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Inmate firefighters from the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation walk in at the Station Fire Incident Command Post in the Lake View Terrace area of Los Angeles (AP Photo/Jae C. Hong)
Interesting fact, via the Disaster Accountability Blog, about how state budget woes and a court order to lower prison population could affect firefighting:
According to a California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation press release, “there are 2,245 adult inmates and 53 Division of Juvenile Justice youth deployed to fires statewide, including Los Angeles, Riverside, and 15 other counties,” under the supervision of “187 correctional officers and supervisors.” According to Reuters, “Inmates collectively did 3.1 million hours of emergency firefighting last year at $1 an hour.” California relies heavily on this labor and many worry that a release of 27,000 or more low-risk inmates will forfeit their availability.
The two firefighters who died in the Station Fire last Sunday were assigned to Camp 16, one of the many prison camps where inmates are trained in wilderness protection. It appears they died searching for an escape route for workers, 55 inmates and other fire personnel.
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"Fewer" firefighters, not "less." Honestly now.
This is laughable. Our prisons are overcrowded, this is why there's a court order to lower the population to begin with. Do you honestly think that we'll have fewer prison firefighters volunteer with a reduction?
I'd be more worried about those released early going back to criminal enterprise; especially in this economy.
That is a load of, well, crap. How many inmates do we have in the (low-risk) system? And losing 27,000 of them exposes us to danger? How many inmates do we use to stop fires?
Woefully bereft of facts. It appears that the 187 prison jobs restructured overseeing the fire-fighting inmates might be the guiding issue behind the article. By their own admission less than 2,500 inmates have been used to fight fires. They make it sound like we won't have low-risk prisoners whatsoever anymore.
This state's prison system is overloaded with prison pork, the more inmates controlled by the industry the better, in their minds.
Where there's profit there's a way to make it sound serious.
I never knew convicts made such good workers.
Am I evil for finding that last sentence, "It appears they died searching for an escape route for workers, 55 inmates and other fire personnel" funny?
Ks328 and I are on the same page. Zach needs to revisit grammar class.
Gosh, isn't it terrible that the government's supply of slave labor for dangerous jobs might be threatened.
As much as people seem to be against this idea, I knew a guy that had been a prisoner who volunteered for these services. It was a win win situation. It's not "slave labor". It works out the same for when inmates get work training, and get paid like a nominal 50 cents an hour or something... this program however gives inmates $1/hour. They come out with the possible interest of going into firefighting, or working as a ranger or something... as well as come out with some $ in the pockets so they're less tempted to go and do something. With the 2000 or so inmates they used last year, it worked out to be about $3 million dollars of labor costs... multiply that by 15 or something to pay someone actual pay rates... we're saving the state tons of money. I wish there were numerous programs along these lines, training towards solar panel installation and other similar projects.