Federal workers in Colorado Springs feeling the pinch of shutdown
By Kurtis Lee
The Denver Post
COLORADO SPRINGS — The angst of not knowing if he’ll receive a full paycheck is nothing new to Bill Adams.
Before the federal government shut down 10 days ago, automatic budget cuts — known as sequestration — had already forced him to take several furlough days last summer from his $38,000-a-year job as a butcher at the Fort Carson commissary.
The days off reduced his income by about 20 percent for six weeks, amplifying concerns about how he’ll make payments on the lot he leases for his family’s single-wide trailer on the city’s southeast side.
“It seems to never end,” Adams, who served a brief stint in the Marines, said on a recent afternoon while seated in his living room. The television blared what has been an onslaught of battling news conferences between Democrats and Republicans in Washington. “And now we’re past the one- week mark of the shutdown. I don’t care about the politics, I just want to get paid and live my life.”
With a local economy fueled by five Army and Air Force bases, about 55,000 federal workers live in Colorado Springs, according to an analysis by the Washington-based nonprofit Brookings Institution.
Per its total workforce, the analysis found Colorado Springs has the highest percentage of federal workers in the nation at 18.5 percent.
Most federal workers here are active-duty military and guaranteed a paycheck throughout the shutdown.
But for nearly 7,000 Defense Department civilian employees deemed non-essential — like Adams — who were ordered back to work this week after initially having to leave their posts due to the shutdown, concerns remain about if and when they will get paid.
Thousands of non-Defense Department employees all across Colorado who work for agencies such as the U.S. Forest Service, U.S. Geological Survey and federal prison system remain without pay as the budget impasse continues.
A bill in the U.S. Senate would offer retroactive back payments to all civilian workers once the government reopens for business, though a final vote on the measure has not been cast. After previous government shutdowns, federal workers received back pay.
At the American Federation of Government Employees offices at Fort Carson, phone calls and visits from civilian workers have inundated the small staff.
“These are blue-collar people, who work the front desk at the hospital or keep buildings here on base clean,” said Albert Rivera, vice president of the union that represents about 3,000 civilian Fort Carson employees. “They’re not making a lot, and when Congress isn’t working together it can have ripple effects on the community.”
A recent analysis by the Colorado Fiscal Institute estimates that all federal workers in the state collectively earn about $1 billion in wages every three months.
“Income drives spending, and spending drives the economy, so when people don’t have paychecks, buying coffee and eating at the local restaurants is not going to happen,” said Carol Hedges, executive director of the Colorado Fiscal Institute.
Hedges could not offer a set figure as to how much the shutdown will impact the state’s economy because it is ongoing and discrepancies remain in who will actually receive pay.
Martin Anderson has owned a quaint Cajun restaurant a few miles from Fort Carson’s main gate for about four years.
“Business overall has remained OK,” said Anderson, noting a large clientele comes from the Army base and the North American Aerospace Defense Command. “I have, though, seen drop-offs in revenue this summer when the government made people take furloughs … on the weekends especially.”
Anderson said since the government shut down last week, his business has not felt any immediate impacts — a sentiment shared, based on several interviews this week with business owners surrounding Fort Carson.
But as lawmakers continue to battle in Washington over a budget deal that has left the government shuttered and inching toward a debt ceiling deadline, civilians employees such as Adams want to see it end.
“Creditors don’t say, ‘Oh, you’re furloughed, don’t worry about making a payment this month,’ ” said Adams, who gets paid Friday and will have three days of pay deducted from his check. “It’s not how life works. We have children working in Washington, and the politics is hurting everyday people.”
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