Laura Paskus, a reporter and producer for PBS of New Mexico, interviewed three wildland firefighters for an episode of Our Land: New Mexico’s Environmental Past, Present, and Future. They covered some of the pressing issues faced by wildland firefighters, including health care, benefits, extensive travel, and pay.
Seen in the video are Marcus Cornwell, federal wildland firefighter; Kelly Martin, president of Grassroots Wildland Firefighters; and Jonathon Golden, former wildland firefighter.
There’s a new documentary about to launch, “Compassion spreads like Wildfire” by gorilla filmmakers, Tucker Debevec and Scott Briggs. A touching and informative piece about the Arizona Wildfire Firefighters, both current and those who lost their lives…
Look under
Scott Briggs on IMDb
And watch for and contribute to their “Seed and Spark” campaign coming next week!
Thank you for the PBS piece! Brilliant, well documented and filmed!
Wild fire smoke still blowing into Reno.
Qe are not sure what fires continue to donate smoke to our region for 90 percent of our summers.
Alkergic or normal humans on a consistent basis will become critically ill year after year unless wind movements change.
Please let us know Bill where and when smoke might arrive.
I have service chickens that get ill with consecutive and toxic smoke and they are key indicators that I can become critically ill next.
My chickens have become the proverbial canary in coal mine.
They have already been into vet surgery to toxicity of smoke here in Reno.
Mother vet is always on stand by for apointments.
My birds come inside nightly and are in birds during long term smoke events.
Linda Lowman
Nice job PBS! Thank you for sharing the stories, and thank you to the participants. One thing to add is the retention issue. As retention is a reoccurring cycle in this agency which continues whether it be a generational influence, inflation, schedule, pay and lifestyle etc. it must be addressed. Over the years there have been numerous attempts to communicate retention concern to those that can reflect direct change. They have the figures. They have the data but no changes have been made. It is as if the want the agency to fail. With past efforts and no resolve, we as the people of YOUR United States Forest Service are committed, loyal, dedicated and whole heartedly genuine in these endeavors. With much effort, current data continues to be bottled, which illustrates various reasoning’s regarding agency departure, specifically within Fire. As we continue to invest in liabilities, exhibiting our return on investments offer little to no dividends. An abundant of exploration has been devoted to this matter and will continue. As minimum wage rise concurrent with inflation we simply can’t afford to be employed with an agency that once was the pioneer of land management but rather a gateway, stepping stone, quit simply last place. Make this agency the conclusive career path. Give us the conduit to those who are the subject matter experts regarding cost comparison analysis in area’s we have predetermined as main focuses of concern:
• Wages/Retirement
• Incentives
• Liability Insurance/Compensation Pay
It is apparent that diversity within recruitment has its challenges and continues to be a subpar standard within the agency, but a direct parallel to retention. Incentives comparable to municipalities, state and contract resources will entice a variety of diverse employees. Over the last two decades were totaling millions of dollars in investments and capitol losses. We lose the significant investment of funds spent on their training and education while in the agency, all funding goes with them to benefit their next employer. It’s time to stop playing defense. The challenges of retaining employees are clear and quantifiable. If the Forest Service doesn’t become competitive with other fire agencies in the areas of salary, benefits, and career development, the current trend will continue until it’s no longer sustainable at all. The POEOPLE need to know the facts.
Sean, I agree with you 100%.
Another issue is the disconnect between leadership and the people on the ground. While many places were burning last year, some forest supervisors chose not to send firefighters to help in other areas due to the corona virus. These firefighters that were made to stay on their local district were unable to make the money that they needed to. When asked to go off forest or at least for more overtime opportunity, one Colorado replied that they should be happy to have a job during this time.
Further, issues are not always passed up the chain for fear that they will be passed up for a promotion.
And there’s of course the issue of poor fire management and the amount of money that can be wasted and bad decisions to be made on fires that aren’t threatening homes or lives
Sean, I agree with you 100%.
I was just going to leave this alone, but after watching the PBS story I have to say something.
First I spent many years on shot crews, crew person, Squad Boss Forman/Captain and Supt dating back to the early mid 80’s thru 2006, every year was tough, hard is not something new, it’s always been hard, in 94 we broke 1000 hr of OT and then nearly every year forward we were over 1000, even in the 80’s we had 7-800 hrs.
Yes you miss many important family events, very important events, there are no do overs, you just miss them.
When dispatch calls you go, no questions, just load up and go.
As far as i am concerned from a suppression perspective all WLF is the same, mega fire or not, it requires the same amount of physical exertion/output.
Is pay and benefits an issue, sure it is, always has been, it has been so for everyone in the workforce for ever, no matter what kind of work you do.
Do you really think pay and benefits is the key to fixing things, it will help but not fix a darn thing.
Federal FF pay issues need to be addressed in stand alone legislation and not in some socialist infrastructure bill that will never see the light of day, or at least I hope it never sees the light of day.
What I believe we really need to do to start moving in the right direction is have a much improved EAP, we are sending folks home that have PTSD’s and do not cope very well adjusting back into civilization, speaking from my own experience, I am now retired and I still have issues, when one of our own finds resolve by ending things we all lose, we really do.
Mental health support needs to be priority one.
It’s a very hard, very difficult job, it’s not for everyone, I finally talked my daughter out of pursuing the feds, I would not wish that on anyone.
I do wish the very best for those who choose this profession, and it is just that……A choice.
Well said
It really comes down to your last two words. You’re right, it is a choice. And so many are making the choice to leave right now that the program is quickly moving toward collapse. Improving pay and benefits may not fix every problem but it will obviously help retention.
Awesome job! The only thing I would like to add is that the FS is not headed towards a train wreck. It has already happened! Image that analogy…the train wreck has happened…the train is on fire and people are hurt and hazardous waste is pouring from the cars…but there’s no firefighters to put out the fire, no EMT to help the people, and no environmentist to clean up the spill. That is what is going to continue to happen if we don’t do something about it and it starts with management. I implore you to get rid of poor management and reinstate people who want to work, who want to fix the problem.