Plant Works production manager Brian Mandela stages plants for a delivery to an Eastern Oregon restoration project in the Blue Mountains. Mandela is one of two employees remaining after owners Richard Kenton and Sandy Roth laid off workers earlier this year. (Photo courtesy of Richard Kenton)
Richard Kenton and Sandy Roth have spent three decades building their native plant nursery in Cove, a small town 20 minutes east of La Grande in Union County.
The married couple operates Plant Works LLC, where they grow willows, cottonwood, dogwood and just about any plants native to their region of northeast Oregon. Federal agencies such as the U.S. Forest Service, the Bureau of Land Management and U.S. Fish and Wildlife regularly contract with them to raise plants for habitat restoration and wildfire recovery projects.
Their business relies on timely payments from those federal agencies, but with the federal government shut down since Oct. 1, a $40,000 payment they were expected to get on Oct. 28 is on hold — a delay that could be devastating for a small business like theirs.
“We’re just local nurseries that grow the plants that grow here, so we don’t go outside of our ecological regions to seek money or to seek business,” Roth said. “This stuff gets politicalized and we definitely hurt because if you don’t care about the environment, it defunds our projects.”
The shutdown has left federal workers, and small businesses like Plant Works, caught in the middle. While Republicans blame Democrats’ failure to vote on a budget temporarily keeping the government funded, Democrats blame Republicans for not negotiating on health care subsidies and other policy demands.
Kenton said he called the office of Rep. Cliff Bentz, R-Oregon, who represents him and the 2nd Congressional District in Congress, for help, but was told to contact his U.S. senators instead — blaming U.S. Sens. Ron Wyden and Jeff Merkley, both Democrats, and other Congressional Democrats for the shutdown.
Until Congress passes the necessary spending bills, agencies can’t process payments to federal employees or contractors like Plant Works.
This isn’t the first time small Oregon business gets caught up
This isn’t the first shutdown to disrupt Plant Works’ operations. In 2013, when the government shut down for 16 days, Plant Works was left in limbo.
“One time we didn’t get paid, and it was pretty brutal,” Roth said. “We had over 200,000 plants waiting here when they shut down, and there was no chance of payment, but then they opened back up again. We almost went under that time.”
Kenton said this time feels different.
“In previous times it’s been horrendously stressful, but in the past we haven’t had a loose cannon at the helm who might just decide that we don’t need to get paid because we’re doing something that he doesn’t believe in,” Kenton said, referring to President Donald Trump.
Since returning to office, the Trump administration has dismantled Biden-era climate initiatives, removing data and references to climate change from federal agency websites and prioritizing timber production and forest development over restoration projects.
Kenton and Roth have already laid off five of their staff, leaving two employees after losing federal contracts following Trump’s election earlier this year.
Shrub steppe species are grown in a greenhouse at Plant Works LLC, a native plants nursery in Cove, Oregon. (Courtesy of Richard Kenton)
Oregon ranks third nationally in nursery production, behind California and Florida. Some Oregon nurseries — the state’s largest agricultural sector — are feeling the strain. With federal workers researching pests and disease furloughed during the shutdown, nursery projects across the state are stalled, Oregon Nursery Association Chief Executive Officer Jeff Stone told the Capital Chronicle.
Nurseries are also struggling with the uncertainty of tariffs, Stone said.
“It’s really hard to plan as a business when one week you’re dealing with 10% tariffs and the next it jumps to 15% on certain products,” Stone said. “It takes a lot of different inputs to make a nursery or greenhouse — anything from imported pesticides to imported plastic pots.”
For Kenton and Roth, the stress of the government shutdown goes beyond a delayed paycheck. The unpredictability of federal payments and rising costs because of tariffs threaten the survival of their business.
“It’s not just our money,” Kenton said. “I’ve got a line of credit, so I’m not paying on my line of credit and my costs are going up while I wait for Uncle Sam to pay. They need to sit down and talk and think about the public rather than the ideals of the president. They were elected by us to represent us, not the president.”
