Sam Conder, his brother and his father spent two months this fall, joining about 30 steel kiosks for the Federal Land Management Bureau. Conder expected the large, independent steel structures to keep track marks and land markers on the BLM land through Utah.
He also expected to be paid for the work.
Instead, he received an email explaining why it would not be – though his small family business handed over the kiosks to Blm in November. Day 1 of President Donald Trump Order Executive Funds of Inflation Reduction Act He also interrupted the BLM funds to pay his $ 30,457 purchase order with Solutions Construction Arc, a three -employee construction store in Cedar City.
“It’s not big, but it’s not irrelevant,” Conder said. “We are a really small business. $ 30,000… keeps us going. ”
Conder said his contacts at his local BLM office, including his contracting officer, have tried hard to fix things, but until the freezing is removed or repealed, or if the congress does not authorize new funds, there is nothing that may to do.
The executive order has been opposed in court but remains in force. Mentioning the policy that stops commenting on active court cases, a BLM spokesman said she could not discuss how much similar letters were sent to Utah businesses.
But Christina Judge, Director of Communication at Utah for BLM, said the agency “appreciates our partnerships with Utah contractors. Hopefully we can find a way to compensate them for the work they have done.”
(Photo politely) Arc construction solutions delivered about 30 steel marks kiosks, shown here in the middle of construction, at the November Bureau of Land. Now the agency cannot pay.
Trump issued the executive order of “US Energy Energy” on his first day at the White House “to release the affordable and reliable natural resources of America,” according to the order. The order included a decree that “all agencies … Immediately a pause for disbursement of funds adopted through the law on inflation reduction.”
Conder said he had been waiting to be paid in December, and received the email from the BLM last week. “This contract was funded using IRA money and according to the latest executive order, the funds have been frozen,” she said, according to the copy divided by Salt Lake Tribune, “stopping all payments at this time.”
The company withdrew to offer the project because the internal department, which includes BLM, has made it an advantage to work with small businesses, Conder said. The department is “committed to raising prices of key contracts and subcontracting prices for the small business community,” he said in a last memorandum, and noted that it gave more than half of its small businesses to in 2023.
He has arrived at the Utah Federal Delegation for help, he said, but he has not arrived or heard again of anyone. Representatives from each office – sense. John Curtis and Mike Lee, and Congressman Celeste Maloy, which represents the Conder district – did not answer the tribune questions.
On Sunday, Curtis said Congress has failed to fix issues such as federal expenses and national debt, and Trump’s efforts are now not a crisis, but “how we test the Constitution”. Trump, Curtis said in “Face the Nation with Margaret Brennan”, “He is trying to fix it with the tools he has. The courts will push back if he leaves the line. … and that is the beauty of the system. It works.”
Conder said he is ready to offer offers for future federal projects. He does not blame Blm, he said, whom he instead sees as captured in a seizure of energy by the new administration.
“At the end of the day, I would like to pay for the work we’ve already done and done well,” Conder said in an email for the Tribune.
But “this story is not about $ 30,000 the federal government owes to our small business,” he said. It is about “like the executive branch, in their zeal to dismantle our federal government, has tried to eliminate controls and balances, and in the process damages a small business in a small community.”
Shannon Sollitt is a Rapport for America Corps member covering business accountability and sustainability for Salt Lake Tribune. Your donation to match our RFA grant helps to keep its writing stories like this; Please consider making a tax deductible from any amount today by clicking here.