I agree. I was in a similar position in the late '80s in southern California. I was trained to take samples from monitoring wells, and to perform Phase I Site Assessments on properties that might be likely to have contaminated soil.
I certainly understood that hydrocarbon-contaminated soil was "bad", and I was well aware of the potential significance and high emotions that go along with real estate combined with water and contamination issues (in California, "whiskey's for drinkin', water's for fightin' over.")
But I had no idea who had financial interest in the results from each monitoring well, nor did I have any access to the testing or the results of that testing. I was an entry-level employee doing the gruntwork of collecting the samples and walking and photographing the parcels of interest.
However, I also agree that those private citizens with strong interest in these topics would not generally distinguish between bosses and low-level employees if they wanted to vent their frustrations. I also experienced that, years later in a different state, as a federal employee, when simply driving past in a government pickup was enough to draw middle fingers from passersby, even though my job was not related to the contentiousness happening at that time.