News & Features
From the Idyllwild Town Crier weekly newspaper, 04.17.08 edition.

Feinstein rejects FS retention report

By J.P. Crumrine, Assistant Editor

In a move unusual for inside Washington politics, Sen. Dianne Feinstein has called the administration’s bluff. Last week, she wrote to Mark Rey, undersecretary of agriculture for natural resources, and Abigail Kimbell, chief of the U.S. Forest Service (FS).

 In her letter, she politely dismissed the report on recruitment and retention, which the agency provided at the April 1 Senate Appropriations Committee hearing on the 2009 FS budget. She also asked several questions contradicting the report’s conclusions.

“Sen. Feinstein is concerned that the Forest Service report denies there is a service problem with firefighter attrition and morale ... She wants answers on why the report differs so much from the draft report,” said Phil LaVelle, her press secretary. “She is committed to ensuring that California has enough firefighters — before fire season begins.”

Normally, if a senator or representative disputes the executive branch reports or actions, they will add money for their favored project or deny money for disputed actions. Generally, the public discord does not surface outside the hearing room but this time it did.

“The Forest Service stands behind the report it has prepared and is looking into the points raised by the senator in her most recent letter,” said Allison Stewart, FS national press officer. “Our analysis does not represent the final word on recruiting and retention.”

The debate is whether the FS has difficulty filling and keeping firefighting personnel in Southern California. In her April 9 letter, Feinstein challenged Rey and Kimbell on three critical points in their report.

She cited the number of vacant firefighter positions and the effects that has on availability of engines and other firefighting resources. She noted the absence of an acknowledgement that FS pay may lag other state and local wages with similar emergency response responsibilities. Thirdly, she accused the FS of reversing, not simply revising, a draft analysis prepared in this region months before the report was submitted late to Congress.

“I am concerned that the final report’s conclusions contradict a draft analysis currently circulating in the wildland firefighting community which confirms pay and retention disparities in Southern California and includes a number of proposed recommendations to improve retention that have been omitted from the final report,” Feinstein wrote.

Feinstein made two requests, one of which is fairly common. She asked for a timeline to fill the vacant firefighter positions in this region. What is unusual is she repeats Rey’s commitment at the hearing to fill vacant positions. She wants proof that actions will follow the promise.

“However, over the past two seasons with diminished staffing levels, primarily experienced in California, fewer crews from California are taking assignments away from their home forests knowing full well that if they did and a wildfire occurred on their home forest, the ‘domino effect’ of a lack of staffing/resources would impact the initial attack capability on their home forest,” said Casey Judd, business manager for the Federal Wildland Fire Service Association.

Secondly, Feinstein returned the draft analysis and asked confirmation on whether FS personnel had prepared it and why the recommendations were ignored in the report submitted to Congress.

In concluding her missive to the other end of Independence Avenue, Feinstein recognizes that the retention issue involves morale in the FS ranks as much as money. Yet as chair of the Appropriations subcommittee overseeing the FS budget, she offers to provide additional assistance to help the FS resolve the issue.

“In order to recruit and retain quality employees, the Forest Service will continue to study strategies that will ensure a highly capable workforce and we look forward to working with the senator on that,” Stewart added.

After Feinstein’s letter was made public, an anonymous FS comment appeared on www.wildlandfire.com/theysaid.htm, “It is great to see Congress coming down hard and providing oversight to a program that has been struggling since 2001.”

Meanwhile, the Region 5 (California) office is establishing several teams to address issues such as FS fire and aviation mission, pay, working conditions and facilities.

“The regional forester has directed forest supervisors to look into those things within his authority and make recommendations,” confirmed Ed Hollenshead, regional fire chief. “The chief made decisions relative to the national relationship of our issue. Randy [Moore, region 5 chief] still wants to take a look at the local level.”

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