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OGDEN — As federal firefighting crews with the U.S. Forest Service and Bureau of Land Management try to staff up for the upcoming fire season, they're now having to wait and see if they'll be able to hire seasonal help.
Luke Mayfield, a former federal lands firefighter, and president of the Grassroots Wildland Firefighters says his organization is hearing from concerned firefighters.
"It's impacting hiring managers and their ability to bring on the bulk of the workforce that truly provides the federal ability to implement work on the ground," Mayfield said. "There's, a lot of people looking for answers and looking for clarity on a daily basis."
One hiring manager on the federal level in Utah told KSL that their agency was already in the middle of hiring their summer workforce when the federal hiring freeze came down.
If it's not cleared up, they could be left with two people per truck instead of four or five, and some trucks wouldn't be staffed at all. Mayfield, it will likely get resolved, but the damage is already being done.
"The inability to have workforce onboarded and ready to respond is going to have a negative impact on suppression efforts across the west," he said. "Federal employees respond across jurisdiction, right alongside state and local partners."
Mayfield adds that southwestern states that are already on the brink of fire season could soon need the aid of fire crews in Utah and other neighboring states.
"It's having immediate impacts," Mayfield said. "I think people are trying to gather situational awareness, gather clarity, and get to a high spot (to) see what's happening, and see how to best move forward."
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