Maryland leaders fight a plan to close the Beltsville Agricultural Research Center

Leaders from Maryland have launched a campaign to stop a proposal that would close the -year-old Beltsville Agricultural Research Center BARC and move personnel to other states across the U S On Monday lawmakers including U S Sens Chris Van Hollen and Angela Alsobrooks Rep Steny Hoyer Rep Jamie Raskin Rep Glen Ivey Prince George s County Executive Aisha Braveboy and other state leaders gathered to highlight the importance of the facility and why it should stay in Maryland Related stories Trump s USDA to scatter half its Washington staff to field offices Critics see a ploy to cut jobs After cuts to food stamps Trump administration ends administration s annual description on hunger in America Laid-off fed workers head back to school now as teachers It was not that long ago that we all gathered together with this simple message BARC provides really fundamental guidance and research to the country and that it should stay right here in Prince George s County Maryland Van Hollen declared who took a tour of the facility located in Beltsville After speaking to employees on the tour the special nature of BARC came through to all of us Van Hollen commented There s been a multi-billion dollar capital of American s taxpayers dollars in this space disclosed Ivey If you just pick it up and move it you re squandering that money and it s expensive to move and you ll have to build a new facility wherever you go Ivey noted And you re going to lose the human capital to move out to wherever they re trying to take them to It just doesn t make sense In July U S Secretary of Agriculture Brooke Rollins unveiled a major restructuring plan aimed at relocating Department of Agriculture employees out of the D C area citing high housing costs and salaries as key factors However Rollins acknowledged that as numerous as half the affected staff may opt to leave the agency rather than move BARC spans acres and has been a cornerstone of agricultural innovation in Maryland for over a century It is home to the George Washington Carver Center which houses the headquarters of the USDA s Agricultural Research System as well as several University of Maryland research initiatives These include a premier turf grass research facility and long-term agricultural scrutiny fields BARC employs more than federal workers and plays a vital role in supporting hundreds of jobs throughout the public We re going to fight this for the American people explained Hoyer For the AG district not only here but around the country he commented Our global standing will be hurt even further commented Alsobrooks We re losing revenue We re losing our workforce And this would mean much of the same This is really the collective voice of each of us standing up and saying now that BARC is so fundamental not only to the state of Maryland but to our country and we are here to say that we absolutely cannot afford to close it You can t just move soil Braveboy mentioned who notes it makes sense to keep the facility in Beltsville because of Maryland s diverse state And so the decades of research that has been conducted here means something Source