Study finds US public land workers facing assaults, threats
Source: Associated Press
Study finds US public land workers facing assaults, threats
By MATTHEW BROWN
October 21, 2019
BILLINGS, Mont. (AP) — Federal employees overseeing U.S. public lands were assaulted or threatened at least 360 times over a five-year period marked by heightened tensions with anti-government groups and dwindling ranks of law enforcement officers, a congressional watchdog agency said Monday.
The Government Accountability Office in a new report highlights anti-government tensions that at times have boiled over, including a six-week armed occupation of a federal wildlife refuge in Oregon in 2016 and other standoffs with armed protesters in Montana and Nevada.
The clashes have been rooted in a deep distrust of government on the part of the protesters, who view the federal bureaucracy as unlawfully impeding people from using public land for grazing, mining and other economic purposes.
Even a routine traffic stop or the collection of a park entrance fee can be enough to trigger an assault or threat, according to GAO investigators.
The incidents investigators cataloged during interviews with federal workers ranged from threatening phone calls and gunshots fired over the heads of employees, to the stabbing of a Bureau of Land Management worker outside a federal building.
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Read more: https://apnews.com/6bad5bd1faa54804990dd1cb587651ee
= new reply since forum marked as read
and in another vein... not as violent but disrespectful... my daughter is working at a National Park and just today told me that numerous times after she does a small service for the guests, someone will remark sarcastically, "nice to see my tax dollars hard at work" 
