Wildland Firefighters such as Hotshots, Smokejumpers, Rappellers, Helitack Crews, Fire Engine Crews and others are actually titled as “Forestry Technicians” and the 2-page job classification document does not mention the word “fire” once. Curiously, the Bureau of Labor Statistics states that wildland firefighters are a “specialized type of firefighter.”

This is nothing new: Look back at 1991 here!

The Forestry Technician job title and series was implemented into written policy during the early 1970’s as a utility position that would allow the United States Forest Service to accomplish its dynamic and diverse land management mission with a single and primarily seasonal workforce. This utility player purpose was echoed in the early versions of the forestry technician position description (PD) 1. A Forestry Technician was expected to contribute to a multitude of project areas, including periodic and need based implementation as fire suppression “militia”. These positions were originally intended to establish a workforce that could aid forest service leadership in accomplishing holistic ecosystem management without being limited by title specificity.

Forestry Technicians were included in OPM’s 1991 job series update and continued under the classification that we are currently familiar with, GS-0462.1 At this time the position description of these employees remained unchanged, as did their intended purpose. During the 90’s, only 16% of the USFS budget went to fire suppression (2). If this is an indicator of what the agency was up to, it made perfect sense at that time to leave the Forestry Technician position description as it was.  

The next two decades brought massive growth in wildfire management activity and cost as the repercussions of a full suppression ethic, unbridled WUI expansion, and apparent climate change manifested (3). Recent projections forecast suppression activities to take up 67% of the USFS budget in 2021 (2). The increasing occurrence of high consequence wildfires exposed an equally growing need for personnel with the primary directive of fire suppression within the Forest Service. This fell on the bulk of the USFS workforce, the Forestry Technicians. Currently, there are 196 sub-categories within the GS-0462 series who qualify for firefighter retirement and are described as Interagency Fire Program Management positions primarily tasked with some sort of fire suppression or adjacent duties (4). 

The Forestry Technician job series was implemented to avoid over specialization of the workforce and maintain mission alignment as a land management agency. However, in an era of multi-billion-dollar fire seasons land management agencies have strayed far from that ideal. This comes at the detriment to both fire personnel who feel under-compensated and the essential non-fire federal land management project areas that still need access to an adequate workforce not constantly preoccupied with fire suppression, hazardous fuels reduction, and off-season fire specific training.

The federal government land management agencies currently sponsor the largest fire organization in the world.  As such, the structure, training, qualifications, positions, and duties performed by the forestry technicians that staff this organization closely mirror that of a clearly defined fire suppression organization. However, our history reminds us that federal firefighters are intended to be more than just suppression specialists. They have made a clear choice to be a part of an organization with a mission that goes beyond simply suppressing fire. 

Ideally during periods of low fire risk, federal firefighters will still serve an important role in the accomplishment of their agency’s mission by performing non-suppression land management tasks. This crossover is often cited by suppression personnel as a highly rewarding element of their job. Unfortunately, as fire seasons become more demanding on all fronts, the ability for program integration is made more and more difficult. The inability of federal firefighters to contribute elsewhere is exacerbated even more by current retention issues and vacancy rates.  The four pillars being offered by GRWFF serve to reconcile the dynamic tension of the Forestry Technicians and the land management agencies that employ them. By accurately classifying federal fire personnel and compensating them adequately, we achieve the goal of increasing employee retention and reducing vacancy rates. Implementation of these pillars would allow federal firefighters to continue to contribute to a role that goes beyond just fire suppression, a role many take great pride in. A role best accomplished by both accurately identified federal firefighters, and an expanded land management workforce staffed by employees who are not continually obligated to fire management specific objectives. 

1. U.S. Office of Personnel Management. December 1991. Position Classification Flysheet for Forestry Technician, GS-0462. Retrieved May, 2019 from https://www.opm.gov/policy-data-oversight/classification-qualifications/classifying-general-schedule-positions/standards/0400/gs0462.pdf

2. United States Department of Agriculture, USFS. 2017. Cost of Fire Operations. Retrieved May, 2019 from https://www.usda.gov/about-usda/news/press-releases/2017/09/14/forest-service-wildland-fire-suppression-costs-exceed-2-billion

3. Withen, P., Campbell, R., and Levenstein, C. 2015. Climate Change and Wildland Firefighter Health and Safety. NEW SOLUTIONS: A Journal of Environmental and Occupational Health Policy, 4:577-584.

4. United States Department of Agriculture, USFS, Human Resource Management. Position Description Search.

We hear you: Why our dispatchers matter.

Wildland Fire Dispatchers are highly trained, experienced fire personnel who serve a vital function in wildland fire operations.

Learn why the exclusion of Dispatchers, Equipment Operators, and others from a new Wildland Firefighter Job series could lead to negative impacts on wildland fire operations and safety.

Special Grassroots Newsletter: Solidarity within the Wildland Fire Community

Dispatch Survey Results- Verble et al- 2022-2023 Surveys of Wildland Fire Dispatcher Environmental Health: Preliminary Results

Dispatch Overview- Comments/Suggestions on why the wildland fire dispatcher should be included in the wildland firefighter series, written collectively by a Center Manager, Assistant Center Manager, and Initial Attack Dispatcher.

Unintended Outcomes of the 0456 Series- GRWFF highlights Critical Issues/Unintended Outcomes Regarding New Wildland Firefighter Classification- What could happen if our dispatchers or other positions are not included?

More surveys and results- Includes the Figgins Dispatcher Report, 2022 Wildland Firefighter Environmental Health Report, and more!

Hazard pay is a 25% addition to a firefighter’s base pay — applied only to assignments classified as “hazardous.” This 50-year-old compensation system does not account for today’s professional workforce, for the demands of a year-round, increasingly severe fire season on a warming planet, or for the unanticipated hazards of a global pandemic.

Why Hazard Pay No Longer Works: Hazard Pay is Outdated

When the system of hazard pay was created in the 1970’s, wildfires were smaller and less frequent, and firefighting was not the professionalized industry it has become now, in the era of mega and even gigafires. Firefighters today are routinely exposed to hazards in prescribed burning, in project work such as roadside hazard tree removal, and in assisting with a broad range of non-fire emergency responses. In 2020, wildland firefighters were exposed to a hazard simply by traveling across county and state lines to respond to fires, or when staying in hotels while on assignment: the hazard of a deadly virus.

Firefighters are also frequently injured on the job, and unable to work on the fireline and losing 25% of their pay while recovering. Women who get pregnant or are raising young families, don’t want to be away from their homes for dozens (if not 100+) nights a summer, also lose 25% of their pay, making family life unsustainable with the current system. This increased burden on women and injured firefighters is another outcome from a system that relies on hazard pay.

Pay must reflect the reality: that we are routinely exposed to hazards on and off the fireline. A 21st century system of pay will account for this continual risk by paying firefighters more.

Other wildland firefighting agencies (Cal Fire, municipal fire departments, Oregon Department of Forestry, Washington Department of Natural Resources) long ago abandoned the practice of providing special pay only on the fireline; firefighters for these agencies are paid as firefighters at all times. Federal wildland firefighters are now seeking pay parity with these agencies.

The Definition of “Hazard” is Incomplete

So what, exactly, counts as “hazardous” under the system of hazard pay? 

Tree climbing qualifies as a “hazard” only if firefighters climb to a height of 50’ or more with no scaffolding. Free climbing 49 feet? Not hazardous.

Mutual assistance responses, in which wildland firefighters help with rescue operations, traffic control and emergency medical care for traffic collisions -- not hazardous.

Ever jumped out of a plane? No? That’s probably because you considered it too dangerous. The federal government, however, does not allow hazard pay for parachute jumps. 

Staying in a crowded hotel in a Covid-19 “hot zone” at the height of the pandemic is not an official “hazard.” Nor is entering a fire camp packed with other firefighters from all over the country or having to stop at dozens of gas stations and stores while traveling to a fire, all during the outbreak of a deadly virus.

Running a chainsaw to fell large, burned, or standing dead trees (incidentally called “hazard trees”)  is not a hazard unless a fire is nearby.

Driving on dangerous, winding, unmaintained roads with sheer drop-offs in remote parts of our forests and parks is not a “hazard” while on patrol or in travel status -- only on a fire.

In an ultimate stroke of irony, hazard pay does not apply to prescribed burns, which can be as volatile as wildfire. Though smoke from planned burns contributes significantly to firefighters’ increased risks of cancer and cardiovascular disease, and while homes have been lost and members of the public killed from prescribed burning gone awry, this isn’t classified as “hazardous” work.

Helicopters have crashed* (killing firefighters) and firefighters have died when crushed by falling trees during prescribed burn operations -- yet this work is not a “hazard.” 

Wildland firefighters face daily exposure to hazards on and off wildfires; the nature of the job is hazardous. Yet the current pay structure does not account for this pervasive risk.

*Those in the helicopter were in fact receiving hazard pay for low-level flight.

Hazard Pay Incentivizes Risky Behavior and Reactive Land Management

Opportunities for earning hazard pay vary substantially between fire seasons, creating an unpredictable income that makes it extremely difficult for firefighters and their families to plan financially. Entry-level firefighters, whose base pay begins at just $13.45 an hour, will take on as many fire (“hazard”) assignments as they possibly can, just to make ends meet.

Firefighters who work more than 1,000 hours of overtime end up in a state of cumulative fatigue that can lead to mistakes and accidents on the fireline. Trapped in a vicious cycle of overwork, it can be a short leap between a hazardous situation and a fatality fire. 

Meanwhile, as fire seasons grow in duration and intensity, firefighters’ personal relationships suffer, and they end up burned out mentally, physically, and emotionally. A staggering 55% of wildland firefighters report thoughts of taking their own lives, and firefighters’ rate of death by suicide is 30 times that of the general public.

Additionally, valuable project work -- such as thinning the understory or conducting prescribed burns to create a healthier, more fire-resilient forest -- goes untouched in favor of assignments offering hazard pay. When proactive forest management goes undone, the land is more vulnerable to devastating fire. And when these high-intensity fires begin, firefighters necessarily spring into the reactive stance of fire suppression. Thus the cycle continues.

View Agency Chart: Hazard Pay vs. Professional Pay

The federal government is one of the last professional firefighting services still using this arcane system. Hazardous duty is the nature of the work of wildland firefighters, who respond nationally and internationally to every type of emergency incident, risking their lives and health to save other lives and protect property and our natural resources.

Federal wildland firefighters deserve a living wage on par with that of their state and municipal counterparts. It’s time to make a change.