What is happening in Fire???

In a time of great financial crisis in our country we in fire are seeing those affect.  More and More the agencies are building up their own resources, working our cooperative agreements to utilize County, state and local fire departments as well a inmate crews in lieu of supporting the use of private contractors. 

There is a debate to be had about whether this is cost effective or not and whether in fact it will put more and more small businesses out of business.  Most of the private contractors that provide resources for wildfire are located in the rural areas of this country and supply good paying jobs during fire season (some yearround) to the local community. 

Private sector has been encouraged by the agencies over the last decade to provide a professional, cost effective industry that was needed by the agencies.  We wonder if that sense of cooperation is disappearing......

I suspect we will see a battle for our industry, and it will be our job to prove that we are a professional, cost effective resource for the tax payer's money and that there is a need for the industry.

Many reports that have been soliciated by the USFS talk about the optimal mix and how cost effective it can be.

Some of those reports are listed below:
http://ddr.nal.usda.gov/bitstream/10113/28618/1/IND44194544.pdf

http://www.fs.fed.us/fire/ibp/cost_accounting/Final_Cost_study_report_crew%20.pdf

Time will tell where we are headed.


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