BANGOR DAILY NEWS • February 28, 2025
For months, Angela Harwood has been planning to take over Happytown Farm in Orland from her retiring employers using a loan from the U.S. Department of Agriculture. But that loan has been delayed for weeks because of a funding freeze, staff reductions at federal agencies and additional reporting requirements ordered by the Trump administration. The frozen funds were supposed to pay farmers for projects they’ve already completed, meaning they fear they’ll be out tens of thousands of dollars in an industry that already runs on tight margins. Almost every farmer in Maine works with the USDA, and for more than a month many have faced uncertainty about their access to the hundreds of millions of dollars of federal loans, grants and contracts they’ve built their businesses around. Also, the USDA has cut its staffing and scrubbed online webpages and resources that reference climate change or “climate smart” agriculture, which gives farmers options for responding to the changing growing seasons, new pests, diseases, weather patterns and storms that challenge them.