Several hundred Salem residents who work for the federal government are off work without pay, but locals will otherwise see few immediate impacts from the partial federal government shutdown that began Wednesday.

The federal government partially shut down at midnight, triggering workforce changes for hundreds of thousands, including around 500 local federal employees on unpaid leave, according to state estimates. Another 1,000 federal employees who work in Marion and Polk counties will likely remain on duty, many without pay.

Salem agencies and programs that rely on federal funding are otherwise operating normally as of Wednesday.

That means public housing and rental assistance from the Salem Housing Authority will continue. Officials with the city of Salem, Salem-Keizer School District and Chemeketa Community College said they weren’t expecting immediate impacts.

Food assistance and Social Security payments will not be immediately impacted by the shutdown. Head Start, a federally funded preschool program that serves hundreds of Salem kids, is also running normally.

However, approvals for federal grants and loans, such as those administered by the Small Business Administration and Federal Housing Administration, will stall immediately. 

Democrats and Republican lawmakers came to an impasse this week over approving ongoing government spending. Democrats refused to vote for the money without an agreement to extend Affordable Care Act subsidies for low and middle-income Americans, which are set to expire later this year. They also sought to roll back the cuts to Medicaid made by a domestic policy bill passed in July.

This is the first federal shutdown since 2019. 

During the shutdown, government workers deemed “essential” will continue to punch the clock without pay, while “non-essential” workers are on temporary leave. 

Essential services are those that pertain to public safety, national defense and transportation. This means departments like the Federal Aviation Administration, Department of Homeland Security, Department of Defense, Transportation Security Administration and Federal Emergency Management Agency will see little to no changes in staffing. 

National parks, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the National Institutes of Health and the Environmental Protection Agency are expected to see significant workforce changes. 

Salem workers with local U.S. Department of Agriculture and Bureau of Land Management offices were largely furloughed Wednesday.

“I am on furlough without access to email, due to the lapse in federal government funding. I will return your message as soon as possible once funding has been restored,” read an out of office message from a Salem-based USDA scientist.

But about two in three local federal employees are expected to remain on the job.

That estimate comes from 2024 data compiled by the Oregon Employment Department about the state’s federal workforce. There are around 30,000 federal employees in Oregon, including about 1,500 in Marion County and 89 in Polk County.

The department estimated about 450 of Marion County workers and 18 from Polk County could be furloughed by the shutdown.

The top two federal employers in Oregon are the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs and the U.S. Postal Service. USPS is unaffected by a shutdown, as it does not rely on congressional funding. The VA will remain largely operational, with some areas suspended, including national cemeteries and regional benefits offices.

U.S. Rep. Andrea Salinas, a Democrat who represents most of Salem in Congress, fingered Republicans for the shutdown, calling the consequences “devastating” in a Wednesday morning statement.

“Republicans control the House, the Senate, and the White House. This shutdown is entirely of their own making. By refusing to protect health care, they are forcing this shutdown on the American people,” she said. “I won’t support a partisan spending plan that cuts health care coverage and raises costs. What I will support is a bipartisan agreement that stops Republicans’ cuts to health care, lowers costs, and works for the American people.”

Republican leaders are pointing the finger back at Democrats, with Senate Majority Leader John Thune saying Wednesday that Democrats “have taken the American people hostage” by refusing to approve the spending bill.

Nationwide, about 750,000 federal workers in the country could face temporary leave each day, the Congressional Budget Office estimated in a Tuesday letter. President Donald Trump told reporters Tuesday that “vast numbers” of federal workers could be laid off during the shutdown.

Have a news tip? Contact reporter Hailey Cook: hailey@salemreporter.com or (208) 515-4097.

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