An Environmental Protection Agency facility in Northern Kentucky remains fully operational, despite the Department of Government Efficiency planning to end its lease a year ago.
The 20,000-square foot building in Erlanger contains a stockpile of emergency response equipment for the EPA to use during train derailments, natural disasters and oil spills. It’s one of four EPA facilities in the country that has equipment available to respond to emergencies quickly. The other three are in New Jersey, North Carolina and Nevada, according to the EPA.
In March 2025, Elon Musk’s DOGE added the Erlanger EPA building to its website for lease cancellation, claiming the closure would provide a total savings of $889,450.
DOGE has since changed course and the EPA says there currently are no plans to close the Erlanger facility, which houses “mission-critical assets.”
In a statement to WVXU Tuesday, the EPA wrote, “The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s Erlanger warehouse in Erlanger, Kentucky, remains fully operational and continues to house mission-critical assets, including serving as the Agency’s CIN COOP site and supporting EPA's Office of Land and Emergency Management emergency response operations.
“As part of our ongoing stewardship responsibilities, the Agency routinely evaluates its real estate portfolio to identify opportunities to save hard-earned American tax dollars,” the EPA continued. “There are currently no plans to close the Erlanger facility and all real estate actions are done in a coordinated manner according to agency needs.”
The Erlanger EPA warehouse is one of many federal buildings that have remained open after DOGE announced plans to cancel their leases and close them.
DOGE and the U.S. General Services Administration finalized approximately 30% of the lease terminations sent to landlords in 2025, according to reporting from the Federal News Network.
The agency began walking back hundreds of lease terminations after officials realized closing certain offices would impact “public-facing benefits and services,” according to the outlet.
The Erlanger facility is still part of the federal government’s property inventory and its lease continues through August 2028, according to February 2026 data from the General Services Administration.
The Erlanger facility also no longer appears on the DOGE website.
‘A benefit for the Cincinnati area,’ former employee says
Greg Powell worked at the Erlanger EPA warehouse for nearly 20 years before retiring in 2022. He says the facility is important for keeping people safe during emergencies like oil spills and train derailments, especially in the Midwest.
From the Erlanger facility, the EPA can be in Louisville in an hour and a half and Columbus in two hours. Those response times would’ve increased significantly if the federal government closed down the facility, he says.
“It's just like a fire station,” Powell said. “You know, if your fire station is 100 miles away and you have a fire, you're not going to expect them to be there anytime soon.”
Powell says the facility staying open allows valuable equipment to remain in the region.
“It's a benefit for the Cincinnati area, because you have a lot of equipment that can be deployed quickly to monitor for chemicals or radiation, or respond to oil spills,” Powell said.
He says it also means training for federal and state on-scene coordinators can continue at the Northern Kentucky facility, which hosts hands-on training for oil spill response on the Ohio River.
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