From Wildfire Today:
WASHINGTON, March 11, 2025 – The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) released the following statement today regarding the status of probationary employees:
“On Wednesday, March 5, the Merit Systems Protection Board (MSPB) issued a 45-day stay on the termination of U.S. Department of Agriculture probationary employees. By Wednesday, March 12, the Department will place all terminated probationary employees in pay status and provide each with back pay, from the date of termination. The Department will work quickly to develop a phased plan for return-to-duty, and while those plans materialize, all probationary employees will be paid.”
USDA’s mass firing on Feb. 13 included thousands of federal land employees, around 75% of which had secondary wildland fire duties, according to Grassroots Wildland Firefighters Vice President Riva Duncan, who obtained the numbers from the National Federation of Federal Employees’ Wildland Fire division.
“While ‘primary firefighters’ were exempt, the positions that were cut made some pretty huge contributions to operational wildland fire,” Duncan said. “For example, eastern national forests rely much more heavily on these collateral duty folks to do a lot of prescribed burning and initial attack of wildfires…There were people working the LA fires who, because it was the offseason, weren’t primary fire but were filling in on engines and crews.”
The Hotshot Wakeup looked at the specific steps (what’s next):
The big question is, what happens after the 45-day order expires? Here are the potential moves being made as this stay order is implemented.
- OSC Investigation:
- During the stay period (until April 19, 2025), the OSC will gather evidence and determine if the terminations were unlawful.
- If violations are found, OSC may seek permanent corrective action.
- Further MSPB Actions:
- OSC could request an extension of the stay if the investigation is incomplete.
- If OSC determines that the agency violated laws, it may file a formal complaint with MSPB to reverse the terminations.
- Legal Proceedings:
- If MSPB finds wrongdoing, it could order reinstatements, back pay, or other remedies for affected employees.
- The employing agency may challenge the findings, leading to potential litigation.
- Policy or Legislative Response:
- If OSC confirms misuse of probationary terminations to bypass RIF regulations, broader policy reviews or Congressional oversight could follow.
If I had to guess, I think that USDA will back off and go on to VERA and RIF, which are more commonly used and easier to justify.
Importance of Collateral Duty Firefighters to Prescribed Fire and Wildfire Response and the Future National Wildfire Fighting Service
I asked around about the “75% red carded” figure and how it was obtained (from NFFE Wildfire folks, that much we know), but haven’t received an answer back. I did ask a new retiree who was involved in preparing the testimony for NAFSR (post on that later) and he said:
Quals from their red cards – most people don’t know what a red card is so we kept it to qualifications. Trained in wild land firefighting means they had FFT1 or FFT2 quals – on the ground collateral duty wildland firefighters. We don’t use the term militia anymore since that has multiple meanings for the general public. The point being – while probationary personnel in primary wildland firefighting position descriptions were not fired, many of those who were fired had on-the-fireline red card quals as collateral duty firefighters, which will impact the ability of the agency to respond to wildfires.
I thought that this was interesting as 1) the terminology has apparently changed from “militia” to “collateral duty firefighters” and 2) that the approach to the use and importance of “collateral duty firefighters” (CDFs) (not to be confused with the old California Department of Forestry, now known as CalFire) may vary from Region to Region, because 3) a bill has been introduced to take fire people out of the FS. Of course, they could still interact with CDFs still in the FS, but hopefully the process of integration would be relatively pain and bureaucracy- free. From a Fire Aviation story in February.
Republican Senator Tim Sheehy of Montana and Democratic Senator Alex Padilla of California recently introduced a Senate bill that would create the “National Wildland Fire Service.” The bill directs the Secretary of Agriculture and the Secretary of the Interior to reorganize federal wildland fire response nationwide, create a Director of the National Wildland Firefighting Service position, and develop a description for the new agency.
“The Secretary of Agriculture and the Secretary of the Interior (referred to in this Act as the ‘Secretaries’) shall jointly develop a plan to consolidate the authorities of the Secretaries relating to Federal wildland fire preparedness, suppression, and recovery efforts under an agency of the Department of the Interior, to be known as the ‘National Wildland Firefighting Service’,” the bill’s text reads.
Great news!!!
For a group with efficiency in the title, none of this is being done efficiently. They are mistaking speed for efficiency. Building leases are being terminated and buildings have been put on the list of those that will be sold, probationary staff are being let go without any consideration of what the staff do or how many years of service they actually have. After that, they’ll do the RIF. Seems like the first step should be to figure out what programs will be cut and how many staff are needed for each remaining program (before any probationary staff are fired), do the RIF/VERA, then figure out where the remaining staff are located and how much building space is available in those locations, consolidate staff into building space, then remove surplus buildings from the system.
Time in service is a factor in the RIF process, so many of the probationary staff would be first on the list to be let go and those that are needed for critical work would be kept. Firing staff for poor performance who had never had a performance evaluation or who had good performance evaluations was destined to fail and a giant waste of time.
I am not arguing for these random layoffs, but I think you have an optimistic view of how RIFs actually work.
I’m glad they are taking a step back to consider things more carefully, but (as an admitted outsider) I’m a bit skeptical of some of the collateral fire claims.
75% red carded? Are these people with certs and a current arduous pack test, or did they sit/click through S-130 as part of annual training?
How many of these collateral duty folks are actually mobilizing to fires? At least in Region 6 I cannot recall the last time I saw a Type 2 USFS crew on the daily reports. This doesn’t mean those folks aren’t supporting in other roles like overhead, mop-up or filling out engine crews, but at least in R6 it now seems contract crews have displaced the role formerly filled by the so-called militia.
This data should be available and would help inform agency decision-making. It seems they could save costs by relying less on contractors, and RIF decisions could be shaped by looking at employees with collateral fire duties that don’t actually meet red card standards.
I see your skepticism out there but on the flip side, I work in R8 and have collateral fire duties, meaning I take the arduous pack test and maintain FFT1 qual. I and about 75% of district employees actually respond to IA fires, Rx burns, and staff engines or handcrews out west in the summer. Of the 5 probationary employees we lost, 4 had active FFT2 quals and 1 had a purchase card and was always there to bring us meals during long nights on the line.
Most eastern forests maintain an active militia that work district fires and mobilize nationally each summer. In my part of the world at least, the 75% claim is accurate.
It wouldn’t surprise me if, for a variety of reasons, this varies by Region. Would be interesting to have more detailed numbers from across the country. I suppose they must be collected somewhere.