A senior-level wildfire management person in the U.S. Forest Service (FS) told Wildfire Today that there are hundreds of vacant permanent firefighting positions in California. The agency’s difficulties in recruiting and hiring seasonal and permanent firefighting personnel has resulted in multiple hotshot crews not qualifying to respond to a fire with 18 personnel, the minimum required by interagency standards.
More than a dozen FS fire engines in the state are completely unstaffed, or instead of seven days a week coverage they have cut back to only five. (Check with your local fire department and ask which days of the week they staff their fire engines.) Thirty modules of FS hand crews, dozers, or water tenders in California have been shut down due to a shortage of employees, according to our source.
(Read more: Forest Service issues statement saying in part, “Federal wages for firefighters have not kept pace with wages offered by state, local and private entities in some areas of the United States.”)
The personnel issues are caused by two primary factors, difficulty in hiring, and experienced firefighters leaving the organization for better pay and working conditions.
Seasonal federal firefighters in California are generally hired in January and start working in mid-May or mid-June. The centralized hiring process now being used has been heavily criticized as inefficient.
A look at the system for advertising vacant permanent firefighting positions in the federal agencies, USA JOBS, shows a large number of unfilled FS positions. Here is a sample from this week:
- Supervisory Forestry Technician, Fire, GS-7-8, USFS, 43 locations.
- Supervisory Forestry Technician, Interagency Hotshot Crew Superintendent, GS-9, USFS, 43 locations.
- Forestry Technician, hand crew, GS-7, USFS, 17 locations.
- Fire Prevention Officer, GS-10-11, USFS, 61 locations.
- Forestry Technician, Dispatch, GS-4-7, USFS, 56 locations.
Some of the FS fire jobs at the website are open for a few months or a year, and others are basically continually open with no end dates. Hiring of permanent fire personnel can go on throughout the year as additional positions become vacant.
The entry level wildfire job with the federal agencies is usually a GS-3 working under the title “Forestry Technician,” which receives $13.32 per hour, almost $2 less than the minimum wage sought by some politicians recently. In California a state agency that competes with the federal government for hiring firefighters pays about double that rate. A recent survey found that the first and second most cited reason for leaving federal firefighting organizations is to move to a job with the California Department of Forestry and Fire Suppression or local municipal fire departments.
Difficulties staffing Incident Management Teams
Skilled fire personnel leaving the federal land management agencies have made it difficult to find employees qualified and willing to serve on Incident Management Teams (IMT) that are mobilized to suppress large wildfires and manage other incidents.
From a report released May 13, 2021 by the Incident Workforce Development Group:
Today, critical challenges in rostering and managing IMTs is leading to a decrease in the number of teams available for an increasing number of complex incidents.
In the past five years there have been multiple occasions where all available IMTs have been assigned to large fires. Local units have had to face the consequences of managing a complex incident without the services of an IMT.
Firefighters in the Department of the Interior
A spokesperson for the Department of the Interior told Wildfire Today that they do not anticipate having a large number of vacant firefighting positions. (Wildfire Today was unable to confirm this claim):
The Department of the Interior is on track to have available a total of approximately 5,000 firefighters, a similar number to what was available last season.
The initial bureau hiring targets are:
Bureau of Indian Affairs – 600
Bureau of Land Management – 3,450
U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service – 530
National Park Service – 930
How many firefighters does the FS have?
The Forest Service, which is in the Department of Agriculture, has been saying for years that they have 10,000 fire personnel. Wildfire Today filed a Freedom of Information Act Request with the the agency on December 10, 2019 to obtain the actual number of firefighters. We are still waiting to receive factual information.
Widespread news coverage
Three major news organizations have published articles this week about the recruitment and retention of federal wildland firefighters. Below are excerpts:
Despite the increased threat, the Forest Service does not expect to meet its goal of hiring 5,200 federal firefighters in California this year.”It will be below that number,” said Bob Baird, director of fire and aviation management for the Forest Service Pacific Southwest Region. “With hiring challenges and attrition, it could be a lower percentage than that, but we won’t know until we finish our hiring process.”
“California is ground zero for attrition,” said Riva Duncan, a former Forest Service officer who is the executive secretary of Grassroots Wildland Firefighters, which advocates for federal fire personnel. “We’re losing people at an accelerated rate because there are so many other opportunities.”
The [FS] projected a shortfall of 313 firefighters in Region 5 this year, at least 8% fewer firefighters than it aimed to employ. The shortfall is frustrating for many in California’s state government, which relies on the federal service to help put out wildfires, but has little control over staffing levels.
Thom Porter, the chief of California’s state fire agency, CAL FIRE, said he’s had regular conversations with California-based Forest Service officials about staffing this year. He said he’s most worried that when the agency’s teams are moved to fight fires in other states, the Forest Service won’t have enough people, or enough experienced people, to backfill those roles in California.
“If they’re unable to hire, if they’re unable to keep staff on when we’re having our most critical periods, it is a public safety risk,” Porter said of the Forest Service. “Because we so much rely on each other that—there isn’t a single agency in California that has all of the resources it needs for a major incident of any type. It’s all hands on deck.”
Los Angeles Times (subscription):
Jon Groveman, a spokesman for the Forest Service in California, said the agency attempts to staff 46 hotshot crews in the state annually, but it hasn‘t been able to fill all of those positions for several years, leaving it with between 35 and 40 crews. The agency expects “a similar number of crews to be staffed this fire year,” he wrote in an email, adding that “some crews for various reasons (mainly due to staffing challenges) will not be able to attain Hotshot standards.”
Hotshot crews that have lost that designation include the Horseshoe Meadow Hotshots in the Sequoia National Forest and the Modoc Hotshots in the Modoc National Forest, both of which the agency considers “unstaffed.”
A Forest Service job posting earlier this spring for a full-time, experienced firefighter in the Bridger-Teton National Forest in Jackson, Wyoming, warned applicants that real estate costs were high. It suggested a few affordable options, including Habitat for Humanity, the nonprofit home builder that helps low-income people get into new homes.
You’re far from alone there. USFS Management speak about equal opportunity almost daily on social media yet behind the scenes don’t extend that equal opportunity to their veteran wildland firefighters, plenty of people who have 7-10 years as seasonal and aren’t hired on permanently.
Pay issues aside, the process of getting hired and then dealing with Albuquerque is incredibly difficult and frustrating. The timeline for a seasonal FF to start from the time they apply to onboarding is ridiculous, and those new to the federal hiring system may just take jobs elsewhere because they need a job now not months and months down the road. Not to mention the pain it is to get past the initial screening system with ASC to get referred. I was once told I was not qualified for a seasonal engine job, with prior wildland experience, because my fire science degree had nothing to do with agriculture or natural resources. I also had them try and push back my start date because they needed to do a background check for a LincPass and didn’t check to see if I already had one (hint, I did!) Since leaving the USFS I have found the hiring process for other agencies to be much smoother and quicker with less roadblocks.
This article is a bit unfair in that it is difficult to impossible to pay wages which are competitive against other fire fighting entities State and Local when the budget sources and funding allocation policies, laws, practices, and procedures are different, ending up with the U. S. Forest Service being unable to pay wages sufficient to hire and retain experienced employees or fresh recruits through no fault of their own.
Do you think that the USFS *wants* to have difficulty filling positions and are avoiding doing so for “reasons?” The Federal agency is not funded well enough to address billions in deferred maintenance of Recreational spaces in part because Fire takes the lion’s share of budgets, yet even then, Fire employees are finding it difficult to get paid a living wage because Fire is not funded well enough — which is a Congressional decision, not the fault of the USFS.
Peoples passion for the career is on thin ice IMHO. I have heard supervisors say they don’t do this job for the money and I never believed them or I thought they were stupid…..their passion is what has kept the agency alive – that’s what the people need. I’m grateful for it now.
The scary thought is one which the ice breaks, passion runs out, and people leave leave. Leaving people, land, and everything else under the sun at greater risk of disaster. The FS needs to pay it’s employees a competitive wage if they want to save anything worth saving. A classic example of how socialism works. Ever seen a public bathroom on HWY 99?
Let’s focus on the task at hand. What is the Federal Government, Management, and the WO doing besides providing lip service….lipstick isn’t a great look on Pigs so at some point perhaps paint an accurate picture. In this article Bob Baird is quoted “With hiring challenges and attrition, it could be a lower percentage than that, but we won’t know until we finish our hiring process.” The hiring process has been over for months so what hiring process ? The one we were denies in R5 because HRM was unable to staff appropriately to manage the work load of a seasonal hiring event. At some point it would be great if management within the agency started being up front and honest about the situation. We don’t have people to hire at the seasonal or permanent ranks. You can go from a seasonal to a GS8 in the time it takes you to get time in grade. Quality candidates is not a thing it’s who applies and how R5 can fill positions with numbers of heart beats to make them look good. Never mind years of experience, depth, keeping people safe, your just a number, and how they can use you to put butts in seats. Saddle up the USFS is about to tank in Region 5 and we can thank the regional office staff and their absolute disconnect from what is happening on the ground, lack of support and overall ability to know what it’s is to represent a land management agency. This is what happens when you hire high ranking officials into fire positions over seeing a agency who get a pay check…..it’s like a politician, they don’t give a F@@@@ about the people just the dollars in their pocket and how quick they can get to the top of the ladder before retirement.
Dude you nailed it.
I don’t agree with any of that, Bravo, the USFS employees that I see with their boots on the ground in R5 are dedicated to saving what’s left, they bleed green and sweat and work every day to salvage and save recreation spaces, watersheds, and wilderness not just from fire but from pollution and from misbehaving recreating public, and that commitment to America’s public lands is something I see in the USFS employees in Arcadia who harbor the same commitment and the same HEART to doing what’s best for the forest and for the owners of the public lands they administer. I see zero “I just want mind, nothing else matters” behavior in any USFS I’ve talked with over the past 3 decades or so, they get the job because they are hikers, bikers, climbers, campers, raised when young to have an affinity for the wilder outdoors, they’re like the rest of us, I don’t agree with your summation at all.
During the 2006 fire season as Division Chief on the Angeles National Forest Los Angeles River Ranger District. We had 4 unstaffed Engines out of 12, 2 Battalion Chief vacancies. a total of 53 vacancies on the district. This hampered initial attack by not being able to staff Type 3 Incidents adequately this combined with 4 unstaffed engines made incident management decisions tougher.
The district had two Hotshot crews Little Tujunga and Bear Divide with a vacant Superintendent on the Little Tujunga Hotshots we had to Rob Peter to pay Paul to to get a detailer to do the Little Tujunga Hotshot crew. Which took an experienced Captain from Bear Divide Hotshots to detail as the Superintendent of The Little Tujunga Hotshots.
There are many effects on the fire organization when you experience recruitment and retention issues such as over working employees to fill in the gaps of staffing.
Senator Feinstein stepped in and allocated funds for a 10% recruitment and retention pay for Region 5 of the Forest Service in fire. This recruitment and retention pay lasted until the positions were fully staffed.
The point that I am making is this has been an age old problem in Forest Service Fire Management program that needs a permanent solution to retain and keep the best Firefighters during these times of extreme fires across the nation.
Will Spyrison Retired Division Chief Angeles National Forest
The US labor shortage is not specific to the fire agencies. 2 federal administrations and many states who feel paying people to stay home and do nothing as a means of protecting them from the pandemic has done nothing but make all these problems worse. I cannot remember a time since I started working in the early 90s where there are so many ‘Help Wanted’ signs EVERYWHERE. If a fire job isnt paying the bills for you right now you have no one to blame but yourself. There are tons of good paying jobs with benefits available in pretty much any line of work especially if it involves some manual labor. From burger flipping to nursing to HVAC, equipment operators, ….. Heck prevailing wage rate for a laborer on a road crew is $58.00/ hr plus bennies in this area. Many folks may not want to hear the truth but the truth is even tho you may love your fire job it could be time for a career change. Relying on government for anything is a bad decision in all matters
Rocco what’s your point. This is a wildfire blog, not an HVAC blog. The people that are here working for the feds have been passing up higher paying jobs their whole careers in large part because they are passionate about the outdoors, and the community they work in, they believe in what their doing. That’s all fine and dandy if we all run out and get high paying union jobs, if that’s your point, your right, it’s much easier work for much more money. The folks that are advocating for change here see the multitude of problems, which are fire seasons are longer, and the resources that are fighting those fires can no longer depend on their passion for the job as a substitute for paying their bills. That’s fine if you don’t like the government, but who else is going to handle the problem?
Until there is legislative action in DC anything else will be band aids.
Washington is the place to address pay. The Western States don’t have the votes to put forth legislation that will pass Congress no matter how great the need for personnel.
*Despite the increased threat, the Forest Service does not expect to meet its goal of hiring 5,200 federal firefighters in California this year.”It will be below that number,”*
Also like to point out with that Klamath National Forest Management blacklisted me for doing their job and am now working out of state.
All because they care more about their public image over my child’s respiratory issues and the publics safety.
Applied for location with USFS but nothing, even though I have experience. So can’t blame lack of applicants.
For the most part I agree with Shane. Each region of our country is uniquely different, CA vs. VA no comparison, when i moved from CA to VA my money went a hec of a lot farther, I could actually live on my salary.
Not every Mc Donalds pays 15 buck an hour, and I wish folks would stop using that one….Really…..
Maybe stop and consider that the millennials do not want to fight fire for a living, my generation grew up in the out of doors, now days it’s odd to see kids out playing.
It’s the USFS, yes we fight fire but there is so much more than just fire, when I was a kid on a type-3 engine on the CNF and eventually a Captain we did project work and a lot of it.
I certainly do not have all the answers and I doubt anyone does either, yes change is needed and maybe change is on the way, however I can never support folks starting out with a total and complete benefit package, maybe I am just to darn old, I feel that we appreciate things when we have to work for it.
Money alone will not cure retention….just saying…..
Peace…..
“the millennials do not want to fight fire for a living”
Bruh, millennials aren’t kids anymore. The youngest of us (born in 1996) are 25 and leading engine crews. I’m 37 with a decade of service, command staff experience, and a PIO2 taskbook. The next generation is here already.
Yes you sound completely too old. Rookie structure firefighters get a complete benefit/retirement package when they are hired. Why should that be any different from a wildland employee? Jesus, people with your mentality truly are the problem. And yes we should definitely shout from the rooftops that we make less than McDonald’s workers.
“Maybe stop and consider that the millennials do not want to fight fire for a living, my generation grew up in the out of doors, now days it’s odd to see kids out playing.”
I just had to collect all of our CNF District’s Type 2 crew’s driver licenses to get them set up with a .gov license. I was reminded that CA driver’s licenses are different for under 21. All but about 5 were under 21 years of age.
You’re comment made me laugh. We still do project work, and a lot of it. You ever consider it’s always been the “kids” who have worked the hardest? From the days of the CCC’s, early hotshot crews, to kids struggling to make a name for themselves on a Type 2 crew on the Cleveland. Most of these kids use their experience gained in the Forest Service and make their way into the municipal and State departments.
Do you think hard work was invented and died with your time on the Forest?
the average rent in Bozeman is $1200/month
The inability to keep pace with the growing professionalism and consequently pay, is only going to worsen. Southern Region of R5 is ripe for a contract situation. CalFire could easily assume a contract, supply a more complete Emergency Staffing for the local rural areas than the USFS ever provided before. The USFS needs to re-evaluated and completely overhauled to change an entrenched, antiquated hiring/pay/training system as well as an altered schedule that addresses the gaps created by their absence. Or better yet, contract out to CalFire.
The issue of retention and pay is definitely not an R-5 issue, it’s nationwide. People can work at McDonald’s and make money money right now.
Maybe try looking beyond region 5 for a moment. This site is turning into wildfire.com, where R5 came to complain about everything. The IMT’s are not struggling to fill operations positions. It’s the positions filled by typically non-fire people that are being UTF’d. That is because of stagnant budgets and fire sucking up more and more of the budget. Outside of California and maybe Colorado, the state agencies can’t compete with the feds and municipal wildland departments are rare. Let’s not forget the reason California FS has turned into a federal fire department is to protect things not on the forest. The state and local agencies should be footing the bill for that.
In expensive towns outside of California are they having retention issues? No. Bend, OR, Bozeman, MT, and Boise have no issues getting candidates. In Region 1, the regional forester mandated 2 years ago that all District fire modules would go to 4 permanent employees instead of just the captain and assistant. Of course there was no increased funding for this, but progress is being made. Recruitment issues, outside of California, are caused by our inefficient HR system. Candidates have to apply in September, selections are made in January/February, and folks are onboarded in May. That is a ridiculous timeline.
I dont work in R5 and we have retention and hiring issues among our seasonal employees. The pay is not worth the work unless people can count on 500 plus hours of overtime. The system is broken. Also talking to friends in those towns you mentioned there are issues. People are leaving because they will never be able to find a home. I’d say that’s a separate issue but paying people a living wage would help. 15 years in, multiple single resource, ic4, college degree and I make $21.00. I don’t think people in D.C grasp this career. If I leave I take those quals, experience, training dollars to a state/local org and the FS looses it. More and more gs 5-8s are walking away.
Like Smokey, I don’t work in R5, and I know we’re hurting for both permanent and seasonal positions. We have 10 person IA mods staffed with 5-6 total at best, engines lacking overhead at all levels, etc. Just look at the FS Employment outreach database – there are 50 outreaches for positions GS8 and below, and those aren’t just for single locations in some cases. And they aren’t all R5 positions. A lot of outreaches have expired and places seem to have just accepted that they aren’t going to have those spots filled for the year.
As a result of the most comprehensive mutual aide agreements in the country (world?) the State of California and local municipalities do in fact “foot the bill” for the costs of Federal agency fire resources used on State and local jurisdiction incidents. What goes around comes around… in return, the State and municipalities are paid by the Federal gov’t for their services when deployed on federal jurisdiction incidents. Every operational shift there are hardworking individuals from Operations, Finance and Resources tracking which fire line resources are working on which piece of line and who’s ground that piece of line is on. Believe me when I suggest that no agency is giving anything away.
Perhaps the reason the USFS in California is/has become “a federal fire department” is because the wildland fire problem on federal lands in California is among the most severe in the world. In southern California in particular, any fire on a NF, even in the deepest depths of the NF, has the real potential to ultimately threaten populated adjacent State and local jurisdictions/populations. The feds sure as heck better be cognizant of that threat and fight fire in such a way as to “protect things not on the forest”. I hope you’re not implying that the USFS in other less populace states aren’t fighting fire aggressively because their fires don’t threaten populated state and/or local jurisdictions – those “… things not on the forest.”
Hate to break it to you Shane, we do struggle to get candidates and we do have retention issues in at least one of the locations you listed outside of California. You do have a point with the hiring and on boarding timeline though.
Shane
This is a classic comment from someone GS-11 or higher, that has less then five years until retirement. That’s great your not feeling the pinch at your level. Talk to your module leaders and look at the crews. Ask the Supts in NV, OR, or WA how many 10+ year firefighters they’ve lost to county departments in the last few years. The smoke jumpers pool of applicants which was 400 applicants a season a few years ago is down to 150. We’re losing a whole generation of firefighters. As a supervisor with 20+ years of experience maybe 5% of younger entry level Fire employees are going to stick with the Feds. That’s great your closing on retirement, for most of your career federal wages were decent compared to the general economy, but that’s not the reality today.
Range tech you nailed it.
Plus the comment of not having issues filling ops positions is short sighted.
Who is covering behind these people at the home unit when they are committed all summer. I can guarantee it’s a struggle everywhere with this.
This is a national issue, but maybe the entire workforce is wrong if Shane says so.
There are 10,000 contract firefighters. 300 crews, 500 engines plus.
They are not recognized by the federal agencies that hire them. The meet the same nwcg standards as fed. We struggle to match fed wages with no garrentee
Yep you are correct.
Shane is hands down the best supervisor I have ever had in the agency. I can assure you, he is not checked out like other GS fantastics, is transparent about all the BS in the agency, and has all of his employee’s best interests in mind.
If **you’re** going to trash talk, work on **your** grammar.
Man you got me. Thanks for the grammar lesson.
I’ve had great supervisors. Doesn’t mean everything they say is right.
The argument that it’s not a nationwide problem is ridiculous. It’s factually inaccurate.
I’m proud of the folks speaking up. If you are good with what’s happening just keep YOUR course. This is how things never move forward. A divided workforce with one side pushing for change looking to the future and the other believing we are still in 1970.
Even if I did feel like nothing was wrong and things are going good, I would not whine about others trying to push for classification and better pay….How dare folks speak up and want change. I mean that sounds terrible.
Bet if it actually happened your not turning it down.
**You’re.
I mean if you read Shane’s post, he clearly states that centralized HR and the inefficient hiring timeline are major factors hindering recruitment. Last I checked, Albuquerque is a national problem.
But thanks! I already left my perm with the agency and am working a job where I still get to run a powerhead, but pay and benefits are commensurate of the risk. I still work outside and get to enjoy sunsets. I’m home every night, too! Enjoy all that red tape and working for a faltering “boots on the ground” agency run and managed by politicians who don’t care about you.
Cant speak for Bend or Boise, but the Gallatin NF (Bozeman) actually does have a pretty significant retention and hiring problem.
Plus one vote for this being a problem firmly rooted in a a disaster of am HR department.
The USFS has yet to figure out they are in a competitive market place for firefighters. If they paid comparable rates, they would very likely have the staffing they need.
As for the “fire line duties” vs “forestry technician duties” when not on a fire: both are needed in the USFS, perhaps less so in other agencies. So, why not have the standard Forestry Tech. salary, and a “comparable fire fighting wage” when shipped to a fire; something in the neighborhood of $25-$30/hr like their counterparts in the County and or State job? That higher wage is based on RISKs they are taking on the line and it has to be comparable to others fighting the same fires and taking similar risks.