From the NY Times today. Excerpt:
Earlier this month, the United States was on the verge of a nightmare scenario. Several Western wildfires were raging at once. In California, San Bernardino County was in a state of emergency; the nearby Bridge Fire had destroyed 54 structures, stretching the state’s resources thin. Smoldering fires were reigniting across Washington and Oregon, and the Davis Fire bore down on ski resorts near Reno, Nev., burning 14 structures. There wasn’t a single elite operations unit available — the kind you call in to manage major wildfires.
Cooler temperatures have brought some relief, but at any moment fire conditions might sweep back in, as they often do in California in September.
Wildfires are always “Perilous.” Yes, we need a sufficient number of firefighters to handle the expected demand, which seems to be leveling off this year. If you read the NYT editorial, it is a pitch for higher pay for those firefighters, a pitch for a doubling of their wages.
Higher pay is certainly justified, if you cannot attract enough firefighters with present compensation. But I object to the scare tactics to push extreme measures. It is far better to make level headed decisions, when the immediate danger has passed.
The “Climate Crisis” mentality needs to give way to sensible decisions. There is no impending climate catastrophe, as those with ulterior motives constantly want us to believe.
Resources are always going to be finite. Use them wisely.
Let’s hear a little more about those “ulterior motives” (including your sources).
“Oh, we’ll just red-card all our other field-going people to fight fires.”
“What?!?”
“Well, damn!…. since they will be laid off, too….. scratch that idea.”
Will the targets and goals of timber, wildlife and recreation (etc) fall by the wayside, again?
Where are all of those millions of working age young male illegal immigrants going? Or all those people living on sidewalks? There is year-round work needing to be done on our forests, but it was the USFS decision to use our money to hire part-time workers and migrants — many illegal and being taken advantage of — to fight our fires, plant our trees, and prepare our food while our forests burn and our sawmills and rural communities go broke.
If the USFS had fashioned full-time contracts with experienced local businesses instead of opportunistic nonprofits and shady labor contractors and made it a point to immediately salvage the dead trees resulting from their predictable “mega-fires,” this discussion wouldn’t be happening.
Beginning with spotted owls and roadless areas in the 1980s and continuing with a failure to salvage their catastrophic wildfire snags — starting with the 1987 Silver Complex and followed by the 2002 and 2003 Biscuit and B&B Complex — the USFS has seemingly done all it can to destroy our forests, kill our wildlife, bankrupt our rural businesses and communities, and pollute our air. And then blame climate change, the railroads, Congress, and the electrical companies for their documented mismanagement. And somehow avoid responsibility. Impressive and concerning.
I’d like to see the numbers you’ve seen on Forest Service hiring illegal immigrants.
Hi Jon: They hire contractors who hire illegals. I’m only familiar with crews that were busted to plant trees, but I’m guessing landscaping, meals, laundry, and maybe even firefighting are also involved. I was called a “racist” by USFS employees at a forestry conference because I showed photos of a short man planting trees the USFS was promoting to show their post-fire stewardship. I reasonably speculated he was from “Mexico or Guatemala” and was sending his money home, rather than spending locally. Apparently Guatemala and Mexico are biological races in today’s world and I was strongly criticized for my choice of words. An exact number is impossible because of phony i.d., dishonest employers, and “under the table” payrolls.
It’s an op-ed by a former firefighter urging Congress to do more. I like he added forest mismanagement to climate change. But the FS is kind of “darned if it does, darned if it doesn’t.”
The Hotshot Wakeup covers this regularly and in greater detail, including things I didn’t think would make a difference like Covid requirements of the past, and recent changes in the IMT structure.
I’m curious about the hiring restrictions.. it sounded like the FS won’t be hiring anyone over GS-10 in wildfire.. are IMT folks higher graded than that? or not in wildfire?