Hundreds of fired probationary employees from the U.S. Department of Energy are returning to work but they may have to go through a new hire onboarding process and face the looming possibility of being fired again.

The federal footprint here has been shrinking, on a relative basis, long before the current administration started its mass firings.

A recent proposal to raise the state’s minimum wage didn’t make it past the first legislative cutoff date, but it serves as a reminder of how local chambers of commerce go to bat when it comes to protecting local businesses and consumers.

The repercussions of a mid-February layoff of hundreds of probationary federal employees at the Bonneville Power Administration, Pacific Northwest National Laboratory and the U.S. Department of Energy’s Hanford field office continue to be felt across the Mid-Columbia.

The nationwide labor market and wages are continuing their upward trend, and the construction industry is playing a big role.

Most of the claims this year—703—were filed after President Donald Trump’s inauguration, with an average of 25 being filed per day since Feb. 13, according to a release.

Among those laid off in recent weeks include dozens of staff connected to the U.S. Department of Energy’s Hanford site as well as Pacific Northwest National Laboratory and hundreds with the Bonneville Power Administration. 

Two Rivers Terminal LLC has been cited for 96 serious and 43 general violations in the past three years, including employee deaths in 2024 and 2012 and three who were hospitalized.

Hundreds of federal employees throughout the state have filed for unemployment benefits since Jan. 20, with more than 150 doing so between Feb. 13-18 alone. 

Benton-Franklin Trends’ Patrick Jones crunches the data on the bicounty’s per adult capita value of investment income and offers several reasons why investment income is relatively low here.