The U.S. Forest Service is relocating its headquarters from Washington, DC, to Salt Lake City, Utah, by 2027, the Agriculture Dept. announced.
March 31, 2026, 8:48 p.m. ET
- The U.S. Forest Service is moving its headquarters from Washington, DC, to Salt Lake City.
- Officials state the move will place leadership closer to the Western lands the agency manages and improve its mission.
- The restructuring will also relocate about 260 positions to Utah and establish 15 state directors.
- The Sierra Club expressed skepticism about the move, questioning if it will lead to more effective land stewardship.
The U.S. Forest Service is relocating its headquarters to Salt Lake City, citing the move as a “sweeping restructuring” of the agency, the Agriculture Department said.
The agency’s move from its current location in Washington, DC, to Utah’s capital city is part of a broader strategy to place the forest service closer to the Western states that comprise the majority of the 193-million-acre forest system, the USDA announced March 31.
Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins said in a statement that the relocation will improve the Forest Service’s mission of managing its forests, saving taxpayers’ money and boosting employee recruitment.
“Establishing a western headquarters in Salt Lake City and streamlining how the Forest Service is organized will position the Chief and operation leaders closer to the landscapes we manage and the people who depend on them,” Rollins said.
“This includes supporting our timber growers across the country, including those in the Southeast, by prioritizing a regional office and promoting policies that boost timber production, lowering costs for consumers,” Rollins added.
The Forest Service’s move come after the 2019 relocation of the Bureau of Land Management headquarters to Grand Junction, Colorado, during President Donald Trump‘s first term in office, which led to a vast majority of the staff leaving the agency, only for the BLM to return to Washington. The BLM manages public lands in several Western states, performing activities such as oil and gas and agricultural leases.
Forest Service jobs also face relocation
About 260 headquarters positions will relocate to Utah, while 130 will remain in Washington, the Forest Service said. Additional phases of the reorganization, including the formal elimination of regional and station office structures and the full transition to a state-based model, will be implemented over the coming year.
Utah Governor Spencer Cox praised the Forest Service move, thanking Trump, Rollins, USDA Deputy Secretary Stephen Vaden and Forest Service Chief Tom Schultz.
“This is a big win for Utah and the West. With nearly 90% of Forest Service lands west of the Mississippi, moving the U.S. Forest Service headquarters to Salt Lake City will put leadership closer to the lands, communities, and challenges they manage,” the Republican governor said in a March 31 post on X. “It also means hundreds of jobs coming to Utah and better, faster decisions on the ground for the people who rely on our public lands, from ranchers and timber producers to families who work and recreate there.”
As part of its restructure, the Forest Service said it would establish 15 state directors to oversee its operations, the USDA said. Each state office will include a small leadership support team responsible for functions such as legislative affairs, communications and intergovernmental coordination.
“This approach is intended to simplify the chain of command, strengthen local partnerships, and give field leaders greater ability to respond to conditions on the ground,” the USDA said.
The Forest Service will also begin transitioning to a “state-based organizational model” to shift authority closer to the field, a goal the administration has been emphasizing since the beginning of the second Trump administration, the USDA said.
Additionally, “operational service centers” will be formed in Albuquerque, New Mexico; Athens, Georgia; Fort Collins, Colorado; Madison, Wisconsin; Missoula, Montana; and Placerville, California. More service center locations may be added as the transition progresses, the USDA said.
The Forest Service said research operations will also be consolidated as the agency has previously mentioned. Research facilities now located in multiple regions will fall under a central research organization based in Fort Collins, the agency said.
The Forest Service said its relocation to Salt Lake City will be complete by summer 2027.
Sierra Club questions uprooting of Forest Service HQ
One major environmental group is questioning the Forest Service’s pending relocation.
The Sierra Club, the nation’s oldest conservation organization, said in a statement on March 31 that it is skeptical about the USDA’s move.
“The Forest Service should be structured in a way that allows them to steward our public lands effectively and with robust public engagement. This administration has routinely pursued the exact opposite by gutting protections and the public lands management workforce,” Alex Craven, the Sierra Club’s forest campaign manager. “Despite continued appeals of ‘common sense’ management, it’s far from clear this latest reorganization will get us any closer to that.”
Source: Utah News