants, he's trying to figure out how to cover the $6,000 he's already paid out of pocket
"And so when we sell 50,000 pounds of carrots, it's going to add pennies to every pound," he said.
And even if the funding is eventually approved, Kroeck said his whole timeline will be delayed, forcing him to play catch-up.
And in West Gardiner, farmer Kevin Leavitt said the whole experience has made him think twice about turning to the USDA for help again any time soon.
"Things have been secure, we have had a lot of faith in the government, but this time it's very different," he said. "It doesn't seem like the contracts really mean anything to the current administration."
Newly confirmed Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins Saturday acknowledged the problems caused by the funding freeze on farmers, and told a reporter that efforts would be underway this week to start solving them.
