Chicago : Fermilab shedding workers

(Crain's) — Facing a budget crunch next year, Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory plans to cut its workforce by 100 employees or about 5%, Crain’s has learned.

About 1,760 of the lab’s 1,900 employees are eligible for a new severance pay package aimed at getting 100 workers to leave their jobs willingly, but involuntary layoffs will be needed if that goal is not met, lab director Pier Oddone said at a meeting with employees on Thursday.

The national lab’s main facility — the Tevatron — is shutting down in September after nearly a 28-year run as the world’s most powerful particle accelerator, superseded recently by a new facility in Europe. But the lab, near Batavia, has embarked on a series of smaller experiments that should keep its research going for the foreseeable future.

With federal funding expected to be “more or less” flat for some time to come, “we are trying to make sure funding is there” for the new projects, Mr. Oddone said, as the lab shifts from operations to construction of new experiments. Cutting headcount frees up cash to finance those experiments.

The lab is asking for volunteers to take the severance package but will decide who gets to quit based on its workforce needs. “The lab has to be functioning when we’re all done with this,” he told employees.

Fermilab is owned by the Department of Energy and run by a consortium of universities including the University of Chicago.