Kevin, Wilson, Marti and the rest of the crew clearing brush at an Ohio wastewater treatment plant didn’t complain about the hours. They ate lunch on site and were endlessly enthusiastic. But because they weren’t unionized, Local 1632 of the American Federation of State, County & Municipal Employees filed a grievance.
Kevin, Wilson and Marti didn’t have much to say about it. They are goats.
In 2026, anxiety about being replaced by computer superintelligence keeps white-collar workers up at night, sweating it out over a technology that even its creators can’t fully understand. At the wastewater plant though, the threat to employment is less abstract, and it walks on four legs.
The “blatant disregard” of labor through subcontracting is the crux of the issue for Will Harmon, the local’s president, rather than the voracious ruminants clearing vegetation at the facility.
The union filed a complaint with the Columbus Water & Power department this month after the agency promoted its partnership with a goat grazing company on social media. The grievance accuses the management at the facility, the Southerly Water Reclamation Plant outside Columbus, of failing to properly notify the union of its intent to subcontract the work, which, it said, violates their collective bargaining agreement.
“Now it’s animals doing my work,” he said. “Before long, they’ll be having A.I. doing my bargaining unit work.”
Columbus Water & Power said it is reviewing the grievance and declined to comment further because it is the subject of arbitration.
The wastewater plant sits about 13 miles south of downtown Columbus. It encompasses almost 290 acres. and can treat up to 330 million gallons per day, serving more than 700,000 residents, spokesperson George Zonders said.
But a storm water ditch on the south side of the grounds is teeming with by poison hemlock, a weed with clusters of tiny white flowers and purple-spotted stems that the state has declared noxious and invasive. Most equipment cannot be used on the slope, according to an email the department sent to the goat contractor last August.
Lauren Cain, the owner of a Goats on the Go affiliate, one of more than 70 nationwide that supply goats for vegetation management, provided about 40 for $2,900 for about 10 days of work. The goats scoured nearly two acres, stripping bark off trees and eating their way through overgrown brush and invasive vegetation.
Goats, with their efficient digestive systems, are useful in dangerous environments, Ms. Cain said. They intuitively know how much poison hemlock their systems can tolerate, she said, and minimize damage to the land and pollutants in the air. They also leave behind fertilizer.
For Kevin, Wilson and Marti, the job is simple: They’re just goats being goats. They exhibited their natural behaviors of climbing and browsing to eat their way through bushes, weeds and small trees. Marti enjoyed rolling down the hill. At times, they were sleeping on the job, which also provided them an opportunity to hang out with dozens of their colleagues, Ms. Cain said.
Unions have long resisted subcontracting, which employers use in two main cases: when work requires a highly specialized skill set or employers are seeking a less expensive option, said Ileen DeVault, professor of labor history at Cornell University.
“Obviously, they’re not providing P.P.E. for the goats,” she said, referring to how personal protective equipment can be costly.
But James Fletcher, who worked as a plant maintenance mechanic at Southerly before becoming vice president of the union, said that the goats’ efficacy is not clear-cut. The goats did not remove all the poison hemlock because it would have been too toxic to ingest in full and some was submerged, Ms. Cain said.
Mr. Fletcher said he did not run into any poison hemlock when he was clearing the brush at the plant four years ago.
“The goats couldn’t do all the job, so, of course, now our employees got to go back in there and do the job,” he said.
Ms. Cain aims for her goats to radiate good. She said she has seen her goats bring bickering neighbors together and is accustomed to hearing that clients set up lawn chairs to cheerfully observe her herd.
“I hate to think that the goats are causing any sort of negativity or strife,” she said.
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