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Discover the premier and original podcast dedicated to wildland firefighting, the vibrant culture surrounding wildland firefighters, firefighter mental health and physical performance, and the wilderness - The Anchor Point Podcast... Join our global community as we delve into the captivating stories of Wildland Firefighters, shed light on career opportunities, promote fire prevention awareness, educate the public, and openly discuss the mental health struggles and triumphs faced by firefighters on and off duty. Immerse yourself in our unscripted and unedited long-form interviews, where we leave no topic unexplored.
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Prepare to embark on an immersive journey into the heart of the action, as each episode of The Anchor Point Podcast takes you on an in-depth exploration of the challenges and rewards experienced by fireline operators. Engage in enlightening interviews and discussions with subject matter experts that provide a comprehensive understanding of wildland firefighting.
Whether you are a passionate wildland firefighting enthusiast or an individual seeking to expand your knowledge, The Anchor Point Podcast is an indispensable and trusted resource. Our episodes cover a broad range of topics, including fire behavior, weather patterns, medical know-how, equipment, gear, and the evolving role of technology in firefighting.
The Anchor Point Podcast is your gateway to a unique and invaluable vantage point on the challenges and rewards of fireline work. Whether you're seeking to expand your understanding of wildland firefighting or simply captivated by the extraordinary tales from the frontlines, our podcast is an essential resource. Subscribe today and unlock a wealth of knowledge and inspiration.
The Anchor Point Podcast Episode 116 with: Assistant Director of BLM Fire and Aviation - Grant Beebe
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[00:00:00] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: What's going on? Ladies and gentlemen, welcome back. Today's episode is gonna be brought to you by Mystery Ranch, built for the mission. And if you don't know anything about the Mystery Ranch fire line packs, well, maybe you should look into it. Yeah, Dana Gleason went down to a South op shop crew tied in with those folks, and from there, basically they developed what you have on your back on the line.
[00:00:19] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: Yeah, that's where the hotshot, uh, pack or the, uh, hot top and all those other packs came from direct, direct relationships with the boots on the ground, and they have a long standing tradition and also a promise to wildland firefighters that will not ever change, and it's pretty badass. Yeah. So what else do they do?
[00:00:40] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: Well, they are also in charge of the Mystery Ranch Backbone Series. Now, if you don't know what that is, well you got until May 31st end of May to submit your stories. And if you're telling the story of Wildland Fire and your story is selected, well you got an opportunity to win a thousand dollars grant from Mystery Ranch in the [00:01:00] backbone series.
[00:01:01] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: It is pretty badass. If you wanna find out more, go to www.mysteryranch.com and check it. Point Podcast is also gonna be brought to you by our Premier coffee sponsor, and that's gonna be none other than Hot Shot Brewery. It's kick ass coffee for Kick Ass cause and a portion of the proceeds will always go back to the Wildland Firefighter Foundation.
[00:01:19] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: What else do they do? Well, they've done it. They've, they've done quite a bit and they continue to do so. They actually make all of the tools of the trade to get your mornings started off right and they have a full line of wildland firefighter themed apparel to help rep that wildland firefighter culture.
[00:01:37] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: Plus on top of that, check this out. You wanna get some anchor point swag, well head over to www.hotshotbrewing.com and there you can find all the kick ass coffee, all the swag, all the apparel, and all of the tools of the trade to get your Mor started off right. Once again, that is www.hotshotbrewing.com.
[00:01:53] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: Go check 'em out. And of course, I gotta give a quick little shout out to my buddy booze over at the ass movement. And that stands [00:02:00] for the Antier Shooting Movement. Homies a firefighter up there in AK and he's doing the good deed of spreading who bearing propaganda across the globe. I dunno about everybody out there that's listening, but I absolutely hate it when I see a surface turd or someone just doesn't clean up their wreckage left behind their human excrement.
[00:02:19] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: And it's disgusting and that shit needs to stop. So not only is he one of my very close homies, uh, and we work together on some other projects, uh, it, it's, yeah, he's got a good mission. And it was all started from humble beginnings, which you can ask him all about anyways, if you have over two. Www dot 10 the Fire Wild and check out the Ass Movement and use the code Anchor Point ass 10 at checkout.
[00:02:45] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: Well, you can save 10% off your entire order through the ass movement. Go check 'em out. Once again, that is www.thefirewild.com/the ass movement. And last but not least, anchor Point Podcast is gonna be brought to you [00:03:00] by, well, actually no, it's not even really brought to you by, I just have a great relationship with Bethany over there at the, uh, smokey Generation, aka a the American Wildfire experience, aka wildfire experience.org.
[00:03:12] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: And it's awesome. Uh, you should definitely go over checking out because it is a history telling and storytelling, uh, project all for the boots on the ground by the boots on the ground. So if you want to do, uh, check out some notes and some interesting stories from your peers in the field or some of those folks that are, uh, still in the game, but, uh, have a story to tell from long, long times ago.
[00:03:35] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: Now, some of these stories go all the way back to the 1940s and there's well over a hundred of them. So if you want a little history lesson, little trip down memory lane, or wanna see what the uh, smokey Generation is all about, well go over to www.wildfireexperience.org and check it out because you can win one of these $500 grants to tell your story of wildland firefighting by submitting your story in your project [00:04:00] to the smokey generation.
[00:04:02] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: Once again, www.wildfireexperience.org. Bethany, you have a kick ass organization over there. Keep it up.
[00:04:17] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: The views and opinions of this podcast do not reflect the views and opinions of the United States government, the Department of the Interior, the Department of Defense, the Department of Agriculture, the United States Forest Service, the Bureau of Land Management, national Park Service, the Bureau of Indian Affairs, or any private municipal county or state firefighting organization, any law enforcement agency, any medical provider, or any contractor employed by any federal agency.
[00:04:56] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: What's going on, ladies and gentlemen, welcome back to another episode of the Anchor Point [00:05:00] Podcast. So this has been a wild week and I have a ton of content and a ton of episodes to, uh, share. I think I have a little over 13, 14 hours of content to share with you all. And, uh, the reason why I have that is because, uh, Micah Booz and I, the boozman the ass movement man himself, we got invited down to the Bureau of Land Management, uh, preseason meeting for all the employees, and we actually had the opportunity to do not only a.
[00:05:27] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: Little seminar on social health, social wellness in a modern era, which was awesome. Hope everybody that, uh, sat in on that got some value out of it. But also we got to, uh, mingle with some folks that, uh, we kind of cut our teeth with in the fire game. So, booze, shout out to you, but also I wanna give a little special shout out to Vanessa Marquez and Brock Uig.
[00:05:50] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: Yeah, and also, of course, my man, we got Paul Peterson. Happy retirement brother. Good to see you, uh, starting in some new endeavors and [00:06:00] yeah, happy retirement, man. It's awesome. Got some cool projects. Anyways, I'll talk about those later. Anyways, so fair disclaimer. Now this is gonna be a lot of, uh, content regarding the, specifically the beer of land management from the state of Nevada.
[00:06:13] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: It is where I've done a majority, a majority of my career. And, uh, I learned a lot of stuff from these folks and, uh, they've always treated me well. So might seem a little bit chilly, but I gotta pay credit and give some, uh, love to the folks that made me who I am today, because without these folks, uh, yeah, I wouldn't be probably sitting here on this microphone.
[00:06:35] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: Anyways, today's episode is going to be all about upcoming things. Now, when I say that, and we're gonna be talking about the, uh, bipartisan infrastructure law, the changes on the horizon, I mean, it does run off and run out in October. So TikTok, I mean, we have other things that are going right now, like the, uh, presidential budget.
[00:06:55] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: Uh, hopefully that passes, but, uh, I have a, well, let's just cut to the [00:07:00] chase. Today's episode, I'm going to have a very real sit down conversation with Grant Bebe. And now, if you don't know who that is, he is the Assistant Fire Aviation Director for the Bureau of Land Management. He is one of those head honcho up there at Nipsey.
[00:07:15] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: And now also, full disclaimer, I do not agree with everything that is going on on Capitol Hill, nor does he. However, he is kind of forced to eat the same turd sandwich as you folks in on the ground, and he does have a unique power and unique, uh, position to where he can communicate with those s ses and upper level Washington execs and help kind of drive that narrative and also help drive those changes.
[00:07:44] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: So Grant, we're all looking up to you in the Bureau of Land Management, and we hope you, uh, move mountains. Uh, we honestly do hope we do. We hope that you have those conversations, those difficult conversations, and listen to the boots on the ground because those are the people that [00:08:00] matter the most. Not saying that everybody else doesn't matter.
[00:08:03] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: Let's talk about the lowest con denominator here, those Gs three through whatevers. So, like I said, I don't agree with everything, and I do, uh, publicly, um, go against us some of the stuff that he says. However, I do agree with some of the stuff he says as well. Um, yeah, you guys get to decipher that and I hope that this is of value and I hope that you guys and girls out there get to understand Grant from his position and his perspective.
[00:08:31] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: So, without further ado, I would like to introduce Grant Bebe. Welcome to the Anchor Point.
[00:08:42] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: All right, ladies and gentlemen, welcome back to another episode of the Anchor Point Podcast. Today on the show I've got a very special guest, grant Bebe. He is the assistant Director for the Fire and Aviation program with the Bureau of Land Management all the way over there. Nipsey, how you
[00:08:55] Grant Beebe: doing today?
[00:08:56] Grant Beebe: I'm doing well, thanks. Thanks for having me on. Yeah. Uh,
[00:08:58] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: first off, I wanna say thank you [00:09:00] so much for being on the show, and, uh, I know I sent you a list of kind of like questions, topics, notes and stuff. Uh, usually I don't do that. Usually everything's pretty, uh, unscripted for the most part and mostly unedited.
[00:09:12] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: But, uh, yeah, we had to submit those just because of, I guess the level of. You're at.
[00:09:18] Grant Beebe: Maybe, I think as always people are scared of what I'm gonna say, but, uh, no, I think, uh, uh, as always, these are touchy subjects and so people just wanna make sure that they understand the questions that you're gonna get asked.
[00:09:29] Grant Beebe: But, uh, um, I'm always, uh, free to talk and willing to talk, and these are important issues, so you can ask me whatever you want, even if it wasn't on the list. Well,
[00:09:37] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: I appreciate the hell out of that. And, uh, yeah, it's, so, there's been a lot of stuff going on on Capitol Hill, a lot of questions from the boots on the ground.
[00:09:47] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: So the intent here for this show today is to kind of like bridge the gap between the boots on the ground, Nipsey and Washington, and kind of just, I mean, you're kind of in the middle of all that to per se, but at the same time, you [00:10:00] have a. I, I guess a, an understanding of what's going on at the upper echelons of government and the boots on the ground, and ultimately, you're gonna be one of those people that has to implement some of these programs.
[00:10:12] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: So I definitely appreciate you being on the show today and trying to explain all this stuff. But other than that, Let's get a little bit of history and background from
[00:10:19] Grant Beebe: you. Okay. Um, yeah, so you're right, I am kind of in the middle and I probably understand both ends imperfectly, right? So I understand kind of what's going on on Capitol Hill within, within, within my purview, right?
[00:10:30] Grant Beebe: And, uh, and I was a boot on the ground, but it's been a while, so, um, I won't say that I know exactly everything that's going on with people who are doing this job today. It's different from, different from the way I did the job, you know, a couple decades ago. So I've been out of the, out of the field for a while.
[00:10:46] Grant Beebe: But, um, I started with hand crews. So I was a for service hand crew person in, uh, Northern California, and then got an opportunity to jump in, uh, in the BLM organization at the fire center in the early nineties. So we're, we're going back a couple of [00:11:00] decades there, jumped for a while, and then, uh, when I had kids, decided I needed to stay more, a little closer to home, actually had some skills that I could apply and got into budgeting, planning, blah, blah, blah, all that kinda stuff.
[00:11:12] Grant Beebe: People kept retiring, I kept applying. And, uh, here I am so happy to be here, happy to try to represent some of those boots on the ground. Try to try to remember what it was like when I was a gs, gosh, wherever I started two. And, uh, and I'm not that anymore, but, uh, try to keep in mind what it was like. So, um, I don't always, don't always do a good job of that, but I'm always trying so, Here's
[00:11:34] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: a question for you.
[00:11:35] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: So the changes that you've seen over the years and you know, used to be in ops, of course, used to jump out a perfectly good aircraft.
[00:11:41] Grant Beebe: Yep. Used to be a ground path. There's no such thing, by the way, that was a perfectly, a good aircraft. You always want to have a, a parachute on your back when you're in an airplane.
[00:11:48] Grant Beebe: That's, that's not just me. Well, hey,
[00:11:50] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: if uh, the plane's not a perfectly good aircraft, well it's gonna take you one place. And that's usually through the scene of the crash. There you go. Anyways, um, so I think one of the most [00:12:00] overlooked things for the boots on the ground is looking to expand your, and diversify your career, right?
[00:12:05] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: So a lot of people just wanna be ops that are entire life. They wanna be the lifelong hotshot superintendent or, you know, whatever in operations. As far as getting into the other things like finance and logs and radio communications, all that kind of stuff, what kinda suggestions would you go out for? Uh, what would you give for the folks that are out there
[00:12:24] Grant Beebe: right now?
[00:12:25] Grant Beebe: Well, you know, one thing that's different now than, than it was when I was coming up is that there are a lot more opportunities now, I think. So just across the bureau, the bureau land management, for instance, and we got so many vacancies in so many different departments that if people have interest in other things, they're always looking for help.
[00:12:41] Grant Beebe: I think one of the beautiful things that's going on now is we're ex we're having opportunity to extend people's tours more than we have in the past. I mean, you know, not to, not to bring it all back to where I started, but it took me, you know, 10 years to get an appointment in the agency. And, uh, and it's different for people now.
[00:12:56] Grant Beebe: You can get, you can get a career appointment earlier. You can [00:13:00] work longer fire season. Than, uh, we used to longer, longer, longer tours. So I think there's more opportunity for people to branch out if they've got an interest. Pretty much everybody out there in the bureau needs help. And so when people come available in the shoulder, seasons in, in the, in the winter months.
[00:13:17] Grant Beebe: They still wanna work. Often there's work for 'em and they just gotta ask. So, you know, for me it's, um, it was, it was kind of a natural fit for me to go into budgeting. That's where I went. I went into kind of planning and budgeting when I, when I did hit that end of that ops career, that, uh, where I, where I wanted to stop traveling so much, but I had fewer opportunities I guess back then.
[00:13:35] Grant Beebe: That was in the mid two, the mid aughts. Right. And I think now there, there are a lot more opportunities than there were back then. But, but I just had this, I was in the right place at the right time and I got a budgeting job cuz I love to do spreadsheets. Not everybody does, but I did. So, uh, I turned that into a budgeting thing and, and frankly I actually loved that work.
[00:13:52] Grant Beebe: It was really, it was really pretty fun. Got to do some op stuff off to the side. But, um, that was a good transition for me. Wouldn't be for everybody. I [00:14:00] think, like you mentioned, you know, radio, uh, g i s uh, remote, remote weather stations, um, fuels work, for instance. I mean, there's a ton of fuels work out there, planning work, just helping people out on, on stuff that they need help on, admin functions, you know, there, there's all sorts of work out there that needs to get done.
[00:14:16] Grant Beebe: So I think people, you know, first step is to, is to tell the folks who are in your supervisory, Jane, that you got an interest outside of just doing the op stuff and see what they can do with it. Uh, one thing we talked about, we were doing a preseason meeting this morning, you know, with the Nevada folks and, and one thing we do talk about all the time is really trying to keep people, um, In the, in the bureau, in the business.
[00:14:37] Grant Beebe: Right. And, and not just kind of drive 'em so hard in the off chain that they, that they have to turn their back on on the career cuz it's just too hard to do. So we're always trying to preach that, that, um, you know, uh, work a long season if, if you can. But, but for sure look for other opportunities to develop a skill set so that when you do decide either voluntarily or involuntarily, that you no longer want to be pound on the ground, be digging line, that there's something [00:15:00] else out there that you're, you're ready and, and able to do.
[00:15:03] Grant Beebe: Uh, I did a little bit of that. I went to grad school and, you know, perfected my, uh, my spreadsheet skills and was able to apply those skills to a different job when, when I made that choice. But, you know, sometimes that choice is made for you. You blow out a knee, uh, you develop asthma, um, uh, you just, frankly, your, your family situation changes and you just can't travel anymore.
[00:15:24] Grant Beebe: You wanna be ready for that when it happens. If, if you possibly can, I'll just say as a, as a bureau, as a community, we're trying to make it easier on folks when that day comes and, uh, and to have 'em ready and ready and willing and able to, to make a transition and stick with us if they will.
[00:15:40] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: Oh, absolutely.
[00:15:40] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: And I think that's one of the things that are, I was trying to kind of allude to is I'm a huge proponent of ex I guess expanding your horizons and, uh, getting some more experience under your belt and kind of diversifying your career that way in case you do take a gnarly fall on a jump or you do blow out your knee hot shotting.
[00:15:56] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: You have options out there and you can still put food
[00:15:58] Grant Beebe: on the plate. So, yeah, totally. I mean, [00:16:00] we, um, last year had a, had a jumper drop outta training and, and uh, we were able to pull him into our external affairs shop. He went to work on external affairs for the summer, developed some skills and uh, and it was a great, it was a great thing for him and a great thing for us too, to.
[00:16:14] Grant Beebe: Have this operational person, this person who was, you know, fresh off the line, come in and help external affairs stuff, do some, do some work. So, um, there are always opportunities out there. You just gotta be a little imaginative and figure out what you wanna do. If, if there's something beyond ops you wanna do, um, by all means just ask the question, raise your hand, and, and you know, learn on the job is always the best way to learn stuff.
[00:16:36] Grant Beebe: Oh
[00:16:36] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: yeah. And I hate when people kind of do that whole, oh, well all I've known is operations. That's all I am. I'm just a firefighter. Well, no, it's bigger than that. You're a professional problem solver and you're pretty damn good
[00:16:45] Grant Beebe: at it, so. Totally. Yeah, I mean that's, that's one of the, one of the beauties of fire and why we always talk about having other people come in and help us manage fires is cuz they get to get to practice Things like leadership, decision making, um, collaboration, uh, public speaking, [00:17:00] all those things that, uh, you get to do as a fire person kind of on a routine basis that other people can only dream about.
[00:17:05] Grant Beebe: So yeah, don't sell yourself short if you're a, if you're a ground pounder, you got a ton of skills. Uh, you just need to apply 'em in the right spot. There we
go.
[00:17:13] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: Everybody's got something to offer. Right? Totally. So last but not least for the to, before we get into like the meat and potatoes, if you will, of this episode, let's talk about the fire behavior when you're coming up through the ranks and what you experienced out there and how it's changed today.
[00:17:27] Grant Beebe: Yeah, the risk of, the risk of reusing a story, I, I, I, I use this a lot and, uh, I just remember in guard school I was in Northern Cal going through, going through basic and uh, We would talk about, you know, the big fires that people had seen and experienced. They were just kind of the war stories people would talk about during, you know, in 1 30, 1 90, those kind of introductory courses.
[00:17:46] Grant Beebe: And, you know, they would talk about this fire called Gordo Rat Fire and, and, uh, the Fat Rat fire. Yeah. It was Fat Rat. Yes. If you wanna translate, but you know how, you know how it goes. So the Fat Rat fire and, uh, named I think for the Fat Rat [00:18:00] campground, don't, don't quote me or Creek or a creek, there's always something like that.
[00:18:04] Grant Beebe: The Fat Rat Creek, it's gonna go with Top Gun names for fires. Oh yes. Right. The goose fire. So, uh, so that fire was, I don't know, it was on the lost batteries and it was, you know, I'm making it up 130,000 acres or something like that. And then you compare it to, you know, your basic year in California. These, these days with the Dixie fire or that, you name it, Caldor or camp or car.
[00:18:24] Grant Beebe: And so the kind of fires that were held up as calamitous fires in California when I was, when I was kind of cutting my teeth, um, as a college kid trying to pay, trying to pay his way through school are, are way different from the, from the war stories people are telling now about, about, you know, Dixie hitting a million acres.
[00:18:40] Grant Beebe: Um, so, so big fires, different fire behavior, longer lasting, uh, different seasons, all that kind of stuff. We've been, we've been saying it actually for three decades, but I think we're finally. Um, getting across to people that this is different. This is not what we grew up with in the fifties, early the sixties, or the seventies, or the eighties and nineties, or in the aughts, or [00:19:00] even five years ago.
[00:19:01] Grant Beebe: I mean, it is changing. Um, it feels like more than, more than mathematically possible, right? That, that things are getting way more intense. And on top of it, we're seeing effects of fires that we didn't see before. And, and, you know, I think we're running the risk of losing entire ecosystems, at least in our lifetimes, forest types that might not reestablish.
[00:19:20] Grant Beebe: Uh, you know, we're, I think we're running the risk of, of changing the landscape in such a way that, um, we're gonna be missing some particular, you know, pieces of the landscape that we've grown used to over the years. Yeah. And it sucks
[00:19:32] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: to see that too, because, you know, we grew up, I, I, at least I grew up and probably a majority of wild and firefighters out there grew up doing outdoor stuff.
[00:19:38] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: I mean Right. It's just kind of a natural calling. Right. And now you're seeing this generational damage of cross forest and it's all because of these mega fires, giga fires, whatever you want to call it in the Steve Prime, uh, kind of context. Yeah, it's, it's happening
[00:19:54] Grant Beebe: tied with climate change, right? So, so yeah, you may have a fire driver system, uh, into some, into some sterile [00:20:00] state, and then, uh, and then it will never come back in our lifetimes because of the, you know, available moisture and the temperature regime.
[00:20:06] Grant Beebe: So, um, there's, there's a real concern that, uh, we need to preserve some landscapes and we can't just let nature run its course. Uh, you know, for sure. Yeah,
[00:20:16] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: I mean, there is definitely an application for good fire across the latest case. Totally. But it's, you know, it's not a one size fits all kind of thing.
[00:20:22] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: It is one of the safest ways to fight fire with fire, and it is also effectively nature's garbage disposal. But we gotta apply that practically and in the right time, the right environment, the right force, the right ecology, all that stuff.
[00:20:34] Grant Beebe: Agreed. Yeah. As we talk about hitting fuels targets, for instance, and the kind of fuels treatments that we need to do as land management agencies, you know, and, and I'm talking inclusive here, fed agencies, state, local, um, we need to account for good fire.
[00:20:49] Grant Beebe: However it shows up if we're lightning it, that's one thing. If it's occurring from a lightning strike and we're, and we're shepherding a fire around to do good things, uh, absolutely. But that's the only way we're gonna hit the acre targets that we need to hit, is [00:21:00] making use of fire that occurs on the landscape without, without us needing to set it.
[00:21:03] Grant Beebe: I mean, gotta gotta admit that that's part of the equation, for sure.
[00:21:07] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: Oh yeah. And here's the question for you that wasn't really on the list. Um, speaking of those pop-up questions, as far as targets, I mean, what are our targets as far as fuels treatments across the. Just the west, or, I mean, even if you wanna throw it in a nationwide thing, that's hard to
[00:21:21] Grant Beebe: say.
[00:21:22] Grant Beebe: Um, you know, I think, I think we should admit that we're gonna burn 10 to 20 million acres a year across, across the west. One way or another, just on average. The question is, how much of that are we gonna light ourselves and how much of that is gonna be lit for us? Um, but, and so, and so, that's what we should expect for burning.
[00:21:40] Grant Beebe: What, what we wanna see is that when those 10 million acres burn, that those 10 million acres burn in a majority of places, in a way in which we want 'em to burn, they create the effects that we want. So that's the goal. Not that we banish burning from the landscape, cuz this is a fire environment. We live in nature and it's, it's built by fire and it's, it's always gonna [00:22:00] burn, but is it burning in a way that we can live with, right.
[00:22:02] Grant Beebe: That people can live with, uh, because of where they recreate, where they live and that and, um, fire that's creating the kind of ecological effects that we want it to, to create on the far end. Right. So that's the goal. The way we get there is, you know, sometimes suppressing fires, sometimes using it and doing a hell of a lot more fuels management than we have been just by virtue of.
[00:22:23] Grant Beebe: You know, both effort and, uh, other priorities and money. Um, so for my agency, for blm, you know, informally we've been aiming for a million acres of treatment a year and, you know, we, we manage about 240 million. So a millions, it seems like a lot, but it's, it's small compared to that 240 million of that 240 million, that's not all high priority work.
[00:22:44] Grant Beebe: So, so say that we have 80 million acres that we really wanna focus on, on the BLM cuz of values. And, and those values could be homes, but they could be grazing allotments, they could be community interests, things that people depend on. They could be timber interests, they could be recreational values. So [00:23:00] say we got 80 million acres, um, to really manage intensivess of fire risk and we want to treat, or we have been treating about a million now and that that wasn't an aspirational goal and we got to it this year.
[00:23:11] Grant Beebe: We're hoping to hit somewhere around 1.3 million acres treated, I think as, as, as a group. We're, we're aiming to 2 million acres a year. So of that 80 million, if we're treating 2 million acres a year, we think we're on a pretty decent glide path. Um, but um, I, I say this a lot too. This is a generational investment, right?
[00:23:29] Grant Beebe: This is not one and done, this is not a budget cycle. This is not a political thing. This is what we need to do forever. We need to be treating 2 million acres until I'm dead. You are dead. Our kids are dead and our grandkids are dead. And that just needs to be going on and on and on. This is not something that we're gonna treat and be done.
[00:23:46] Grant Beebe: And then look, we don't have to fight fire anymore. You know, look, uh, we don't need hot shots. Uh, no, we're always gonna be managing fire, but if we can get a landscape in better shape, and I, again, I'm speaking from my agency, agency here, if we get, if we get the landscape in better shape, we're gonna [00:24:00] be able to make better use of fire.
[00:24:01] Grant Beebe: We're gonna be beating our heads against the wall, maybe a little bit less, and we'll have fewer deleterious effects on the far end when fires do occur. But, you know, also in, in the BLM land, a lot of what we manage, um, is, is really full suppression. It's ground that's burning too much. It's, uh, range land that's degradated and that is burning every three to four to five years and should be burning every 25 to 75 to a hundred years.
[00:24:24] Grant Beebe: Right. And, and so we've had a lot of places where, where we flat out just have too many exotic invasives coming in, sheet grasses, you know, Notre noted example. Win Winnemucca. Yes. Drive north from Winnemucca to Bird Valley and you see it. And uh, yeah, we got a lot of land where we need to put fire out, um, for a long time to, to try to recover that landscape.
[00:24:45] Grant Beebe: And you know, that's a big emphasis in, in our bureau for sure. And then we also have landscapes where we need to do a little more burning. Um, uh, Juniper for sure got juniper croach men and there's a lot of discussion about, about. How much is the right amount of pinion juniper? Uh, we know [00:25:00] sagegrass could use a little more opened pinion juniper stands.
[00:25:02] Grant Beebe: We know we've got, we've got Pinion j that's a, a different species that has different dependencies and we got people who also depend on pinion nuts. But, um, we gotta find a balance there because we got, we got a lot of pinion juniper and, uh, we think we need to manage that a little more intensively also, and that might require more fire use.
[00:25:19] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: Oh, yeah. And that's a good way to get rid of the stuff too, especially in the areas that it's, you know, overgrown. I mean, you're gonna have to nuke it out, of course, but
[00:25:26] Grant Beebe: Yeah. Requires intense fire and anybody who's done, uh, PJ work knows. Yeah. Uh, you know, in se in season burning is really, uh, one of the, one of the only ways to deal with it, um, on a, on a big scale, right.
[00:25:36] Grant Beebe: And mm-hmm. And that's scary cuz that gets up in the crowns and just rolls, so, um, oh yeah. So it, it takes a while. But, uh, for instance, in the Boise area where we are in the, in the Ahis, um, Boise districts been doing great job of getting the landscape set up so that they can let for more fires burn out there, you know, um, burning some holes out there so they've got more, more, um, fine fuel growth so that, so that fires will actually do more good and burn into some of those [00:26:00] stands.
[00:26:00] Grant Beebe: So they're setting it up for success long-term. Again, these are all long-term, long-term investments, long-term goals. Uh, my, my worry with, with a lot of these investments is that people, you know, they'll see a big fire season next year or the year after and they'll say, oh my God, what are we doing? We're throwing all this money at fire and we're still having big fire seasons.
[00:26:17] Grant Beebe: Yes, we're gonna have big fire seasons buckle up. Yeah. For you. We are in the pira scene for our lifetimes and that next lifetime, it's just, it is, um, it is where we're going and, uh, you know, until the weather changes for a decade and, uh, doesn't look like that's gonna happen anytime soon.
[00:26:32] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: Oh yeah. Well that's another thing too.
[00:26:34] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: I mean, that 2 million acres that you're talking about, that's a drop in the bucket. Comparatively speaking to other, the other agencies out there, I mean, well the other department did Department of Agriculture, you know, United States Forest Service. I mean, they've got much more land I
[00:26:48] Grant Beebe: wanna say. Yeah. I think, you know, I don't know the Forest Service numbers right now, but they probably treat 2 million acres in the southeast on an annual basis.
[00:26:54] Grant Beebe: And those are different burns. They're doing more maintenance burning and, and of course, you know, in the southeast generally, really in the [00:27:00] state and private sector, I mean, those guys are burning way more aggressively on, on shorter intervals because they have to, because of the ecological nature of the southeast, right.
[00:27:10] Grant Beebe: With longleaf pine and mm-hmm. And, um, all that stuff that's going on down there, plus their, their incredible history of doing, of doing burning. Um, and so, you know, we can't export that model from the southeast to the west very easily. Different landscape like that. Yeah. Different, different fuels, different topography, different weather.
[00:27:27] Grant Beebe: Uh, I, you know, the forest service I think would, would like to get to a much bigger numbers in the west and, and that's their goal. Cross fire sheds priority fire sheds the chiefs priorities. I mean, you see all that stuff, uh, rolling out. Um, It's, it's great stuff. It's gonna take a lot of work on the forest service part to really hit the targets that they're trying to hit on the, in the, in the west.
[00:27:47] Grant Beebe: A lot of it is gonna be, um, taking advantage of, of natural ignitions, you know, where they can, I'm, I'm sure that's gonna be part of it cuz they're, that's probably the only way to hit some of the big goals that they have. Oh yeah. Then
[00:27:58] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: we also have kind of a, a little bit of [00:28:00] a people problem that we're starting to develop here.
[00:28:01] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: And I guess that's a good segue into the next set of topics that we're going to be, uh, talking about. And that is going to be all of the gripes, I guess, from both the public and the boots on the ground. Now, I don't wanna say these gripes because there is change on the horizon, and I do believe that with enough, uh, guidance that the federal government legislators and the agencies can direct this into a positive change for the boots on the ground.
[00:28:30] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: Because I mean, you agreed with me, you said, yeah, we do have a people problem currently, and it, I, is it getting worse? I mean,
[00:28:40] Grant Beebe: I think we're holding our own, but um, again, it's, it's anecdotal. I saw boy a month ago some attrition data that, um, for my, for my bureau at least, that talked about, you know, when, when, when in people's careers do they leave the agency and what series?
[00:28:54] Grant Beebe: And so I can see. For instance that, you know, 4 62 s most where most of our, uh, [00:29:00] forest techs, current current forest techs are soon to be, soon to be, um, 4 56 wildland fire specialists or whatever. We're gonna end up tidying them, uh, wildland firefighters. Um, those folks tend to leave at the GS six seven level.
[00:29:12] Grant Beebe: Right? And so, at least for permanent employees, that's, that's the way they depart. And it's where I. That's where a lot of people are, right? It's like, all right, I'm done with this. Uh, I'm not, you know, there's no transition plan in place, or I don't like what's, what's above me in the, in the pay grade scale or whatever.
[00:29:27] Grant Beebe: Or we have fewer opportunities at that next grade than we should, which I think is really one of the problems. Um, especially for people who wanna transition into something that's less obsi, that's less travel, that's, uh, a little different. Um, that's, it's a tough grade level to, to make that transition. I think what we wanna do, at least in the fire organization, is build more opportunities so that if you're a GS seven eight and you know, you, you wanna be done with that GS seven eight work, cuz it entails duties that you can't handle anymore, you know, for whatever reason.
[00:29:56] Grant Beebe: Um, but there's not, there's something else out there for you that maybe within the fire [00:30:00] organization that's, that's, um, more fuels work that's, that's, um, more tied to a home base that, you know, has some different set of duties that you can still contribute, can still go do some fire stuff, but don't necessarily have to be on the road all the time.
[00:30:12] Grant Beebe: I mean, that's the goal. And I think a lot of what we're doing is trying to build out the organization. Um, not just, not just building the boots on the ground doing firefighting work, but also the support organizations that have been underfunded, understaffed in the past that also give people more opportunities or to just flat.
[00:30:27] Grant Beebe: Give people, you know, I'll air quote it sabbatical time, give them, give them save, you know, time to do something different. Like, you wanna take a season, do something different. I mean, personally, I've done that a couple times in, in, just in my job. And I don't have a lot of boots on the ground in my organization other than the smoke jumper unit.
[00:30:42] Grant Beebe: But, but a couple guys who wanna go out and, and learn to fly say, okay, um, yeah, take a year off. Go, go learn to fly. I can come back. And so it's been super successful and I think that model has to happen more people have to be more ingenious as managers about, about recognizing they've invested in this employee who's invested his or [00:31:00] her time in the organization.
[00:31:02] Grant Beebe: Let's keep that relationship going. Uh, look for, look for a way to, to feed those interests. Give somebody an opportunity either inside or outside of government and then, and then bring 'em back in. Those are the kinds of things that need to happen at every level so that we keep people in the organization and they don't just bail out on us, but, uh, we have a people problem.
[00:31:18] Grant Beebe: We have, we have people leaving the organization for a variety of reasons, but, um, I think not lost on us, is that they can make more money doing easier work elsewhere. It could be in a, it could be working for pg and e doing firework for pg and e. It could be going to work for CalFire doing, you know, firework for CalFire.
[00:31:36] Grant Beebe: It could be working for Colorado, it could be working for Oregon, Washington. I'm trying to think of all the states that pay more than the federal government. At least before Bill, um, that we're paying more than the federal government for, for doing the same work, for doing firework. So part of part of what happened with Bill, with the infrastructure law and, and with President Biden actually coming out and just saying, Avery Firefighter should be making at least 15 bucks an hour, was, was that pay inequity that people were doing the [00:32:00] same work in state organizations or in other organizations, private organizations, and getting paid less.
[00:32:06] Grant Beebe: And, uh, so that, that was the first recognition. And then the infrastructure law came around and said, well, let's apply that to everybody regardless of where they live, and bump up that pay and try to make it commensurate, both with other organizations that are doing the same work and just with the general level of risk that's attributed to the job, that that should be compensated just flat out by itself.
[00:32:25] Grant Beebe: It's like you're, you're doing this hard. Uh, we should pay you better than $13 an hour. Right? Yeah. And, and so you see, you know, GS three s making in the mid twenties, which is, which is awesome. It's perfect. It's
[00:32:36] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: not sustainable if you're gonna stay at GS three, that's for sure. Yeah.
[00:32:39] Grant Beebe: And, and as, uh, as you, you know, as you alluded, that doesn't, that hasn't necessarily fixed our problem, right?
[00:32:46] Grant Beebe: So, uh, I think there's two things going on out there. One, it's not just about pay, it's also about, uh, the life that requires, you know, that that's required of you to, to make this pay count, right? So, uh, you still gotta travel, you still gotta work a lot of overtime. You're [00:33:00] still on the road a lot. There's still a lot of pressures, still dangerous job.
[00:33:04] Grant Beebe: And, uh, and plus the, the permanent fix isn't there yet. And I, I'm, I'm sure most people are hip to that, that they're waiting to see, uh, if Congress will come through with some kind of permanent fix as opposed to this, um, kind of bandaid approach that we've had so far. Yeah, it's definitely
[00:33:17] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: a bandaid. And, uh, moving back to what you were saying earlier about having your most attrition at that GS four to GS seven level.
[00:33:23] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: Mm-hmm. And I think that's, uh, I think that's a life. Issue compounded with, I guess your, your pay and all your classification, all that other stuff. Right? So when I was a GS six seven, I was getting married, I was trying to buy my first house. I, it was like serious about it. Right. And I think that's why a lot of those mid-level, uh, career persons, I guess that would be mid, low, mid mm-hmm.
[00:33:47] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: Kind of career professionals in the fire service are dipping out and, you know, finding other jobs either in the private sector or a different, uh, agency in a different state. And it's because you have this sudden realization that [00:34:00] your ground pounding is very much a young man and young woman's sport.
[00:34:03] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: And when you settle down and wanna have kids and have the two and a half of the two and a half kids white picket fence, you know, American dream that it's really hard to do on 16, $17 an hour, even with the b i l with a, uh, bipartisan in bipartisan infrastructure law. It's, it's got an expiration date on it.
[00:34:20] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: Right.
[00:34:21] Grant Beebe: It's hard. Yeah. Uh, so housing can, we could do a whole podcast just on housing, but, oh man, you're telling me. But, but again, that's not unique to us. Um, it's, uh, you know, housing is housing right now and, and there isn't, there isn't an industry that isn't affected by the lack of affordable housing for its workers.
[00:34:39] Grant Beebe: I'll
[00:34:39] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: just, it doesn't even matter if you're in tech in San Francisco,
[00:34:42] Grant Beebe: it's, no, no. Yeah. I work at a fire center where we hire a lot of Gs twelves, thirteens fourteens. Right. And we get a lot of people up in that pay scale, which is, which is considerably, at least for base pay, considerably higher than, than, you know, your GS seven.
[00:34:55] Grant Beebe: And, uh, and those folks have, have a hard time moving. I mean, you have a hard time getting [00:35:00] every anybody to move right now, especially with, with interest rates being what they are. Oh, yeah. It's a huge investment. But, you know, in my market, in the Boise market, and that is not atypical, people were buying houses over the internet, um, side, unseen side.
[00:35:12] Grant Beebe: Yeah. Most almost unseen or seen through, you know, whatever fish islands that somebody wanted to use on their, on their Zillow listing. So, um, so people were, people were just flat out just buying what they could because they were desperate. And, uh, and so that's a hard, that's a hard thing. I mean, I, I did buy my picket fence when I was GS seven.
[00:35:30] Grant Beebe: My wife and I. You know, pooled our savings. I borrowed some from my mom and we, uh, when we managed a down payment and, and got a house. But it's not the same world now for sure. And so, housing? Housing, yeah, housing is, is its own thing. How we're gonna figure that out. I mean, you know, that's a different discussion really with the country, figuring out how to build more housing.
[00:35:47] Grant Beebe: Oh, yeah. It's not the same across the country. Like it is not, yeah. And rental and, and rents are high too. Um, you know, you name it, there's, there's, it is a tough market in pretty much every western town that I can think of right now. So, [00:36:00] so it's not just Sacramento, it's not just Reno. It's not just Boise.
[00:36:03] Grant Beebe: It is, it is Winnemucca. It's, it's all sort of towns. It is Elco. Elie. Yeah. It is, it is a, it is a hard thing. People as a result, you know, if they don't have housing provided for them, are, you know, faced with living out of their van and hoping that they go off on a lot of fires so that they, uh, they don't have to, you know, live in their van every day.
[00:36:21] Grant Beebe: They go off on Pretium and, and manage to get a hotel and get a shower. But, uh, yeah, it, it's, it's a tough, it's a tough thing. And that's where I say, you know, I, my boots on the ground experience is different from, from what folks have these days. But, but, uh, it is a tough time. It's a, it's a tough time in people's careers that the GS seven, eight level, it's like, all right, what am I gonna do?
[00:36:40] Grant Beebe: Am I gonna do this for a career or do I have to do something else? I think we are still gonna lose a lot of people at that grade level. They're gonna say, yep, uh, this was fun. I don't wanna, I don't wanna do more of this. I don't want to, I don't wanna bump up a level and become a supervisor or whatever. A lot of people are gonna make that choice and.
[00:36:56] Grant Beebe: Flat out that is, that is gonna happen. But, uh, we want to give more [00:37:00] opportunities for people who do think, ah, you know what, I, I love fire. I'd like to stay involved, but I don't necessarily wanna be pounding the ground. What else can I do that feels like fire? That, that, um, maybe is a little, um, less like the job I've been doing.
[00:37:13] Grant Beebe: And, and that's where, that's where I say building out fuels organizations, building out incident business, building out warehouse support, all these kinds of jobs that, that we should be supporting better with with some of these funds that we're getting. Uh, that's what we're trying to do is, is trying to build that organization.
[00:37:28] Grant Beebe: We're building that organization cuz we need those skills. But, um, but it also hopefully will give an opportunity for folks who, who wanna make that life decision where they, where they stop traveling quite so much but still work in the field or do something else for us. Yeah. Go work g i s go, you know, go do, go do this other thing.
[00:37:43] Grant Beebe: There there are all sorts of great opportunities out there in public lands management that aren't firefighting. And then, like I say, people are screaming to Phil Jobs. So it's a great opportunity in a lot of ways to be somebody entering the field cuz uh, cuz it is, you know, it won't take 10 years to get an appointment the way it did for me.
[00:37:58] Grant Beebe: You know, and that, and [00:38:00] that's not, that's not it's sour grapes on my part that's just saying, Hey man, it is, it is a buyer's market and uh, you're the seller. So if you got something you wanna do, make an offer and probably somebody jump in it. Yeah, and that's
[00:38:12] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: another thing too. You have to move around to actually, you know, move up in your career.
[00:38:16] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: And I don't think that's ever going to change. I mean you can pipeline and or stove pipe all of your career ladders to perfect, right? But, and the reality of it is, is you gotta go get other experience in other fuel types, other areas, all that other stuff to diversify your career. And it's, if you're just gonna be sitting around in the same forest service station or b l m out station, duty station, it's, you're not really going to progress as fast as you want.
[00:38:40] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: And I just dunno, any other way to put it other than that it's
[00:38:43] Grant Beebe: kinda of a choice you make, I think. I think some people make that choice. Comes outta a consequence though. Yeah. You've, you've fall in love with the place and you, and you see what you can do in that place and some people have made that work just fine.
[00:38:52] Grant Beebe: Um, Uh, I, as you say, I think getting well-rounded is, is a, is a great way to operate, is to move around, get a lot of [00:39:00] experience. One of the beauties of fire is that you move around just in your own job, right? If you, if you are an operational person and you're doing a lot of fire assignments, you actually get a lot of experience in a lot of different fuel types just by your day job, you know, and you don't, you don't necessarily have to move.
[00:39:12] Grant Beebe: But, um, you know, there is, there is that tradition in the, in the agency of moving around a lot, move, move around to move up. Yep. Um, I think now with, with remote work and telework, that's changed a little bit and, and there are a lot more remote opportunities, you know, in our agency right now than there used to be, where people are saying, well, okay, you don't have to, you don't have to live in Salt Lake City to have this job, but you gotta live somewhere in Utah.
[00:39:34] Grant Beebe: That's much different, much different solution than we used to have, where it used to be, you know, all right, you must, you must move to this other town, so here's your cubicle, here's, here's your cubicle, which everybody cringes
[00:39:44] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: about. Yeah. Especially your operational folks.
[00:39:46] Grant Beebe: Uh, yeah, cubicle, cubicle town is, uh, yeah, it's, it's a real thing.
[00:39:50] Grant Beebe: But, uh, I, I think we're a lot more flexible in what we do now and a lot more opportunities, uh, to work in a more flexible manner in the federal government than there used to be. And that's, uh, [00:40:00] that's mostly a good thing. Oh yeah. But I will
[00:40:02] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: say that being a young person in your 20 somethings, there is something wildly attractive about being practically living outta your car.
[00:40:09] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: That dirtbag lifestyle. I'm just gonna say it, I mean, You and I have lived that, right? Yes, yes. To some degree, yes. I mean, there's something kind of enchanting about that dirtbag lifestyle, but that GS six seven spot, when you're starting to get, you know, serious with your, your wife or your girlfriend, you're having kids.
[00:40:26] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: It's, it's
[00:40:26] Grant Beebe: hard. Oh, it is. And um, like I said, that was a decision. I made it when it was just my wife and I. Um, she had her own business and it was hard. I mean, you know, I would check out for 90 days and she would have to get used to me when I got back, just like everybody has experienced or many people have experienced.
[00:40:42] Grant Beebe: Um, so, so that was hard. But then when we had kids, that was a whole nother thing. And, and, and, you know, that was, that was, that was me just saying, you know, I don't wanna be the absentee dad. And luckily I was able to transition out. I was at a point in my career where most people aren't. And, and, you know, I wasn't a GS seven, I wasn't locked into an option.
[00:40:59] Grant Beebe: I didn't have [00:41:00] to keep taking fire assignments to make ends meet. I was incredibly lucky. I also delayed, you know, having a child until I was, um, a little older and a little more established. But, um, that's hard. You know, and I, I, you know, Pity anybody who's having to make that hard call, cuz that is, that is really tough and nobody wants to be missing their kids' events and, and, um, leaving to their spouse, you know, major chunks of child rearing.
[00:41:24] Grant Beebe: Oh yeah. Uh, that feels, that feels unfair. Uh, unfortunately the way, the way the world works these days, usually that's males pawning off those duties on females. Uh, you know, just that's the way it's typically gone. And, uh, and that's probably not gonna change in our lifetimes either. So, uh, it's a hard call to be, to be, you know, a spouse and saying, you take care of the, you take care of our.
[00:41:44] Grant Beebe: Uh, I'm just gonna go be the bread boy winner. Um, that feels awful to me, at least as a, as a parent. So, um, and I know, you know, many people going through that and many people don't have the luxury that I had of, of opting out. So, um, I do feel feel lucky for being able to do that. Oh,
[00:41:59] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: yeah. [00:42:00] The people at home are oftentimes the people that have to bear the burden of the firefighter out doing operations, you know, during the summer.
[00:42:06] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: Totally. And it's like, it, that's one of the reasons why I got out of the game, is because one was to pay Reno's a very extraordinarily expensive town to live in, and my family's here, my wife's family's here, all that stuff. Right. My kids here growing up next to their grandparents. It's this cool, however, you need X amount of dollars to make that dream a reality.
[00:42:24] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: Yep. And living out of my truck with a two-year-old and a 10 month old, it's just not gonna happen. Right. Thankfully. Yeah. Uh, so I had, I made that dis that decision I had consciously made that decision. I have no regrets about that. Do I miss it? Absolutely. But looking back, I mean, oh man, I, I couldn't imagine some of the burdens that some of the folks on the boots on the ground actually have to face.
[00:42:46] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: Right. And that's something that I, I, I opted out of. Right. You opted out of, yep.
[00:42:51] Grant Beebe: It's, it's a real thing. It's a real thing. It is, absolutely. And, and, you know, people are torn about it. I'm sure. You know, like, love the job, love my family, gotta make a choice. Uh, [00:43:00] or do both poorly, which I think is, must feel bad as well.
[00:43:03] Grant Beebe: So, I mean, that's the goal is to, is to give more folks more opportunities when they're faced with those sorts of things. And, and we're, we're talking about kids. It doesn't have to be kids. It could just be, I, I'm just burned down on this lifestyle. I wanna do something different. So, um, if we can find homes for those folks when they, when they reach that day, or even if it's, even if it's temporary, even if it's, I just need a year off, you know, uh, uh, we gotta, we gotta be able to find that solution there.
[00:43:27] Grant Beebe: Keep people in, uh, don't, don't lose 'em permanently there if we can, if we can help it. Oh yeah. That's especially hard for, uh, dual fire. Oh yeah. Oh my. Oh man. Now I, gosh, yeah, I know, I know some of those and yeah, it is, it is. It's beyond comprehension, how they manage it. But they do, you know, and it's ingenious.
[00:43:44] Grant Beebe: And, and I said this earlier, we're we're talking, we're talking a lot today about the challenges in the work. Uh, I just wanna put a plug in for how, how awesome this job is too. And so what I think what we're trying to do is that's awesome. We're trying to bring people in, you know, who've gotten affinity for [00:44:00] taking care of the land, taking care of people, taking care of fire, taking, taking care of business, right?
[00:44:04] Grant Beebe: It's a, it's a, it's an amazing profession. There are all sorts of opportunities in it. It is a profession. It's, uh, it teaches you things you, you know, won't learn any place else or, or very few other places. Uh, and it gives you opportunities to experience things you won't experience anywhere else, including team week, teamwork, camaraderie, um, sense of purpose, sense of mission, all that kind of stuff that attract people to the job.
[00:44:26] Grant Beebe: We just wanna, we just wanna say, all right, that stuff's still there, but let's make it, let's make it a long-term livable job as well. Not just something cool that you do. And then, and then, you know, by definition you have to burn out on, because it's unsustainable. We want to, but we do wanna recognize that, uh, it's a great job.
[00:44:41] Grant Beebe: And, uh, we wanna, we wanna keep plugging that, that there's a reason to come work for us. Cuz sometimes we make it seem like there's no reason to come work for us. But, uh,
[00:44:48] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: yeah, well, I mean, that's the whole thing is like, despite all the gripes, bitches and moans that we have as operators on the ground, you know, I, I will 100% represe percent say that this job, in fact, I was having this, uh, [00:45:00] conversation with Kevin Kelly earlier today, superintendent of, uh, silver State.
[00:45:03] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: And, uh, it was like, you know what man? Honestly, Some of the lessons that I've learned in wildland Fire have been some of the most influential things in my entire life. And it's actually, it, it's, it's undoubtedly formed me into who I am as a person today. Right. And it's, it's done wonders for me. And that experience alone, plus all the friends, the fire family, and all the cool, untouched by humanity nature that you do get to see, right?
[00:45:27] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: Whether it's, it happens to be on fire or not on fire, uh, that it's irreplaceable. It's, it's a beautiful job. I just changes happening. It's just gotta be slow. Right? And now if we can attract those new applicants and retain our current workforce with these new changes that are on the horizon, then this would be a dream job, right?
[00:45:48] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: An absolute dream job for all walks of GS level. Right? So we're getting there. It's just bureaucracy is a very large e cumbersome ship, and it's very hard to turn.
[00:45:58] Grant Beebe: Yeah. And we're, and we're [00:46:00] talking about big changes. And so one way to think of it is that it's going really slow. Another, I think of it as it's going incredibly fast.
[00:46:05] Grant Beebe: It's like, you know, the last three
[00:46:07] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: years monumental changes totally
[00:46:08] Grant Beebe: happened. Totally. Yeah. Yeah. If you look at the, just at the legislation that's stacked up out there that, you know, that we see proposed for the most part, but it's like, holy moly, look at all this stuff. And, uh, you know, if one 10th of this comes true, we're gonna be in much different, much better spot.
[00:46:24] Grant Beebe: But, but, um, it, it does take, again, it's a long-term commitment. It's, it's like, you know, we we're really worried. Just that, uh, well loo people will lose interest and it's like, all right, you know, we're gonna be the next issue and it can't be the next issue. It's gotta be every year's issue. This has gotta just stay front and front and foremost in people's minds.
[00:46:42] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: Oh, absolutely. And this fire's not going away. Not, it's not. It's never going to go away. And in fact, if it did, we'd be in trouble as a, as a species. Right? Right. We are inexorably, inexorably connected with fire. We wouldn't have evolved as a species unless it was for fire. So yeah, let's just keep that around.
[00:46:58] Grant Beebe: Yeah. If we don't have fire, that means everything's [00:47:00] turned into a, into a desert. And, uh, and then we're gonna be moving north. We're gonna be, uh, we're gonna be headed to Canada. Yeah, sorry, Canada. Yeah. Yeah. You didn't want 350 million of your closest neighbors coming, did you? Don't
[00:47:11] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: worry. I like hockey, so we're good.
[00:47:14] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: All right. So let's get into the topics and concerns. So this is a wonderful job. I will state that however, there are some very real, uh, things that we need to address as far as how we not necessarily treat our firefighters. Just I guess the way our bureaucracy works and some of the things that we need to, I guess, re-engineer, revamp, re-look at in some way.
[00:47:37] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: And those things are happening, especially with the efforts of grassroots, wildland firefighters, nfi, and all the boots on the ground. There's been a big change of the silent professional. Of the old school into this transitory, kind of like, oh, cuz some people are gonna be vocal about it, not all of 'em.
[00:47:53] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: But nowadays we have a lot of people standing up and saying, shouting from the rooftops, like, Hey, we need [00:48:00] this. And it's all walks of life, including, you know, people at the upper echelons of government all the way down to your GS three. And I applaud those people and the efforts that they're making.
[00:48:09] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: However, these questions right here, uh, that I submitted to you, um, they are directly, uh, crowdsourced from the audience of Anchor Point Podcast. So for the folks out there who submitted their questions for Grant here, I definitely appreciate you and, uh, yeah, let's get into it. Okay, so number one, topic and concern.
[00:48:29] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: And these are ordered by like severity and like how many times they came up. Okay? So keep that in mind here. So pay and retention, we kind of brushed on this earlier, uh, with our, our rants, our, our our chat. Little side note that we went down there, a little, uh, thing, but, uh, Number one topic and concern is gonna be pain retention.
[00:48:47] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: And uh, it goes, people are scared about the uncertainty of the b i l, the bipartisan infrastructure law. And it's looming expiration, and correct me if I'm wrong here, but that is going to be expiring October 10 this year.
[00:48:59] Grant Beebe: [00:49:00] It technically, it expires when the money go, when the money runs out. And so we're ballparking when that'll be, but say early fall.
[00:49:07] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: Early fall, okay. Many fear that they're going to be going back down to the pay schedules and rates before that, uh, before the work that grassroots wildland firefighters and N F F E have accomplished with this. What do you want people to know? Uh, regarding this,
[00:49:25] Grant Beebe: uh, so the, the, the cliff is real. The, um, the bill had a certain amount of money for the foresters and the DUI to pay the supplement that people have been, uh, experiencing since last summer.
[00:49:37] Grant Beebe: Um, and then that was retroactive to when the law got passed. So that would've been, you know, October 1st of 21. Right? It was retroactive to then, and then it's been paying forward ever since. So we did retro retroactive payments last year, caught people up and then had been paying forward. Um, when we run outta money, we run out of authority to do that.
[00:49:54] Grant Beebe: So the, so that was particular to a law that Congress passed and it was the infrastructure law, it was [00:50:00] bipartisan. So hence the, the bill language or I I j w, whatever, however you wanna determine it. Um, there are other dollars that are still floating around in Bill, and we're doing fuels work with it, but they've all had specific dollar amounts and specific targets for those dollars.
[00:50:14] Grant Beebe: So, uh, it is absolutely true. That, um, those funds will, uh, expire. And that congress, this is a congressionally mandated, um, initiative. And so Congress needs to do something. Um, they probably have a number of some things they could do. They could do another bill, they could do, um, God knows what, but, um, but of particular interest for us is the 24 budget proposal that went forward.
[00:50:38] Grant Beebe: Um, so the president's budget we call it, which included, um, uh, ways to get to, uh, similar pay supplements to what the bill has been doing for firefighters. And, um, and then the legislator that's re the legislation has, that's required to do that, and then the money that's required to do it, so it takes, it takes, um, money from Congress to pay those salaries into the future, [00:51:00] and then it takes some congressional action to actually, uh, force the change in our payroll systems that, that allows it to happen.
[00:51:07] Grant Beebe: That's the easiest way to describe it. So, so the, the solutions that have been proposed have, um, are kind of in discussion still about, about what exactly it looks like, but it's a, it's a different pay table for fire folks, people who are in special fire retirement coverage, uh, if that makes sense to your listeners.
[00:51:22] Grant Beebe: I think it will. Mm-hmm. For, to, to special retirement. So firefighter primary and secondary firefighter retirement, those are the people who are getting the pay supplement. Now those are the people who are proposed to get it in the 24 budget. And, uh, if Congress acts on that presidential budget and, and enacts part of it, uh, as described then from October 1st, those, uh, this new way of looking at pay supplement would come into force and people would never.
[00:51:49] Grant Beebe: Well, they would, they would notice a difference because the pay amounts will change. But, um, but they at least would continue to be getting the pay supplement or some sort of pay supplement. Let me just say that. Um, so, [00:52:00] so two things have to have to, Congress has to give us some money to do this, and they have to, and they have to do some legislative fixes to, to something called a pay table for, for firefighters.
[00:52:09] Grant Beebe: Um, that's, you know, I'm looking at my watch, what is it? It's, uh, April 14th. I dunno, what the hell is the date today? So, uh, there's not 17th, I dunno, we're 18th. 18th. Yeah, we're 18th. Yeah, sorry. 18th. Yeah, 18th. My taxes are in, my taxes are in, uh, phew. Okay. Um, yeah, so it's April 18th. You know, it's not a lot of time.
[00:52:26] Grant Beebe: Uh, it's not, and Congress is still negotiating debt, ceiling, and, uh, other things. And there's a lot of posturing on, on, you know, what, what, what should or shouldn't happen in relation to deficits and uh, you know, you name it. Um, regardless. Uh, there is a lot of support to my understanding. There's a lot of support for this initiative.
[00:52:47] Grant Beebe: There's a lot of support for paying firefighters more, um, as appropriate. There's a lot of support for getting this done. Firefighting is a white hat thing. I mean, that's one of the beautiful things about fire is that it doesn't really matter who's in the White House or who's in Congress. Uh, nobody [00:53:00] ever, nobody ever says Go away, firefighters, right?
[00:53:01] Grant Beebe: So, Nope. So this is, it's bipartisan. Bipartisan. It is, it is bipartisan and there's bipartisan support. I think it's just, it's part of that whole negotiation process. I think everybody wants to do this. It'll be a question of how they get it done, but you know how this stuff works. It is nothing, nothing happens with how some countermeasure happening out there.
[00:53:19] Grant Beebe: This is how, this is how Congress works, and so it is gonna be fraught with discussion and brinksmanship and everything else, and it's gonna be a chip, you know, it's like, well, we'll do this if you do that. I, I'm pretty confident, I'm usually not a glass half full guy on everything, but I th this is two.
[00:53:35] Grant Beebe: This is too crazy not to happen. The legislative fix for the pay and, and some funding to pay for it. At the very least, I think the legislative fix on the pay table is gonna happen. I, I do have a concern that we're gonna have to scramble to figure out how to pay for it, but, um, but if nothing else, uh, it, we would be forced to pay higher salaries and we just have to figure it out.
[00:53:55] Grant Beebe: So, um, so that's where my brain goes, that it's, it's too popular to let fall, [00:54:00] it's gonna get, it's gonna happen, but it might not happen until really late in the game. So my, uh, I'm concerned obviously, like my, my primary job in my job is to, is to try to manage the BLM S 3,500 fire folks, you know, in, in concert with all their local managers, but try to make things my, make things right for the program to make sure that the program program is successful.
[00:54:23] Grant Beebe: And we don't do that without bringing in great people and keeping 'em, and we're not gonna do that if this fails. So, uh, you know, I, I have, I have, I have faith in Congress. Can I say that out loud? I have faith in Congress that they're gonna make this happen. It is truly bipartisan, it is truly a no lose situation.
[00:54:41] Grant Beebe: Uh, some, they're gonna figure it out, it's laid out before they know exactly what they need to do. And every Congress person I talk to, I don't talk to that many, but the ones I talked to is recognize that they need to make it happen. That Bill was a flash in the pan and they need to do something permanently.
[00:54:55] Grant Beebe: Um, so I, I think it. They need
[00:54:58] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: to do it right though. And if they [00:55:00] don't do it without the input of the wild land firefighters, the boots on the ground, it's going to fall flat on its face. Yeah. People are gonna
[00:55:05] Grant Beebe: be pissed. Right. So, and, and you know, there's a proposal out there that, that is a sliding scale for, for Gs, you know, threes through fifteens and it does not look exactly like what, um, has been happening in Bill.
[00:55:18] Grant Beebe: And it's a combination of, of portal to portal pay and, and base rate pay. And it, and it definitely, um, is tilted towards the lower grades, towards the boots on the ground, more so than it is to higher graded managers, which is good for recruitment and, and mid-level retention. And I, and it's honoring what Congress said they initially wanted to do, which was pay firefighters more.
[00:55:41] Grant Beebe: And they didn't necessarily, I not to, not to, cuz I am a fire manager, they didn't say pay fire managers more. They said we wanna pay firefighters more. And so this proposal that's gone forward is reflective of that cuz it, it, for the lower grades, it, it pays them more. Of an increase than it does for higher grades [00:56:00] by percentages.
[00:56:01] Grant Beebe: And, uh, that's, that's kind of, that's kind of more in line with what Congress said they wanted to do. Um, there was a lot of scrambling when Bill got passed on how to make that happen. And, and I think, you know, people grabbed it at, uh, a fairly easy solution. The $20,000 or 50%, whichever is less. But, um, this one is a little more, there's a little more math involved.
[00:56:20] Grant Beebe: There is, my fear is that it, um, is that, I mean, it's great. It's way better than we were, than we had before Bill, but people are not gonna remember before Bill, you know, true. 800 people were probably in our agency are probably new, you know, and they've all, this is all they've ever experienced, right? And so what we're, what it, the perception is that people are gonna see that we're taking something away from them.
[00:56:39] Grant Beebe: Not that we're giving them something that they didn't have before. The infrastructure law. That's my big fear that people are gonna look at it. As I'm getting less as opposed to, um, we're trying to create a permanent solution, bill was just a temporary solution. And that's a lot, that's a lot for people to grab ahold of.
[00:56:56] Grant Beebe: I mean, oh yeah. You know, you're, you're living on a paycheck and the paycheck goes down. [00:57:00] It's like, and some of those people that are gonna get less are really key people, you know, doing really tough jobs at the GS 11, 12, 13 level. Uh, you know, I am not, uh, I'm, I'm not happy with that myself. You know, because we need those people too.
[00:57:15] Grant Beebe: Right. It's not all about GS threes. We need all of it. Right? Yeah. And so I would rather, if I were doing it, I'd rather have just kept doing what we were doing, cuz at least people were happy with that. With the B i l. With the b i but 20,000. Yeah. It's not the way, it's not the way it queued up on the plus side, the portal to portal pay, we're, we're talking about, um, also applies to everybody who responds to fires.
[00:57:33] Grant Beebe: Not just, not just the people who are in firefighter retirement coverage. So that has a benefit. So including militia Yes. What we call, what we call militia. Right. So because they paid premium from my understanding, right? Yeah. So it would, it would, it would, it would equate to, to, I don't know, a couple hundred bucks more a day for a lot of folks when they go out there and fight fire.
[00:57:50] Grant Beebe: So, and the, we need those people to help us. So I love it from that point of view that we're, we're actually rewarding those people a little bit more for sacrificing and going off on large fire assignments for the most part. [00:58:00] So that, that's a good thing. Yeah. I know
[00:58:02] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: that morale is kind of at all time low across all agencies right now, and it's just because I think people are, are kind of getting disillusioned with what's happening on, uh, Capitol Hill.
[00:58:11] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: Maybe just I, I don't know, maybe. I, I really don't, I can't really put a word to it, but people are just starting to get like, meh, just over it practically. Right, right. And, um, I, I, I honestly think that people, cause they're disenfranchised, especially when they're chasing ot, hazard, all that stuff, all season long and then they're expected in some places to keep going past their term of appointment if they're seasonal.
[00:58:36] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: Sometimes that gets a little bit much, especially if you just cranked out a thousand, 1200 whatever hour, 1200 hour overtime season and now you're expected to go respond to Santa Ana's in, you know, region five. That's hard. That's all a lot to chew on. Now, the homelessness, we literally have a homeless, unemployed veteran wild band firefighters in some areas.
[00:58:59] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: And [00:59:00] if that was to actually hit the news of like stories like that, I, I don't know if that would ring with, with Congress. It might motivate people to do so. But the morale, I think that people are just, they've heard it all before for the past 38 or 40 years. And then all of a sudden in the last three years we've had a, these monumental changes.
[00:59:22] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: So my biggest fear for the agency, cuz we need both agencies. We need beer of land management, we need the U S D A, we need doi, all that stuff, right? We need all of these fire agencies to accomplish our missions. Right. And it's not just suppression, it's all the folks involved with that. What I'm concerned about is what you just.
[00:59:41] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: And it seems like you share a similar level of concern that if this does not go through and it falls flat, flat on its face, I think that people are honestly going to use this b i l money as a severance package if something doesn't get implemented right away. What's your thoughts on that? Well,
[00:59:57] Grant Beebe: I, I, I won't argue with you.
[00:59:59] Grant Beebe: I [01:00:00] think, um, for one, uh, so Le let's back up just a little bit. Bill was actually kind of proposed as a re as a retention thing. Yeah. So it was, it was really intended to retain people. Oh. And so, and so I think it served its purpose in a lot of cases. I mean, I, I personally know folks who've delayed retiring, for instance, or quitting because Bill was there.
[01:00:20] Grant Beebe: And so, and so, you know, it did, it, it did what it was supposed to do, which was retain folks. And, and if it expires, then it's retained folks for, you know, two years essentially. And, and that's it. Um, our goal is to replace it before it expires so that people, um, continue to be retained, uh, you know, if they are motivated by what's in the bill, at least for pay.
[01:00:39] Grant Beebe: Um, but, but, uh, yeah, I have the same, I have the same concerns that, um, people will say, yep, that's, that's it. That's what I expected. That people, you know, this was a momentary thing and now people moved on to the next issue and there's, then there's no incentive to, to make this thing happen. Uh, I guess I am, I'm more, I'm more confident than I am not confident that, um, [01:01:00] we will reach a solution and hopefully before people get so jaded that it's, you know, it's waiting, that we're waiting until the last possible minute.
[01:01:06] Grant Beebe: But I, but in all honesty, I mean, I, I'm just frankly, Try to be plainspoken, which is, you know, people ask me, I say, yep, it's gonna run out and we need a solution. And when congress people come into me and ask me, I say, yep, it's gonna be a problem. We need this fixed before it runs out. And when firefighters come to me, I say the same thing.
[01:01:25] Grant Beebe: So I say the same thing regardless of the audience. It's like, that's gotta get fixed. Um, it's, it's plaintiffs and nose on our faces. Right. Uh, and, and yeah. Giving somebody a benefit and then taking it away. We see this in all walks of life in, in the United States, right? In, in the world. Yeah. I mean, you, you, you go anywhere, you give somebody a benefit and then you take it away.
[01:01:45] Grant Beebe: That's why tax breaks are so hard to ever expire. Right. They may, they may have, they may have some time lapse in 'em, you know, in, in law. And you always see Congress walk in and, and extend those time, those tax breaks at infinitum. Right. It's just human nature. It, it is. Once something's [01:02:00] established as a benefit, it's, it's hard to take it away.
[01:02:02] Grant Beebe: Oh, yeah.
[01:02:03] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: Well, I mean, I hope we're not looming towards like a mass attrition event, because that would really, really suck. And this is between the two agencies. I think that, uh, this, this is a wonderful job and, but it's Scott, it's like issues. It's, it's, it's wonderful. I loved it. I miss it. To this day. I'm very far, I'm almost five years removed from the game and I miss it every day.
[01:02:24] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: Right. However, we need to address the elephant in the room. Yeah. Or else we're gonna face a
[01:02:29] Grant Beebe: macur. Yeah. I mean, I, it's hard for me to use that language that you use. Uh, you're free to, you're freer to use language than, than I am. And I'm also kind of, um, Uh, I mean, I fear that I fear that that will be true because, you know what, um, that just makes sense to me that people will say, ah, this is both a blow to my income and, and a sign that this country isn't serious about, um, this very important work.
[01:02:57] Grant Beebe: Cuz, cuz it's just fair to pay people, [01:03:00] um, a living wage. And a living wage is way higher than it, than it, than it was. And, and I'll also say there are a lot of other people in the federal sector who are also not making a living wage. So, so it's not just us, we are the beneficiary of the focus on fire. But, but I'll I'll say there are a lot of, a lot of coworkers out there who, um, do similar work who aren't getting the same benefit.
[01:03:21] Grant Beebe: And I do always wanna be mindful that there are a lot of people left out even in the fire organizations who just aren't in special retirement. So since we're
[01:03:30] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: on that subject, let's se segue into the elephant in the room. And I know this is gonna be one of those ones that is, that's
[01:03:35] Grant Beebe: two elephants. Now how many elephants, twos are in this room?
[01:03:37] Grant Beebe: Well, dispatch because minutes. This room is getting
[01:03:39] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: crowded. It is. There's like two over there, one over there. It's, it's getting crazy in here, but one of the biggest things that is a concern is the exclusion of dispatchers. And that was a huge blow. And if people, people are crawling into my inbox and sending me like nasty grounds, why isn't grassroots doing this?
[01:03:58] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: Why isn't anchor point doing this for the [01:04:00] dispatchers? And you know what, dispatchers are a very real, uh, part of this game. If you. It's like the military. If you can't shoot and move and communicate, you're gonna lose the war. It's pretty granted. This is not to be compared with warfare. Wild and fire is not war, it's not combat.
[01:04:18] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: However, we do derive a lot of our SOPs from the military. We still need to move items logistically. We need to be able to communicate and then we need to be able to be operationally efficient. Now, if one of those things fall, we're done. So if we have a situation to where dispatch is and logistics with dispatch specifically being excluded from this, uh, presidential budget, that's, that's a problem.
[01:04:43] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: I mean, what is going on there? Um, sorry. The B i
[01:04:47] Grant Beebe: l. The b i l right. Correction. Um, so I, I'll just say that I have, in my organization at nfc, I have 400 employees. Hundreds of those are left out of the bill. They are [01:05:00] fi direct fire support people, not dispatchers, but direct fire support people who are not in special, special retirement coverage.
[01:05:07] Grant Beebe: And they're all left out of the pay supplements and have been since day one. So it is not lost on me that there's a huge, i I just say 20% of our organization. So six, 700 people, um, who are in fire positions, who are not covered by special fire retirement coverage and who are left out of the pay supplement and, and will be left out going forward apparently.
[01:05:28] Grant Beebe: So. So it's not just dispatchers, it is the whole support organiz. That, uh, exists out there to keep things rolling. And those folks, um, have not been included in the bill based on what Congress said about firefighters being the focus of the PACE supplement. I mean that, you know, president Biden came to the fire center and, and announced the $15 an hour thing and he, you know, was thinking firefighters and people have been thinking firefighters ever since cuz that's what they hear, you know, hotshots, engine crews, hell attack.
[01:05:58] Grant Beebe: Um, but, but [01:06:00] I, I feel that there have been a lot of people left out of the discussion, people who are really critical to the, to the fire organization who are not being, um, compensated the same way that firefighters are. Um, that is ongoing discussion, but I, you know, haven't been able to influence that. The blm, our organization has been able to award those people with some, some pay supplements, um, last year and this year.
[01:06:22] Grant Beebe: But it's not enough. And, and, uh, we, we feel that particularly about dispatch, we've had dispatch problems for a long time staffing up our dispatch centers and we've had. People in dispatch who are fire covered, essentially who, who've got, you know, fire line experience on the ground, fire line, fire line experience.
[01:06:38] Grant Beebe: And there are people in dispatch centers who do not. And um, and, and that's by necessity and our workforce is better for it, you know, having, having a folks from a variety of backgrounds. So now we're faced with these kind of two sorts of employees who, who are in dispatch centers, especially local dispatch centers.
[01:06:55] Grant Beebe: It's kind of like divisive
[01:06:55] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: almost. It's like the haves and haves nots. It is,
[01:06:58] Grant Beebe: it is. Yeah. Pardon me. [01:07:00] And, uh, and so, you know, we got a couple issues. One is pay issue. Two is what's the future for folks who come into those, those dispatch centers who don't have that fire line experience? Can they progress? Is there a place form 'em in the organization?
[01:07:11] Grant Beebe: But, um, particularly for the 4 56, which is what you, you started with, um, there was a, there was some, uh, ground truthing of, of fire duties that happened last year when they were first looking at the 4 56 series. I, I'm air quoting. They, you know, it was people from op p m and, uh, other folks who were trying to figure out how to, how to roll out this new series.
[01:07:32] Grant Beebe: And they did it in a hurry. Oh yeah. Bureaucracy moves slow unless they don't have to and then it's real quick. Yeah. And they had to and they went really fast. And I think frankly, um, That got missed, that dispatch was an essential function to fire. The whole dispatch element got left out. Um, it's back in the discussion.
[01:07:51] Grant Beebe: Um, there are some surveys coming out here next week I think that are, that are gonna really try to plumb what exactly the duties are in dispatch. I think people are [01:08:00] honestly trying to find a way to, to fit dispatch back into the 4 56 discussion, um, which is a little separate from the pay supplement, but, but at least it's recognizing that dispatch is an inherent function and, uh, inherently stressful, maybe more stressful than other people's jobs really, when it comes down to it.
[01:08:17] Grant Beebe: Oh yeah. Um, with no off switch, right? You, you, you can never, you can never go take five and uh, um, so, so I have a feeling that that, um, dispatch is gonna end up back in the 4 56. Uh, again, I'm, I'm hopeful about that, but, um, there was recognition that something got missed. So, um, it's all been reengaged.
[01:08:37] Grant Beebe: Grassroots was part of that discussion. I know Forest Service was part of that discussion. B LM was part of that discussion about the effects of leaving these people out, um, you know, that are so, so important to, to all of us. And that, and that their job is inherently wildfire centric, you know? Yeah. They do other things, but so do we all, um, so there were, there was some miscommunication I think and uh, hopefully we'll write that wrong.
[01:08:59] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: Yeah, I'm [01:09:00] hoping so too. I mean, it's, it's not just the dispatchers too, it's your wage grades. It's, which now are included there. It's that there's a lot of confusion on the wage grade
[01:09:07] Grant Beebe: side. Yeah, there's, so there are a lot of different wage grades. I've got wage grades who do warehouse work and, and, and, um, those folks aren't necessarily in fire jobs, but there we have wage grade heavy equipment operators who absolutely are.
[01:09:18] Grant Beebe: And so, um, they will be included in the pay piece. I'm not sure about the 4 56 in all cases, but, um, there are gonna be plenty of jobs that are fire jobs that are fire covered jobs that are not in the 4 56 some aviation jobs, you know, you name it, there's a whole bunch. You don't have to be in the 4 56 to be part of the pay solution.
[01:09:37] Grant Beebe: You have to be part of Firefighter retirement system to be part of the pay solution,
[01:09:43] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: which transitions into the next question. That was all of these questions that I'm asking you are crowdsourced. So, um, these are directly from boots on the ground and some public. Um, so with that, I think that's a good segue into whether or not we're gonna be moving towards a national fire service [01:10:00] or some sort of national fire.
[01:10:02] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: Fighting agency as far as a federal contact in a federal context, I guess now, do you support a national fire service? Why or why not? Explain if it's a advantageous, if it's a horrible idea. I know that the, this is, these are all, and I, and I understand, uh, that the Forest Service mission is completely different with some overlap.
[01:10:25] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: Mm-hmm. There are completely different missions to the b l m right now, specifically about fire wildfire suppression. Do you support a national, uh,
[01:10:36] Grant Beebe: fire service? Uh, I don't. And, um, but I, but I don't say that lightly. And, and I mean, you know, we've been arguing about this for my whole career. Like, there have been people saying it's not a new topic.
[01:10:49] Grant Beebe: It's not ave been, it's, it's, this has been talked about for decades. It's, it's not a new topic. And typically it's the f it's, I'm just, I'm gonna air quote the fire guys. It's the fire folks who really see, um, who [01:11:00] see the appeal of it. And because they'll, they'll get upset by things like OPM taking two years to figure out dispatch belongs in the 4 56 series.
[01:11:06] Grant Beebe: Right? Or how come it takes so long to get this to happen? You know, these people are worried about, you know, something else that doesn't have anything to do with me. I want them to worry about fire. And if we had a fire agency, it would be more responsive to my needs as a firefighter. And that's, that's the argument that we should stove pipe this stuff because we don't have anything to do with what the rest of the bureau does.
[01:11:28] Grant Beebe: It's that statement that I just said, we have nothing to do with the, what the rest of the bureau does. That I absolutely dispute because, um, we have fire problems, because we have fuels issues, because we have land management issues. And so we got 250 million acres, you know, give or take, that we manage in the blm.
[01:11:43] Grant Beebe: We have fire on that landscape because the landscape sports fire and the fire mission that we have in the bureau is tied to that landscape that's being burned. And that, um, and for which fire is, is a huge change agent. You could, you could supplement Forest Service for BLM in that sentence and it would be absolutely the same.
[01:11:58] Grant Beebe: So you can't separate fire from the [01:12:00] fuels, you can't separate the fuels from the land management actions that happen. This to me is why fire belongs in the land management agency because those two things work together. And what we wanna do is actually have the same folks who are managing fire suppression or fire management in the summertime, primarily in the summertime, helping to manage the fuels in the shoulder seasons because they have the experience on, on what fire behavior looks like on what.
[01:12:22] Grant Beebe: Fuels should look like that they can apply to the fuel situation when they've got time to do it. I mean, that's the marrying of fuels management and, and fire management or fire suppression that, that has been in the program for decades. Right. So, I mean, we created the fuels management program because this recognition that the best people do prescribe fire, for instance, are the people who go out and do fire suppression.
[01:12:44] Grant Beebe: They like fire. Yeah. They like fire for a living. You know, they fight fire for a living. So those are the great people to do prescribed fire or to plan fuels projects cuz they're really good at identifying places where we need fuels projects. So that's, that's why fire and fuels are in the same program and that's why fire and fuels are in the land management agencies.
[01:12:59] Grant Beebe: [01:13:00] Cuz that tie to the, to the land itself, to the condition of land. If you make some super agency, super federal agency, for instance, that has 20 like FEMA or something like that. Yeah. The FEMA for fire, although FEMA doesn't really have on the ground people, they just borrow people. Right. Yeah. So, but, so this is, this'll be a whole, this will be like tsa.
[01:13:16] Grant Beebe: This is my example. All right. We're gonna do TSA for fire. Maybe I could just stop right? Universal. Maybe I could just stop right there. Can I just stop? Go ahead. Keep going. No, I was gonna say that's, that's, you wanna be, uh, I'm, I have friends in t s a I don't wanna impune T s A, but I mean that's, you know, it would look something more like that.
[01:13:32] Grant Beebe: Mm-hmm. Where, um, where you would have to have this wildfire agency ex sitting. In Winnemucca, Nevada. Cuz then, cuz they'd need the staff Winnemucca, right? This fire agency. And they would, they would set up an outpost in Winnemucca, separate from the blm, maybe across the street from the BLM in some, in some office.
[01:13:49] Grant Beebe: And then be responsible for putting fires out on all BLM land. I just don't feel like that agency. As a, as a, as a experienced bureaucrat would be responsive [01:14:00] to the agency's needs. I, I think that's a kind of monolithic approach that would separate firefighting from land management. And I, I think in the long term that that's exactly opposite of where we need to be.
[01:14:11] Grant Beebe: So, so our approach, you know, in the Feds at least, is to, is to respect agency missions and then to work collegially and collaboratively, which we do incredibly well. And I, I don't have to tell anybody on this podcast that, that, you know, there's nothing, there's nothing more seamless, frankly, than a team showing up with people from 20 different local state, federal county agencies and all agreeing to the same standards and, you know, managing fire the same way and talking the same language.
[01:14:36] Grant Beebe: Um, I. I think we're really good at doing that right there and, and in fact, we're a stronger organization cuz we have to do that cuz we don't, we're not commanding control all the way to the top levels. We actually have to get along with people. We have to listen to people and we have to collaborate. And I think when you create this national monolithic federal response agency, you absolutely lose that need to talk to one another.
[01:14:57] Grant Beebe: You start ordering people around you end up [01:15:00] with boots on the ground having way, way less ability to influence what happens to them as an organization. I, I flat out believe that, I mean, I'm part of the BLM because it's an incredibly flat organization. You know, I was a firefighter. I've become this assistant director.
[01:15:16] Grant Beebe: Not that I'm hung up on titles, but you know, I've, I've managed to kind of, uh, warm my way up or, or fall into, fall into jobs that nobody else wanted, however you wanna describe it. And, uh, and that's a great thing. And, uh, and you know, I get calls from people on the ground who say, you know, this is screwed up.
[01:15:33] Grant Beebe: And, and so I think that availability of folks who can maybe try to help influence things is a great thing. I just, I just fear that this national fire. Would not, would neither serve the land or the people very well, nor do I think it would serve firefighters very well, is even though it looks like on the surface, like, oh man, they would really just jump and they would be responsive, whoever they are.
[01:15:54] Grant Beebe: I, I feel like we would lose, we, we, the royal, we, all of us in the fire, [01:16:00] in the fire agencies would lose in the long run. I mean, I got frustrations like everybody else. Yeah. Having to deal with bureaucracies and competing priorities, that's called being an adult. And uh, and I find, I find my agency is incredibly responsive to the needs of firefighters.
[01:16:14] Grant Beebe: My, my boss and my boss's boss are really good, really smart, really care. They've got other things going on too, but they, but they are putting their time and money and effort into protecting grassroots firefighters. Grassroots. The other, grassroots the people at the grassroots, right. Not the organization, but, uh, they're, they're in the right place.
[01:16:33] Grant Beebe: And, uh, so I, I don't support it, but there you go. I
[01:16:37] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: will agree with you that they're the, despite the differences between the BLM and the, uh, the forest service, I will say that some agencies are a lot better at taking care of the personnel than others. And I'm not gonna disparage any one particular AR agency or another, but I'm pretty sure everybody can get drifted.
[01:16:52] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: It's, it's, it's, it's not necessarily they're bad at it. I think that. They're [01:17:00] just different missions. And I think that also the personnel difference, the amount like sheer numbers and volume of personnel involved with some of these organizations, that's gonna be also one of those factors. But my experience with working with the Bureau Land management, it's, it's a people first organization.
[01:17:17] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: It's a boots on the ground first organization, right? I mean, yeah, it's guys drawbacks, but I tend to favor Team
[01:17:24] Grant Beebe: Yellow, if you will. Well, I do too, but, um, and, and, uh, I love the Forest Service and I started with the Forest Service, but they do, I've worked for 'em as well. But if they're the most bureaucratic and the least responsive to the field and you wanna make a super agency, we're essentially, you're gonna take the Forest Service model and, and grow it even bigger.
[01:17:40] Grant Beebe: I'm, I'm not sure that. Is a solution. I, I think one thing that happens right now, and, and you know, forest Service is great at this and, and so are we, we, there's a healthy competition, right? And Oh yeah. So, and, and that's where you get grade creep. All those things that as managers we we're supposed to not like, but you know, we'll offer more than the Forest Service because we wanna [01:18:00] steal Forest Service employees and they'll try to do it back.
[01:18:01] Grant Beebe: And, uh, that's a good thing. It's like we are in competition with one another in a healthy way. Like, oh, you know, you know what they're doing, they're doing that, that makes perfect sense. And Forest Service does it all the time. It's like, holy crap, how did they get away with that? How come we can't do that and we will try to pursue it?
[01:18:15] Grant Beebe: So I think there's part of that, if you've got one monolithic agency, you, you're not gonna have that. You're not have competition among the agencies trying to make lives better for, for, for their employees because they're, because frankly they're trying to steal 'em. Mm-hmm. Um, so just that alone, that competition among the agencies is reason enough to keep it, to keep it dispersed.
[01:18:32] Grant Beebe: Cuz uh, cuz yeah, there's a lot, there's a lot of benefit there to having people, you know, do things independently, figure things out for themselves and, and offer it up to their partners. Um, That's how we progress. Oh, absolutely. Yeah. If you just had Ford and no GM cars would be a lot crappier. Yes, they would.
[01:18:48] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: And I'm kind of torn on this whole subject about a national fire agency because of exactly what you just said. Mm-hmm. Like thinking about it in the, uh, the, the grand scheme of things. Yeah. You could solve a lot of these problems with some agreements or [01:19:00] memorandums of understanding or whatever you wanna throw out there.
[01:19:02] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: Right. But in reality is adding more bureau bureaucrat style stuff, like b more bureaucracy, is that really the answer? Because we may end up getting that, especially if it's managed by a bigger department, say like Department of Homeland Security or something like that. Right, right. So it's gonna come with good or bad, but I'm kind of indifferent to either way.
[01:19:22] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: Yeah. I, I just don't understand the, the pros and cons.
[01:19:24] Grant Beebe: You hear, you hear a lot cuz I'm at the fire center and we have five different agent major agencies that are doing stuff and they'll say, well, why do you need five different agents? Why do you know, why is there a phish person and a B LM person and a and a b i a person?
[01:19:35] Grant Beebe: Why don't you just have one person. Because if you had one agency, you would need a, you would need a National Fire Service slash BIA person to deal with the bia. You would need a National Fire Service, fish and Wildlife service person to deal with the Fish and Wildlife Service. You would need, you would need the exact same organization.
[01:19:51] Grant Beebe: You would just be telling, you would be telling, you would be calling them something different. Right. So you would have the same bureau, you'd have the same bureaucracy even more. Mm-hmm. [01:20:00] Uh, because you would need the same number of people really to manage it. Because frankly, the same person can't be managing all of fires on B L M who's managing tribal interests specific to, to the BIA program.
[01:20:10] Grant Beebe: Um, so I think a lot of, a lot of the, you know, the quote efficiencies that people see are really a lose. Cuz you would, you would need the same sorts of staff, just, they'd just be working for, you know, a single, a single boss, some cabinet level person who may or may not have the interests of firefighters at heart.
[01:20:26] Grant Beebe: You know, if it's something like, something like a FEMA model, uh, I'm just not sure that firefighters would see a, a better representation of their interests up at that level in that kind of bureaucracy. But, uh, you know, it may happen to us. Somebody may tell us to do it and, uh, and I guess we'll see. But, uh, cuz I do, I hear the same conversation and I, and I know there are people who, who lobby for it.
[01:20:49] Grant Beebe: I just, uh, I'm not a, I'm not a fan.
[01:20:53] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: Oh, I mean, there, there's a lot and there's a lot of complexity and nuance with this. And there's no like silver bullet or [01:21:00] one size fits all solution for any of the problems that we have across the United States, particular to wildland firefighting or fuels management or whatever.
[01:21:08] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: But it's little chunks at a time. I think it's gonna be like Right, the best way to fix
[01:21:14] Grant Beebe: it. Right. Progress. Progress is incremental. Absolutely. We shouldn't, shouldn't expect, um, whole hog solutions overnight. I Oh yeah. And it's, it's
[01:21:21] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: like, uh, like the state agencies and the private contractor world and all these other cooperators that work with us on federal incidents and they're, we've had some detractors with the efforts from grassroots, not the grassroots firefighters, but the grassroots wildland firefighters, the organization, um, saying like, well, what about contractors?
[01:21:39] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: What about state? It's, it's not our mission. One, we are very specific and very keyed into one particular element of what we're trying to change. Right. And that's federal wildland fir fire firefighting. Now, you even kind of alluded to it yourself in that previous conversation with the fact that a rising tide will raise all shifts, just like the Forest Service and the Bureau of [01:22:00] Land Management is competing each other for stealing each other's employees.
[01:22:03] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: Well now, The agencies and the federal government side set the standard, then everybody naturally has to go, you know, a rising tide raises alt ships. So
[01:22:13] Grant Beebe: potentially I, you know, potentially, yeah, in, I'm from Idaho and I, I don't see Idaho Department of Lands competing with the Federal Pay scale, but, um, maybe, but they will.
[01:22:24] Grant Beebe: They've always been below and so they probably always will, but, uh, but maybe not always, but, but, um, they, you know, in effect they become the minor leagues, the feeder crew. Um, that's, that's been the case for Idaho Department of Lands for, for some time. For folks who wanted to move for higher pay, they would have to get outta IDL and move into some other agency.
[01:22:46] Grant Beebe: Uh, it depends on the state, you know, uh, some states outcompete us. I don't think that necessarily means that everybody from the Fed side will, will automatically go work for Cal Fire or, or Washington the same way. Those IDL folks won't automatically come to work for us because we pay more. [01:23:00] But, uh, it's definitely creates a tension in the system.
[01:23:01] Grant Beebe: And I, and I think you, I think you're right, there will be economic pressure on those other agencies to, to raise their pay. And, and it has been felt even in Idaho, which is, which is a, a pretty, um, a pretty, uh, how to describe it. They're, they're pretty bullish on, on pay generally just for, for state employees.
[01:23:21] Grant Beebe: Uh, but they're having to catch up too, cuz you know, the world's an expensive place these
[01:23:24] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: days. And that it is my friend. All right. So topic and concern number two. So we have a problem affecting the workforce with mental health, substance abuse, and suicide. This problem is indiscriminate to agency, department, race, gender, rank, region, or any other demographic.
[01:23:40] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: And many will argue that it has entered a mental health state of crisis. What is being done to assist the boots on the ground with this other, I'm gonna use this term again, elephant in the room issue. Yeah. So yeah, the mental health crisis, uh, I mean, is the, are the agencies aware of the issues that are just running rampant within our ranks?[01:24:00]
[01:24:00] Grant Beebe: Um,
[01:24:01] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: I know that's hard to say because so, so yes, you have that. How do you
[01:24:05] Grant Beebe: define that without endorsing all the language you use? I'd say yes. So, um, but um, So for one, let's, let's, let's dissect this a little bit. Um, we have, you know, by tradition, a culture that maybe has not been as open to asking for, you know, individuals less, less interested in asking for assistance than they might otherwise be.
[01:24:27] Grant Beebe: And that's definitely a cultural thing. That's a cultural thing. I, I hate to just throw out stereotypes and, and just, you know, it's a stereotype for reason though. That's a thing. Yeah. Maybe let's say it's true. Uh, because, because I think in a lot of these cases you can just, you can act as if it's true because it, because even if it's, even if it's only partly true, you might as well act that way.
[01:24:44] Grant Beebe: Suicide's a great example. We don't have really good data on suicide rates among wild and firefighters cuz we get lumped in, we wildland fire tends to get lumped in with, um, other fire or people who sometimes respond to wildland fire. And so the numbers tend to get conflated [01:25:00] and it's really hard to know.
[01:25:01] Grant Beebe: Um, I have a person, Patty, Dr. Patty O'Brien on my staff Yeah. Who's amazing. And she's done, you know, as much work on this as anybody else. And, um, and I'll just put a plug in for more science that we need, we need to know a lot more about our firefighting workforce and I, and I'm gonna say firefighting in the broadest sense.
[01:25:19] Grant Beebe: Let's include dispatchers, everybody in the organization because we know the stresses of the job apply to everybody. But, um, we need to know a lot more so that we can intervene in the way that we want to intervene. You know, mi being mindful of, of. Um, individual differences, but, but I think we need, we need frankly more data to back up the kind of stuff you just said.
[01:25:39] Grant Beebe: So, suicide rates, for instance, among wildland fire, they get conflated with, with other wildland responders who might be EMTs, might be urban departments who see much different stuff frankly, than we do in the wildland fire community. Mm-hmm. We go through trauma different from the typical trauma that, um, say somebody in an urban wildland fire.[01:26:00]
[01:26:00] Grant Beebe: Wildland fire and Urban Fire Department might see, for instance, coming upon excellent scenes, right? Yeah. So, so there is a difference there. And so I think when we, we talk about interventions, we wanna be, wanna be confident that, you know, the data is good, but, but the data is what it is. Patty has seen that, you know, we look a lot like, um, our demographic.
[01:26:19] Grant Beebe: Um, and, and so our demographic, you know, we're 80%, 80% white male, let's just say it, you know, call it for whatever it is. It's something like that, right? Yeah. And if you look. If you look at, um, our age group, our age group, no, I'm not in that age group anymore, but if I were, that would be me. So if you look at, if you look at at, um, the cohort that you really wanna compare to, it'd be 20 to 50 year old white males who live in the west, who, um, enjoy outdoor pursuits, maybe own a gun, blah, blah, blah.
[01:26:46] Grant Beebe: There. That's a different cohort from just the general population at Right. The American population. Specific breeded people. Totally. And when you, and so when you start making comparisons about substance abuse, about suicide rates, about suicide ideation and all this [01:27:00] kinda stuff, you should, you should first say, well, what exactly, who are we comparing to?
[01:27:03] Grant Beebe: Because comparing to grandma, comparing to binge drinking between grandma and there is no comparison. There is no comparison. Right. Grandma doesn't binge drink. So, so first off, I think we wanna say, all right, how much different from the normal, that normal demographic are we? And, and then let's assume that we are different, that we have specific stresses that are, that are, that are leading folks to, to substance abuse, to alcohol abuse, to, to, um, suicidal thoughts.
[01:27:27] Grant Beebe: Let's act as if that's true. But I think the data, the data aren't as crazy high as sometimes are portrayed that, that, um, suicide for instance, is a great example, is like how, you know, Personally, I've had, you know, a couple folks in my organization, um, kill themselves and, you know, one is too many, but I, but I think we do wanna be careful about, about, um, portraying problems in the proper way.
[01:27:50] Grant Beebe: So that's, that's just my introduction. So, um, we know we have high rates of binge drinking, we have high rates of alcohol use, we have [01:28:00] high, higher than we need rates of suicidal thoughts of, of suicidal attempts. Um, are they outrageous compared to the total? Demographic that we're, we should be compared to, maybe not, but, um, we, we don't know at the same time.
[01:28:15] Grant Beebe: And we know that that age group, that that 20 to 50 year old white male living in the west with a gun is the most at risk, has a, has a super high suicide rate. So, so we might just look like the other folks in similar professions out in the west. Um, but, but it might not necessarily be the wildland fire that's doing it.
[01:28:33] Grant Beebe: Maybe, um, the people who attracted wildland fire also have those tendencies. So it's like chicken and egg kind of stuff. So, so what are, what are we doing? We gotta acknowledge one that, that is so that, that, um, that that tendency is high in that demographic in our firefighters, in our veteran firefighters.
[01:28:49] Grant Beebe: Mm-hmm. Um, we have specific stressors that, that are, um, greater than other people experience. The, the risk of fire, the, it's, you know, risk of turnover, the, um, bad things that happen to our [01:29:00] friends. Um, the risk of bad things happening to our friends, the time away from family, the time away from home, uh, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera.
[01:29:07] Grant Beebe: We have all the stressors, so Absolutely. Do we need to intervene? Absolutely. Have we been? Yes, we have. We've been working, uh, post-traumatic stuff really well for, for a while. Right. Cism kind of interventions. Mm-hmm. Critical instance, stress management. We have people who do that. We have contractors who help us.
[01:29:24] Grant Beebe: We have peer, I wanna say that the
[01:29:24] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: b l m management has pretty much been a pioneer in that. I wanna
[01:29:28] Grant Beebe: say, um, absolutely. Yeah. And, you know, I'll put a plug in for the three folks who have gotten us where we are. And Nelda St. Clair, who is, who really shout out to Nelda, really kick us off. Shout out to Nelda, um, Bo Ro and then, um, Patty O'Brien, who's, who's, you know, licensed, uh, clinical.
[01:29:44] Grant Beebe: Uh, psychologist and, and also a firefighter or former firefighter. So, um, so great work by all those folks to get us where we are now and, and especially in the trauma side of things, when bad things happen, the, the part that it took longer to get to was getting to [01:30:00] people before, before the trauma happens and give them the tools to deal with stuff.
[01:30:03] Grant Beebe: Mm-hmm. And, and stuff Could be stuff, could be trauma or stuff could be just going off on your own for the winter because you've been cut loose from your work and, and your, and your peers and your
[01:30:13] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: partner's. The worst time of year is sitting idle and going from 120 miles an hour, one direction to practically reverse.
[01:30:19] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: It's hard, it gets worse every season for me at
[01:30:21] Grant Beebe: least. And I don't know about you, but the people I know who've killed themselves have killed themselves in the offseason for the most part in the off season, right? Yeah. And, and it's not, it's not in season when it happens. And so the, that is a particular stressor where your mission.
[01:30:32] Grant Beebe: Disappeared. I don't know if you're special forces, you know, your mission doesn't disappear in, in October. You Yeah. You're training for the next cycle. You're training for the next cycle, right? So, so we cut loose people and, uh, and we leave 'em to their own devices. And maybe we check in on 'em, but, but traditionally we haven't, and then we just expect 'em to show up back in the spring.
[01:30:49] Grant Beebe: Um, you know, we need to be way more mindful of what happens when, when the fire department bell stops going off. Um, so, so that's all great. We're doing, we're doing more [01:31:00] resilience work with folks. We're having people go out and visit every firefighter in their stations and talk about issues, open up issues, um, destigmatize seeking mental health.
[01:31:09] Grant Beebe: I mean, we know that, we know that kids these days, I'm gonna say kids these days, but we know that young folks coming into this, coming into the workforce these days have different expectations of mental health investments. I mean, hell, my kids in high school have daily mental health check-ins. They've got counselors, they've got suicide prevention materials.
[01:31:25] Grant Beebe: I mean, mental health. Yeah. I had none of that shit when I was growing up. Mental. The mental health crisis is not ours. The mental health crisis is the worlds and the mental health crisis is America's, I mean, we have incredibly high suicide rates compared to where we were before, across the board. So we're part of it, and we have stressors that we need to deal with, but we're part of a bigger trend, which is, which is critical mental health issues across, across the, across the culture.
[01:31:48] Grant Beebe: Um, but people come in with an expectations that we're gonna talk about it. Perfect people that come in with the expectations, we're gonna, we're gonna help them take care of it. We're gonna, you know, provide services where it's, where it's, where it's appropriate, or provide [01:32:00] insurance where they can, you know, get their own counselor and, and, you know, be portable and, and take care of themselves.
[01:32:05] Grant Beebe: You know, all of the above kind of approaches really what we're after. The infrastructure log has given us an opportunity to have more discussions about making a bigger investment in that, in that piece of the program. Um, I wrote some of that actually. Well, good, good, good job. So, uh, unfortunately we haven't funded it all yet, but, um, but it's, yeah, but we're making, we're making a better effort to provide better services across the industry.
[01:32:27] Grant Beebe: I'll just say the, you know, the industry, the Forest Service than the DOI agencies, beyond's been on the forefront. A lot of that. Proud to be there. Don't wanna slow down. I think this is one of those cases where we wanna keep pushing the envelope and, and keep listening to the field and, and hearing from folks what's working, what's not, what they wanna see more of, what they wanna see less of.
[01:32:46] Grant Beebe: Patty's done a lot of that, of pulling folks to say, Hey, I've got all these ideas about things I should do as a specialist for the bm. What do you think I should do? Um, so she's gonna do more of that, um, to really get a feel for, for people that we don't [01:33:00] necessarily like. I don't, I don't really understand your basic 25 year old.
[01:33:02] Grant Beebe: I mean, I, you know, I admit freely that I don't, so I wanna hear from those guys. All right. What do you, what do you want? Um, what do you expect? No one also that it's not for everybody. Yeah. It's like, we are not gonna put everybody through mandatory blah, blah, blah. Cuz that's the first way to kill a program, is to make it one size fits all and make it cheesy and make it a requirement or death by PowerPoint, which everybody is death by PowerPoint.
[01:33:24] Grant Beebe: Yeah. I don't wanna do that to people. Yeah. It's like we wanna make it meaningful and make it useful, and if it's not, then we shouldn't do it. So, um, I'm not into window dressing. It's like, it's gotta be real, it's gotta be beneficial. The way to do that is really to meet people where they are, hear what they hear, what their ideas are, and invest in it.
[01:33:39] Grant Beebe: Um, that's been a great model for us in the blm and we're gonna keep pushing it.
[01:33:44] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: And that's another thing too. It's just like that you, you, you said it right there. It's like there's no one size fits, fits all solution for this. There's no silver bullet for this, right? It's just like our fuels problem and our suppression stuff, right?
[01:33:56] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: All that stuff. There's not a one size fits all solution for that. And it's, it's human [01:34:00] nature in human nature is in inherently
[01:34:02] Grant Beebe: complex. But, but let me say this. There is, there is, there is some universal solution that I'm gonna, that I'm gonna propose. Oh, shoot away man. Go ahead. Okay. Pay people better because what do we know?
[01:34:12] Grant Beebe: One of the prime stressors in life is not having enough money, right? I didn't said it. I got out of it. He has a finance there. Alright? One of pay people better give 'em benefits so they don't have to worry about, you know, how they're gonna pay their medical bills and they're gonna be taken care of. Give them and give 'em a career.
[01:34:24] Grant Beebe: So let 'em work longer if they want to let 'em work longer so that they, you know, they know that they're gonna be taken care of. They get a paycheck coming in. So more career opportunities, more permanent jobs and, you know, better benefits. So, so health benefits that don't go away in the, in the wintertime like they have in the past for our temporary employees.
[01:34:41] Grant Beebe: Yes. And then yes, they want you to expand on that one and then know that they have a job in the spring that they don't have to reapply and just hope that they get picked up again. So, um, let's take care of some of those stretchers. And then finally, let's make it possible that people don't have to take Avery fire assignment.
[01:34:55] Grant Beebe: That we have enough bandwidth out there that people can turn some assignments down, go to a [01:35:00] party, go to, go to take the boat out, you know, do whatever the soccer or football game do that, uh, all the above, right? Um, so let's make life, uh, more, more part of. You know, being a wildland firefighter shouldn't be who you are.
[01:35:13] Grant Beebe: It should be what you do. And, uh, it should make, it should contribute to who you are as a person, right? It helps make you, but it isn't you. And so, uh, I mean, that's really the goal is that it's not all consuming that people can actually have a life outside of their job. Uh, it seems crazy, but, uh, I think we can achieve that piece.
[01:35:31] Grant Beebe: Oh yeah. No, I think it's
[01:35:32] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: a, and and yeah, you said it perfectly right there. I mean, that, that financial stress and all the other things, it's more complex than just throwing money at a problem. You can't do that. It doesn't work. Now, if you were to appropriate some of these funds to, you know, paying people to where they don't have to worry so much about their finances or where they're gonna get their next meal from in the winter, and also the long-term benefits.
[01:35:53] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: I'm not talking about like temp buyback, if that's going to be a thing ever. I know it's not a part of the b i l and it may or may not [01:36:00] be included in the upcoming presidential budget talks. That's a different subject though. Um, all of these things, the mental health programs too, like it's something as simple as insurance for a temporary seasonal through the.
[01:36:14] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: That would've changed my entire life as a seasonal when I was coming
[01:36:17] Grant Beebe: up through the ranks. Did you opt in when you were a temp? Uh,
[01:36:21] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: before I was ineligible cause it didn't exist, but mm-hmm. A little bit longer in my career it was available,
[01:36:28] Grant Beebe: so. Right, right. Since that's a fairly recent development. When I was a temp, it didn't exist that you could even buy into, into, into health insurance.
[01:36:35] Grant Beebe: You don't get, you don't buy into retirement, but you can buy into health insurance. Yep. The, the downside of that for temp is that you have to pay both. You have to pay both portions in the wintertime. Um, and frankly, uh, I'm gonna, I'm gonna, I'm gonna stereotype people, but folks who are less than, you know, younger than 26 in Obamacare, you, you can be on your parents' health insurance, so sometimes people don't opt in.
[01:36:56] Grant Beebe: I forget what our rate is for opting in. It's not very high. It can't be very [01:37:00] high. Yeah. It's not very high because people don't, frankly don't see the benefit to it. Right. Um, so they, they won't opt into the health insurance cuz you know, by the time you sign up, you know, your season's, you know, halfway over or something like that.
[01:37:09] Grant Beebe: So I can only imagine, but it is, but it is out there. What would be better is if, um, they didn't have to pay the employee, uh, or the employer portion in the wintertime when they're laid off.
[01:37:20] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: Uh, better kinda, kinda setting it up to where it's like, uh, the perm seasonals. So they just pay their double portion when they come back Yes.
[01:37:26] Grant Beebe: And then get, and then get paid back. Yeah. Yes. Um, we don't, we don't have the ability right now. We just, I wish we did fairly recently. We got the ability to even keep 'em on the rolls for, for health and or put 'em on the roles for health insurance and all, um, you know, the better option, which is what we are pursuing.
[01:37:40] Grant Beebe: Um, Making people not be temps. So let's get rid of temps. Um, now people like being temporary sometimes cuz they're going to school cuz you know, blah blah, blah. I only wanna work so many months. Uh, I think one thing that is within our control is, um, the terms of a, of a career seasonal appointment, right?
[01:37:59] Grant Beebe: So [01:38:00] typically in the blm we've done 13, 13 and thirteens. We've done, you know, six months in a day. Uh, so you're guaranteed six months a day as a w e we call 'em mm-hmm. While, while actually employed. Um, so, so our appointments have always been six months, no shorter. Uh, we need to pursue shorter, shorter appointments so the people can, you know, come in as a career seasonal appointment, come in for a shorter period of time and, and lay off and go to school, for instance.
[01:38:24] Grant Beebe: I, I think that would be a better option than having people be temps. But ultimately, one of the goals from 2019 on what we've been doing is trying to say we need fewer temps and way more career seasonal and way more PFT people we need. Uh, 80% of our workforce to be either career seasonal or permanent full-time.
[01:38:43] Grant Beebe: And then 20% of our workforce be temps. So we give way more of our people, um, solidity, we give them, we give 'em benefits that carry over. We give them retirement benefits, you know, if they want. Um, and, and stop hiring people over and over again into temps. Uh, it's not the [01:39:00] appropriate, it's not the appropriate hiring mechanism for the, for the, for the work we have, frankly.
[01:39:03] Grant Beebe: It's just like, it's an old model. So we're trying to get, it's antiquated. Yeah, it's antiquated. And we've been, we've been pushing that way. Um, there's still, there's still always gonna be plays for temps. You know, it's, it's more nimble. People can get their foot in the door and try it out and see if they like it, all that kind of thing.
[01:39:17] Grant Beebe: But, um, we think we have way too many of 'em. And that has been a conscious in. On the parts of, really, of, of Congress and, and the administrations to, to transform our workforce into a more permanent workforce that is not bill related, that is normal. That is independent. Yeah. That is independent. And we've been working on it for a while.
[01:39:33] Grant Beebe: We were, same way, we were working on making Avery engine captain in the BLM GS eight, the same way we said Avery engine captain should be offered permanent full-time status if they wanted Avery GS eight in the hotshot ranks. Avery GS nine in hotshot ranks for. Should be offered permanent full-time status.
[01:39:48] Grant Beebe: Every GS eight in the bureau, if we've got meaningful work form, should be offered the opportunity to be permanent. We haven't got there. Some people frankly don't want it. And that's didn't, you know, didn't 18 and eight is my cap. Totally. Yeah. And that's [01:40:00] all well and good, but for folks who want it, we should offer it.
[01:40:02] Grant Beebe: Um, and we're still working that, I'm still, I still, we're still offering our pilots. They're GS 12 s, we're still offering them permanent full-time status. Not sure if they're gonna take us up on it, but, uh, that should be, that should be an expectation of employees when they reach a certain point that if they wanna be permanent year round, they can be.
[01:40:17] Grant Beebe: That's a good thing. I think that's
[01:40:18] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: a pushing it towards like a, a, a better future for all of us, quite frankly. Absolutely. Um, so going back to the mental health thing, so the B L L B I L B L M, geez, I can't talk right now. The B I l uh, provided a bunch of funding to research and development improvement of mental health programs across all agencies.
[01:40:36] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: Uh, what's something new that the b l M will be implementing with these funds? And we mentioned earlier that we didn't have a lot of data. Is there any funding going to the data to, uh, these mental health, uh, studies?
[01:40:47] Grant Beebe: The, um, there is effort going into the data. So there, there are a couple, couple different groups that are interested in, in exploring mental health and really pushing the envelope on that.
[01:40:56] Grant Beebe: One of 'em, I won't even, I won't even go into it, but it doesn't require [01:41:00] necessarily money, it's just effort. Um, and even our joint fire science program that we have at the fire center, Is getting more into firefighter health and wellness and, and let's just, let's just broaden it out to say firefighter health and wellness, mental health being a key part of it.
[01:41:12] Grant Beebe: But, uh, we have a whole bunch of other things we need to understand about firefighters. It's much more than just the mental health component. Totally. Uh, we want a better, better, um, it's one of your questions. We need a better foundation for how we do work, rest, you know, and how we do, how we do tours.
[01:41:25] Grant Beebe: Mm-hmm. We need better nutrition foundations. We need better, all sorts of better data on, on how this life drives you into the ground or doesn't. You know, we, because we don't frankly know a lot of it, um, we don't know a lot about smoke exposure, frankly. We should know more. It's hard to do. It's hard to, it's hard to figure.
[01:41:41] Grant Beebe: So there's a lot of, there's a lot of new emphasis on that, or renewed emphasis on that and, and more organized emphasis on firefighter health and wellness of all sorts. Uh, in the infrastructure law, the Forest Service took some of that money and used it for investments in mental health on the D O I side.
[01:41:58] Grant Beebe: Um, we were [01:42:00] actually instructed not to, um, not to use bill funds for that. And so we carved out some other funds. So for instance, uh, Dr. Patty. Um, we have a whole little department at our, at our bureau that's now funded out of these new, out of these funds that are designated for mental health and wellness.
[01:42:17] Grant Beebe: Um, uh, the new piece that, uh, we've also funded at the d o I level that hasn't been stood up yet is, is, uh, trauma services contract for the, for the backend of when back bad things happen after Cism is over and people need follow on care. Yeah. People follow stuff, people, their families. Um, so, so, um, that has not been light yet.
[01:42:38] Grant Beebe: That contract has not been yet, yet, but it's, it's kind of the thing that, uh, people have found that employee, e a p, those kinds of services, that longer term services that are your typical government services don't necessarily do that well. So, um, so that is a new thing that, that will be fund. By some of this money we set aside, but it's not infrastructure money per se.
[01:42:57] Grant Beebe: And then in the president's budget is this whole new [01:43:00] 10 million investment on the D O I side. Uh, just on the, do I side another 10 million on the Forest Service side to make more permanent of kind of a, a mental health program. Um, the kinda like with the
[01:43:11] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: transition into Aspire from the previous e a p program,
[01:43:15] Grant Beebe: um, yeah, so Aspire is there, and Aspire always exists and, and people can take its take up, you know, use its services.
[01:43:21] Grant Beebe: Sometimes E a P or Aspire works for people. Sometimes it doesn't. It's oftentimes underutilized though. Uh, it is. And they, and they're all sorts of services they offer there. They also limit to how many times you can use those services before you have to transition to your own, uh, your own health services, right?
[01:43:36] Grant Beebe: Mm-hmm. Your own, like if you find a counselor, Through e a p that you, that you like, um, I think you only get so many visits and then you have to transition to your own insurance, which is not the end of the world, but you have to have insurance to do that. Yeah. So, um, so the, there'll be, there'll be this 10 million, uh, in the president's budget for, um, uh, more of a firefighter mental health program.
[01:43:55] Grant Beebe: There was a summit last week that the d o I and the Forest Service hosted to really, [01:44:00] um, figure out what that program should look like, what people think they wanted from that program. And that kind of scoping is still out there. Again, we're waiting for that piece. We're waiting for Congress to act on that, to g to give us the funding to do that.
[01:44:14] Grant Beebe: But, um, regardless, you know, the BLM s charging ahead and investing in our people to really, um, help the bureau bring services to folks at the ground level, at the district level. And that's, that's. Dr. Patty's job.
[01:44:28] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: And that's another thing too, I think there's a lot of data component that could be pulled out of programs like this, because if we don't know how are we gonna direct an agency into bettering the boots on the ground if we don't know the data?
[01:44:38] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: I mean, historically we haven't hit track of it. You even said that. But now we're just now starting. It's
[01:44:45] Grant Beebe: Yeah. It's kind of anecdotal still. Yeah. It's anecdotal, it's people, people calling in and saying this and that. And, you know, some of the best data on, on suicide is from cdc d c, right. And there's like, well, you know, where, where is there good data that we can plumb?
[01:44:57] Grant Beebe: So, you know, Patty's got some of the best data. I think there's some [01:45:00] other folks out there who have some data. I think we need a more concerted effort to really know what we're shooting at. I mean, it shouldn't stop us from getting started, but, um, but I'm into, into measuring performance. Right. And it's like, you, you can't do that without knowing what you're shooting at.
[01:45:13] Grant Beebe: And, uh, you doubles into details. I totally. And how do you know you're succeeding if you, if you actually don't know what your measures of success are? So that's a challenge.
[01:45:21] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: That's a good one right there. That's, that's huge right there. You gotta know what your goals are and you gotta have the data to back it up.
[01:45:27] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: Right. Totally. So we'll see where it goes. So number three, topic and concern. And this is gonna be, uh, going toward the tail end of the episode here. Mm-hmm. So I know you gotta get outta here pretty soon. Um, so number three, topic and concern is operational changes, concerns, and suggestions. So, so these are some of the issues that, uh, and concerns that the boots on the ground have brought up when it comes to being able to effectively accomplish their mission with suppression and fuels management.
[01:45:50] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: And at the top of that list, there's a lot of questions about aviation. Hmm. So, Where do you see the B L M aviation programs changing in the, changing the [01:46:00] most in the next 10 years?
[01:46:03] Grant Beebe: Uh, well, I see, um, the biggest change is gonna be u a s is gonna be, um, how the doi, uh, pushes forward and especially the, the b l m pushes forward with u a s.
[01:46:13] Grant Beebe: Um, We know that, that, um, we don't call 'em drones anymore. So, so unru, air uncured aircraft is the, is the current term, right? So uncured aircraft are gonna take on, uh, bigger and bigger workload for the, for the bureau and, and in fire to some degree. Um, we're not gonna replace, you know, all, all staffed aircraft with, with unstaffed, but, um, they're gonna do a lot, we're gonna do a lot more burning with, you know, P S D P S D machine drones.
[01:46:39] Grant Beebe: And, uh, and we have a lot more, um, high, let's see, high capability aircraft out there. In the Uua s world, we're driving towards a new kind of, uh, uncured aircraft. Not the, not the cheap throwaway, you know, ones that we had before, but they're gonna, they're gonna stay in the air longer, they're gonna have more capacity, they're gonna have more [01:47:00] capabil.
[01:47:00] Grant Beebe: They're gonna require different skills from the people who operate 'em. So it looks more like an aircraft and less like a toy. So the people who are flying drones on fires and on resource projects are gonna be highly skilled. They're gonna be pilots and they're gonna know what they're doing so they don't crash into, people don't crash into other aircraft.
[01:47:16] Grant Beebe: Right. It's, it's, it's a profession. It is not a, it's not a hobby. You need a license, you gotta, you part 1 0 7 for a reason. This is right. This is not your, uh, this is not your, your, um, you know, your mall drone that you're gonna fly around the living room. So, so it's gonna take a whole nother level of commitment from the bureau to train folks.
[01:47:33] Grant Beebe: And, and we've got, we've got, uh, u a s specialists and on my shop, my aviation shop who're working on this stuff. So plan for how we train people, how we keep 'em current, where, where pilots are located in the organization and what their job duties are. UAS is gonna be part of the 4 56 series. So it's gonna be like a UAS pilot is gonna be part of that series.
[01:47:52] Grant Beebe: Uh, you know, our, our ideal is really, um, you know, we probably have some dedicated program folks at the state level who help manage, [01:48:00] um, drone usage within states. Mm-hmm. For resource work and for firework work. There's, there's way more potential, frankly, in the, on the resource side of the house than there is in the fire side of the house for, for drones.
[01:48:09] Grant Beebe: And they're also alternatives to, to using u a s. It's not the answer for everything. No. There's the time and a
[01:48:14] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: place don think you'll ever remove the human element from fire.
[01:48:17] Grant Beebe: And frankly, we've got, we've got satellites that can do what some people think they need Uua s to do. Right. So there's, there's, or there's data out there already.
[01:48:24] Grant Beebe: But yeah, regardless, we need, we need specialists who are gonna manage this stuff at the regional level. All the, all the drone usage. We need fire teams who can go out and do the things like burning out, you know, division D. Um, so that's gonna be, that's gonna be a, a set of skills that is gonna be in high demand.
[01:48:40] Grant Beebe: And, and frankly, cross-training some folks to do that stuff has been a good model and we, we see that continuing to some degree. Mm-hmm. But, uh, it's hard to be a hotshot soup and to be a drone pilot at the same time, you gotta be one or the other. So, um, we're gonna have to get more specialized, but that's, that's the big investment I see is both in aircraft and the people to pilot 'em and the people to keep 'em organized.
[01:48:58] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: Gotcha. And now [01:49:00] second question to that, I guess is, uh, the contracting issues that we've been having. I know this is more of a forest service kind of question as far as the contracting for, uh, and it, it may have changed since the last time I've looked into the topics, so forgive me if this is an old question, but I don't understand.
[01:49:14] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: There was some issues. Light and medium ship availability for CNS and exclusive use. And I, I, I really don't know the ins and outs of this one, but as far as your knowledge, how could you explain that to address some of the concerns for the boots on the ground, especially the aviation folks? Um, what was it?
[01:49:32] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: Type one ships?
[01:49:33] Grant Beebe: Yeah. Well, so there's, so there's clearly a type one issue. So, so, so basically, um, let me think, how can we say this? So type two s generally as a, as a class are kind of, they're gonna get pushed to the middle. Like the, there are, we're having a challenge keeping some of the older type two s in the air, frankly.
[01:49:54] Grant Beebe: And so and so we're, all of us are really looking for the new models. That are gonna be the aircraft that we [01:50:00] have going into the future. The next gen airframe, if you will, we're the next gen Yeah. Rotor wing, right? Yeah. So, so in the rotor world, um, you know, the next gen looks really expensive. So it's like, all right, how are we, how are we gonna get to, what do we wanna get to?
[01:50:12] Grant Beebe: And, and how are we gonna get there? And, uh, we got capabilities we need, we need, we need solid aircraft that, you know, people can repel from. For instance, we don't wanna be flying in pieces of junk. So, um, this is, you know, I know you had one of your questions in there about type one aircraft in, in the B l m we contracted one seven years ago now to, um, to work outta the Boise.
[01:50:32] Grant Beebe: Um, airport there and be it a crude type one aircraft didn't fit in with the for service policy, but, um, BLM checked out the aircraft that we contracted, thought it was safe, thought it'd offered capabilities that we wanted to use, contracted it for a five year cycle. And an now we're on our second five year cycle.
[01:50:49] Grant Beebe: Kind of. It's kinda what we do is, um, look for capabilities we want and see if we can do that operation safely, even though it's a type one ship tech. You know, forest Service doesn't like flying [01:51:00] in type one ships for reasons of their own. Yeah. They use type one s for bucket work only. Um, but you'll see state of Colorado, state of California, both of them contracting brand new, you know, civilian versions of black hawks.
[01:51:11] Grant Beebe: Um, super expensive. But I think the industry is headed that way into, into, into bigger investments in aviation. And, uh, I think, you know, b LMS trying to keep up with that and recognize that the same old type two ships that we've been using in the past might not always be available to us. We need to start pushing the envelope a little bit.
[01:51:28] Grant Beebe: I know the foresters thinking the same way, but maybe not quite the same mm-hmm. Mindset. But, um, we're all looking at the same thing. How do we add capacity, capability effectively, uh, at a price we can afford? And if we can't afford it, then we have to ask Congress for money to, to make it happen, which is never easy actually.
[01:51:45] Grant Beebe: Sometimes aviation's the easiest thing to ask for cuz what people, what do people see on the news? You know? Yeah. They, they see, they see re retard drops and sky grains. Yep. And so sometimes aviation is the big ticket item that people are willing to fund. You know, unfortunately ahead of firefighter salaries, uh, I wish the world were not.
[01:51:58] Grant Beebe: So cuz uh, you know [01:52:00] what? Gimme firefighter salaries. Was bang toys second. Yeah.
[01:52:03] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: Wait, hasn't that always been like the case with congressional spending though? It's like they all want the Tonka trucks and the fancy new toy, but they don't wanna take care of the operator.
[01:52:11] Grant Beebe: Uh, I can't say that historically. I can't say that out loud.
[01:52:14] Grant Beebe: I can't say that, but, uh, yeah, I mean, I, I do think it's, it tends to, it tends to be the flashier things that sometimes raise interest and uh, you know, hopefully firefighter salaries are the flashy thing this time. Mm-hmm.
[01:52:25] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: So that answers my question about the, uh, the crew, which I'm not going to mention the, uh, name of the crew cuz you kind of went around the, uh, name of the crew with that type one ship.
[01:52:33] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: But it's the only, oh, the Boise crew. The Boise. Oh, they're, I was just wondering if
[01:52:36] Grant Beebe: you're avoiding the name of the crew. It's, no, it's, it's not a, it's not a mystery. I think they, I think they, they like being on the cutting edge as a crew. They're awesome. I've worked with them in the past and they're awesome, awesome folks.
[01:52:45] Grant Beebe: And they're staffed heavy and, uh, you know, they, they have special demands placed on them cuz they're, they're really, um, they get to travel a lot more than maybe sometimes. It is always desirable. I know a good thing. We talk about good things that happened in the Forest Service and I was talking to [01:53:00] Forcer rep Propeller last week and she was talking.
[01:53:03] Grant Beebe: Um, for service operating essentially, you know, two aircraft out of an air base, one that can stay home, one that can go hit the road so that people can rotate in between road assignments and home assignments. And I was like, huh, now that's brilliant. You know, we should be doing, how come we're not doing more of that?
[01:53:16] Grant Beebe: Yeah. And we talk about a lot about Hub and spoke where we, you know, hub people up and, uh, allow people more time to work outta their home station, do more IA work from their home unit as opposed to being on the road all the time. The downside to being the Boise hell attack is that, you know, you do have a big road component and uh, an umbilical cord stuck to that ship.
[01:53:33] Grant Beebe: Yeah. But I'd, I'd love that forest service model of, you know, one at home, one on the road and then switch back and forth and you can, you know, tailor, tailor your work assignments to your personal needs. Uh, I love that. So I'm gonna steal that and pretend it was mine. There we go.
[01:53:46] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: All right. So another question we had of aviation context is, uh, do we have a national aviation toolbox that everyone has access to?
[01:53:54] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: Uh, aviation oversight is significantly diminished in regions where F fao, where there are no FAOs on the org [01:54:00] chart, this leaves a ton of liability and accountability on managers to be dialed, which isn't always the case. A one stop shop for universal required forms and the most current policies would be very beneficial.
[01:54:12] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: This is more of a request.
[01:54:14] Grant Beebe: Yeah. And we do on the BLM side, um, so you know, a forest aviation officer, which that's the F AO reference I think. And for us, that's a unit aviation manager and we have most of those in place. We definitely have, um, state Sam's, we call 'em state aviation managers in Avery, in every BLM.
[01:54:31] Grant Beebe: Um, I, I'll say uams, we tend to have unit aviation managers in places where we have a, a, a sizable enough aviation workload to warrant it. Like Eastern Nevada. Yeah. Yeah. So we don't have, we don't have, we don't have vacancies. Where not to my a aware awareness that, um, let's think we don't have vacancies where we need people.
[01:54:52] Grant Beebe: We might have vacancies where we've figured we, we can cover it some other way, right? So some places aviation can be, uh, uh, collateral [01:55:00] duty, but, um, but where we need one, we invest in one. And, and when I talked about filling all these support roles better now, I, that's been part of the great thing that's been happening with new money from Congress.
[01:55:11] Grant Beebe: We've been able to target specific things in the bureau that we haven't been able to fund in the past, like, um, air tanker bases, which sounds silly, but we we're always staffing up air tanker bases, uh, especially seat bases with, with folks who are just coming on as adss as emergency hires and not investing in actual, actual, uh, government employees, BLM employees to come and manage something that's really critical.
[01:55:35] Grant Beebe: Yeah, you loaded an aircraft and you're making sure it's loaded, right? You're making sure it's safe to operate and fly and drop retardant, and we're dropping $70 million worth of retardant every year. Maybe we should invest in a person to actually staff that base on a full-time basis and not, uh, not just do it with, you know, whomever we can find not, not to disparage our ad workforce, but I started out as an ad's a great program.
[01:55:53] Grant Beebe: I did too, so I'm I'm with you. But, um, but you know, we got, it's got a water term solution. No, we gotta put our money where, where our mouth is [01:56:00] and use an ad for flex time, but, uh, we gotta invest in our air tanker bases. And, and that's the same with uams. We've gotta fill out the support organizations and, and we've been doing a lot of that.
[01:56:09] Grant Beebe: Okay,
[01:56:09] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: good. All right, so moving on to fuels. So we kind of brushed on this earlier, um, and I don't want to beat a dead horse with this one, but how do they plan to bolster fuels programs to meet new objectives and existing objectives without overburdening fire employee, fire employees who have already worked a thousand hour season?
[01:56:26] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: Now, now this is bordering on two things, the target goals for fuels management, and two, addressing our workforce, uh, concerns with the burnout and the too many hours, especially that whole thousand hour, 1200 hour season. And then you're asked to go, you know, IA in SoCal for Santa Ana season. Right, right.
[01:56:43] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: And then do fuels management in the off season.
[01:56:46] Grant Beebe: Yeah. Um, so I, yeah, sometimes this, you probably have a lot of Forest Service folks on this, on this call, and I, and I know the forest service is in a different place than we are, and I know they're talking more about mobilizing for, um, [01:57:00] large scale burning on some of their priority areas.
[01:57:03] Grant Beebe: Mm-hmm. And, uh, mm-hmm. Um, and I, and I think some B l m folks, some other d o I folks will probably get, um, not roped into that, but, but they'll be, they'll be, uh, you know, allowed to participate in that kind of thing based on, um, some work we're doing at the bureau levels, at the higher levels to pool some funds so that, for instance, if a forest service has a burn going on and they wanna borrow some folks from a neighboring BLM unit, they don't have to figure out how to pay 'em, that there's a pool of funding that we can dip into that they can just go without asking questions.
[01:57:32] Grant Beebe: So
[01:57:32] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: more of a ease of operations as far as like mutual assistance there between the Forest Service and
[01:57:37] Grant Beebe: BLM to make prescribed, prescribed fire. Particularly, I'm talking not fuels work generally, but prescribed fire, more like suppression and that you just, you just go and you've got a code that you can use that's kind of pre-ordained and you don't have to, you don't have to work out an agreement.
[01:57:50] Grant Beebe: And we always have neighborhood agreements like that where people can just go help their neighbors, but this would formalize it. Um, That's, that's a good thing. That's a great thing for the forester especially, um, and [01:58:00] say fish or parks who do more large scale burning than, than we do typically in the blm.
[01:58:04] Grant Beebe: Uh, not that we don't do any, but, but it's, it's more them and, uh, so, so that's a great thing to make things easier. The downside of that is if it's too easy than people will start ordering folks from all across the country, and we'll have what you describe, which is, uh, yeah, you worked, you know, four months straight on suppression and now you're gonna work another six.
[01:58:20] Grant Beebe: Traveling around doing prescribed fire, not the life we foresee for our firefighters who need a break, but people who wanna do that, we could make it easier for them to do it, you know, it it to each his own. Sometimes people really want to go out and do more work in the solar season. Sometimes people don't, and sometimes people want a little and not a lot.
[01:58:37] Grant Beebe: Um, we've gotta make room for all that stuff if we can, cuz that'll be efficient and help Forest service achieve some big goals. So that's a good thing on our side. On the B l M side, 70% of our fuels work and we're looking to treat 1.3 million acres this year. 70% of our work is handled by agreements or grants or contracts.
[01:58:52] Grant Beebe: So we are not, um, we're not that same model, we're not necessarily that same force account model that, that the forest service can be for these large [01:59:00] scale burns. Um, we, we do a lot more work with other, with kind of other mechanisms and it's not necessarily just people out, you know, lighting fires. Yeah.
[01:59:07] Grant Beebe: So, um, so it's a different workload for us typically, but, um, but you know, my goal as a, as a, as a manager is to try to make resources available to folks so that there's enough fuels work locally that people can do it if, if they've got the time and got the bandwidth and there's the need in Nevada, you can, you're done with your engine, you know, you're putting it, putting it away for the winter.
[01:59:26] Grant Beebe: Um, you can go help write some, write some burn plans or. You know, work on a contract fe fencing, go do a site inspection or go do fencing, or go paint a go paint event. Uh, you know, whatever it is. Uh, gis Yeah. Uh, you know, there's all sorts of work out there, but, um, but we wanna have enough fuel support out there across the world so that people can, can be gainfully employed in the wintertime.
[01:59:45] Grant Beebe: We don't wanna just pay people to sit around. That's, that's the kids death. No, it's horrible. It's like, we want meaningful work out there.
[01:59:51] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: So I think you'd have a stir crazy workforce if you're allow people
[01:59:54] Grant Beebe: to do that. I, I think it would be awful. And nobody, nobody wants that life. Yeah. Um, at least, at least in my mind.
[01:59:59] Grant Beebe: [02:00:00] So, um, I'm too much of a busy body. I'd go nuts. Totally. You know, you'd be causing problems for other people.
[02:00:05] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: Party him. Um, anyways, so yeah, next question. We're gonna get into hiring, and now this is one of those things that it's our, our system of hiring. I will say that the Bureau of Land Management has a much better system and more efficiencies on hiring anybody.
[02:00:23] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: Doesn't matter if you're a returnee seasonal or if you're a brand new recruit versus the Forest Service. I will say that, and that's my belief. You may or may not agree with me, but that's fine. Um, so how do we address the hiring? So one of the questions is, how do we improve the transparency and honesty with hiring and performance incentives, pay rates, benefits, and retirement when advertising these fly these, uh, fire positions?
[02:00:48] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: And now, I know I sound like a hypocrite saying this because I'm talking about hiring to the, to you, right. You're, you're. At the top practically of the Bureau of Land Management, [02:01:00] and I had an announcement last spring saying that I am going to cease all, uh, outreaches and recruitment announcements for the federal government.
[02:01:09] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: It doesn't matter which one, just because of the fact that there's been so much concern regarding pay benefits, uh, retirement, all that stuff. So I said no more. Let's talk about hiring. How do we improve this whole situation? And I know this is a large
[02:01:27] Grant Beebe: topic, right? Um, I don't, I don't know that we're any better than the Forest Service, frankly.
[02:01:31] Grant Beebe: I I, if we are, then whew. That's trouble from my
[02:01:35] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: experience. Every time I've put in for a Bureau of Land management job, I would always get an
[02:01:39] Grant Beebe: interest call. Oh, that's good. That, I mean, that's, that's, so that's step number one. I mean that, you know, if nothing else, there should be somebody you can call and say, I've applied to your district for this job.
[02:01:49] Grant Beebe: You know, what can you tell me? So, so that would be, that would be step number one. Um, you know, I know the question is talking about transparency and, and mm-hmm. Incentives, what the announcements. Yeah, but the announcements probably the problem is there's too much [02:02:00] information in there, frankly. It's like, I'm sure it's all there, but can the nor can a normal person, and by normal, I mean somebody especially new trying to, trying to figure out their, their way in the federal government.
[02:02:11] Grant Beebe: Um, can there be any way for them to actually read something that's posted on USA Jobs and understand what the hell it means? I mean, I think you or I could say, Hey, you're gonna apply for temporary job. Okay. That means you could, uh, opt into health insurance if you want. You're guaranteed, um, you know, 90 days of 90 days of employment, you're gonna do two weeks of training.
[02:02:28] Grant Beebe: And, uh, you can't work beyond six months unless Congress says it's okay. Mm-hmm. Um, you know, you or I could summarize that for people and you gotta reapply next year if you're gonna, if you wanna, if you wanna work again. Yeah. And this doesn't count towards retirement. If you decide you wanna do this as a career, I, I can do that in 30 seconds if I were talking to somebody, but if somebody's reading u USA jobs and trying to figure it out from there, that's pretty horrible.
[02:02:49] Grant Beebe: What's about word? Vomit? Holy leash. Yeah. And, and it's, it's, it's written by HR professionals, you know, because they have to, um, and I, I guess there's a
[02:02:57] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: liability threshold that you have to, like, a criteria you have to meet with [02:03:00] all the information that you advertise,
[02:03:02] Grant Beebe: right? And, and we're applying this U S USA jobs, um, model, which is really for more permanent employees, for people who are kind of, I, I wanna say, know what they're doing more.
[02:03:13] Grant Beebe: But, you know, it's more, it's more for those folks, for those folks who are, who are, who are familiar with the system than it is for people brand new, it feels like to me. Mm-hmm. And so, and so what we've done with our external affairs staff, staff is, um, because, because we do a lot of, well, we do all the temporary hiring for all the DOI bureaus, uh, out of nps e and we do much of the hiring for many of the BLM states, you know, less a couple.
[02:03:35] Grant Beebe: We do all the fire hiring for them. Um, we have an incredible external affairs staff who put out videos on how to apply. They put on videos on where job opportunities are, you know, and who to, who to contact. So really try to make common sense investments in, in messaging, especially in social media for people so that they're not, you know, we just say, oh yeah, just look at U s A jobs and put in fire and you'll see opportunities like kids of death.
[02:03:58] Grant Beebe: Good luck. Never, never gonna happen. [02:04:00] Um, just this week. We in the BLM have been pushing, um, uh, trying to hire a hundred, a hundred interns across the bureau to do all sorts of different stuff. So high school kids graduating from high school especially, and college kids who, who might wanna work in the federal government and trying to lure 'em in as interns and they would go back to school, you know, and, uh, and so I've been talking to some of my daughter's, um, uh, schoolmates in, in her high school saying, cuz I know some of 'em want, wanna do fire.
[02:04:27] Grant Beebe: And I'm saying, I'm pushing, pushing job announcements. And I'm saying, all right, you could apply to this. There are fire, there are fire jobs in here. You could work fire, go to go to forestry school or whatever you're gonna do, and then come work for us. And then when you graduate you could, you could be a, a full-time employee.
[02:04:42] Grant Beebe: But I've been trying to talk 'em through these systems like, well how do you do this? And it, and it's great for me to actually try to talk through the federal hiring system with a high school student. There is nothing better and nothing will tell you that things are tough for, for, you know, a normal human being trying to negotiate u s A jobs than trying to talk somebody through it.[02:05:00]
[02:05:00] Grant Beebe: I mean, I hope that some of those kids have got applications and, you know, fingers crossed cuz otherwise I'm a terrible teacher. But, um, it's not lost on us that this is a really cumbersome. You know, we're, we're doing our best to really explain to people and to get their applications in and then to, and then to treat their applications fairly on the far end.
[02:05:15] Grant Beebe: But people make mistakes all the time in those complicated systems. I know one of your questions is, can we get outta USA jobs? No, we can't. But nobody, yeah. There is nobody not complaining about it. There's a double negative for you. There is nobody not complaining about U S USA jobs in any, in any place in government.
[02:05:30] Grant Beebe: Uh, we're just, we're, we're using the tool the best we can and trying to, trying to work around the edges of it and make it work for us. But it's, uh, it's a challenge. It doesn't help us for sure. Yeah. And
[02:05:40] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: USA Jobs is a very archaic and clunky and cumbersome system. Man, it, it, it, it's terrible. And
[02:05:48] Grant Beebe: is this a question or is this just, I'm just, it's just me
[02:05:50] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: bitching about it because nobody likes to, especially on the Forest Service side, no one likes to try and apply to a new position on the road in the middle of [02:06:00] August.
[02:06:00] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: And I think the timing, sometimes the timing with these job announcements is just piss poor. Yeah. Now how do we go about fixing that and getting away from u s A jobs? I think that U S A jobs is here to stay, right. It's too big. It's, uh, correct me if I'm wrong here, but it's a third party, uh, contractor that developed the website.
[02:06:19] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: Oh, I'm sure. And now we utilize that exclusively. I'm not sure if that's factual or not. Someone will correct me.
[02:06:26] Grant Beebe: It sounds like a good story. I I probably, so I'm sure we didn't, we didn't invent it in-house. Yeah. So yeah, we paid good money for U S USA jobs. Is that, is that what you're saying? Yes, yes. In a long sense.
[02:06:37] Grant Beebe: Yes. I will say, um, it is tough trying to recruit jobs in the summer if you're trying to, uh, you know, I found with these high school kids I'm trying to counsel, um, you know, what you need to know in October, even in the blm you need to know in October or November that you wanna fly for, apply for a job in, you know, uh, billings, Montana for the following summer.
[02:06:55] Grant Beebe: It's like, I don't know. You're expecting high school kids to make that decision in the fall [02:07:00] of their senior year. Yeah. For the following summer. That's a crazy system right there. So, I love these internships that we're flying right now, cuz it's, it's way closer to summer and kids are actually worried about what they're doing in the summer.
[02:07:09] Grant Beebe: But, you know, it's hard enough for adults to think that far in advance, much less for, for teenagers to think that much in advance. So, you know, we needed a system where we're not trying to recruit people the year before for our summer jobs. Some of that comes back to giving people permanent status earlier in their career, so they're not having to make those decisions.
[02:07:26] Grant Beebe: So they're already in the system. So we can take 'em in at the GS three level and actually in the new series, go 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8. If they wanna stick, I mean, we can fly these jobs in series. Steps that are tied to one another so that in, in, in essence, they come in at the three and they get spit out the other end at the eight.
[02:07:43] Grant Beebe: Mm-hmm. And, and the, the career pipeline and the career ladder pipeline, you know, jobs that are tied together, um, it's a great opportunity. So the new series is perfect for that. And we're, we gotta exploit it so people don't have to negotiate u s A jobs annually, which is, uh, kids of death. It's hard, man. It
[02:07:57] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: sucks, but you have to do it.
[02:07:59] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: It [02:08:00] sucks. Yeah. Yes. I mean, I, I I could go talking on about, uh, Q S A jobs all day, but let's just leave that one. Yes. So general operations. So the next question would be, will it be LM be following suit with the United States Forest Service proposal to convert all permanent seasonal employees to permanent full-time?
[02:08:20] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: Now, let's be specific there. Permanent, seasonal and permanent full-time PFDs are wildly different things. And we already kind of, we, we've honestly beat this subject to death. We've talked about this several times, but what about once one point of clarification there is the permanent seasonal employees, like, are we trying to make more of a push for that to replace our temporary seasonal workforce?
[02:08:42] Grant Beebe: Yes. Yeah. Okay. And so what I described before of 80%, 20%, that 20% would be temporary seasonal. The 80% would be made up of a combination of permanent, full-time and permanent seasonal, otherwise known as career seasonal, uh, and the bulk of our workforce. You know, it used to be temporary. It used to be a third, a third, a third.
[02:08:58] Grant Beebe: Um, basically. So [02:09:00] figure a thousand in each of those columns. A thousand pft, a thousand career seasonals, and a thousand temps. We wanna take that thousand temps, turn it into something more like, you know, 400, and then take those 600 and move 'em into the other two categories. I also don't wanna make Avery, I don't wanna convert every, every, uh, career seasonal employee into a permanent full-time.
[02:09:20] Grant Beebe: Cause Cause they'll quit. Yes. You'll lose. Right, exactly. I'm not gonna tell people they have to do that, but we wanna offer it to people, but, uh, we don't wanna force it on people who, who wanna do, you know, within reason, other stuff as well. Um, we've got room for all those folks. We think. So,
[02:09:35] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: from experience, uh, when I was a, uh, an apprentice for the Forest Service, uh, I was in a situation where I was being politely asked c forced to convert into my position as a permanent, uh, full-time.
[02:09:48] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: And what was the thing I did? I found a new job. Right? Yeah. I wasn't gonna do that. Right. Yeah. So it's not a good, good thing.
[02:09:55] Grant Beebe: Yeah. We have the work. It's, it's a hard thing cuz we are telling Congress we've got all this work to [02:10:00] do and we need people permanently. Mm-hmm. But, but um, I think we also need to be respectful of people wanting to do, uh, you know, couple months outside, outside federal government and, uh, I think there's room for it.
[02:10:12] Grant Beebe: Copy that.
[02:10:13] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: We've already beat the heck out of that question. With the year round insurance coverage for temp seasonals, ah, new complex imts, what are the benefits and drawbacks for this new
[02:10:22] Grant Beebe: program? Um, so the drawbacks are, so the idea is that we won't have type one and type two teams. We will have just teams and those teams will flex according to the needs of the incident.
[02:10:36] Grant Beebe: So a team can flex, grow bigger and handle a large complicated type one fire, and then they can, um, stay normal, stay their normal core size and handle a less complex type two incident. And we will manage all teams as if they're one kind of team and, um, put 'em on some kind of more formal rotation up at the higher [02:11:00] planning.
[02:11:01] Grant Beebe: Uh, and we'll manage workload better. We think we will equalize experience opportunities so that teams all get a share of the incident assignments. So we don't have losers and winners, and we also don't have teams that get work so hard that they burn out. Um, the idea is that we can make better use of people if we don't send teams downloaded for bear when they only need to be loaded for cartridge.
[02:11:23] Grant Beebe: Um, so, you know, that is a problem. So you got people, you got people mobilizing that you don't really need 'em, and, uh, that's, that's wasteful of their time and wasteful of, of, you know, scarce resources that the country needs to manage fires in other places. So that's the idea. It's a change in the way we do business.
[02:11:40] Grant Beebe: Um, so the downside is, uh, right now you get a team and you've got a group of people who go out as a team. And if not all those people get to go out all the time, you lose a little pri de corps, you lose a little teamwork, you lose a little familiarity, um, in the interest of making more resources available in, in the bigger picture.
[02:11:56] Grant Beebe: So that's, that's a downside for sure. Um, [02:12:00] I think we, to do this, we need to invest more in training. So we need to do a better job of preparing our teams to manage incidents. And so we need to train better at the type three level, at the type two level. Uh, we know we need to invest more in training to make people feel like a complex incident Team when it comes in is gonna be able to handle their fire, their very complicated fire.
[02:12:21] Grant Beebe: We need to sell. That our type, formally type two teams can do the work. Yeah. We know they can do the work cuz we force 'em to do the work all the time anyways. We say, you know what, we don't have a type one team for that fire. Uh, you guys gotta go. And, uh, and so, and they rise to the occasion and they do it.
[02:12:36] Grant Beebe: So we wanna make it so they don't have to rise to the occasion that that is a capability they know they have. Uh, the other downside I think is there is some folks who aren't interested in maybe being on some of those gnarly type one fires on the Angeles. Uh, and I'm raising my hand as one, as a former, as a former ops chief.
[02:12:53] Grant Beebe: Um, but I, but I think we need to get people, uh, we need to make peop feel confident that they can handle most [02:13:00] situations and that we'll be able to flex and, and make this work. But I think, you know, big picture, it looks like a good plan. Uh, I think we should try it. We've been trying for 10 years to make some kind of change in mm-hmm.
[02:13:11] Grant Beebe: Incident management, team rotation and composition. And we've always run up against, frankly, against, against the, we never have done it this way. Roadblocks. If there's two things that
[02:13:21] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: firefighters hate, it's change in the way
[02:13:23] Grant Beebe: things are. Totally. And I, you know, we gotta be mindful that these are volunteers.
[02:13:28] Grant Beebe: So mostly team teams are, they're volunteers that's not their day job. Mostly. Yeah. And, and they don't have to go and do these team assignments. So we also don't wanna force people out by forcing change on them. But we're hoping that, um, enough people will see the benefit to it. That we'll both keep most of the people in the team game.
[02:13:47] Grant Beebe: Because, because the, the workload is frankly more manageable and we'll attract more people because the workload is more manageable. Uh, that's the hope. But there are some risks and we're hoping it doesn't explode in our faces. Cuz it's crazy. It's crazy talk. It's change, it's change. [02:14:00] But, but we are going down the toilet, frankly.
[02:14:01] Grant Beebe: You know, we're losing teams, we're losing team members. We gotta do something. We gotta try something different. This is, this is an attempt to try something different I think. You know, team membership might be up a little bit this year. It's hard. It's first, first signs, but, but maybe, uh, maybe we're turning the corner a little bit.
[02:14:17] Grant Beebe: We, we hope so, cuz uh, we need those folks. Oh
[02:14:19] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: yeah. And that's another thing too with, uh, between attrition and retirement, I guess. Well, people moving on to different agencies and retirement. Right. We're losing those, those hitters of wildland fire management. Right. And it's not like we're backfilling these positions at a very steady pace.
[02:14:38] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: So I think that's something like this. Do you think it's, I guess the better question to ask is, do you think that this is something that is going to be proven useful out of utility for a current state? Or is it something that is gonna have longevity.
[02:14:52] Grant Beebe: Uh, I think it's both. I think it's, it's born of utility, but I think it's gonna have longevity cuz I think it, it makes more sense to how we actually operate in the world.
[02:14:59] Grant Beebe: Um, [02:15:00] so, so I think that's good. I'm, I mean, I think we have other, we have other avenues open to us. This may stem the tide of, of attrition, but I think we can staff up better by making better use of cooperators, by being more, um, more receptive to people with other skill sets coming into fire. Uh, just outside perspective maybe.
[02:15:19] Grant Beebe: Yeah. And rpl so recognition of prior learning. We talk about it all the time, but we don't maybe do as good of a job as we could do in, in saying, yeah, you've got that skillset. We think we can apply it in this way. And, uh, let, and let's do that. So I think our cooperators, especially local, um, local municipal departments, rural fire departments have really been pointing out that, um, we can be a little, uh, rigid and, uh, and we should be a little more, a little more, um, open to, to folks coming in and helping out.
[02:15:46] Grant Beebe: And I think, I think we can do a better job of that. We can do a much better job. And I know we're working on this, on the commission, uh, the Wildland Fire Commission. Mm-hmm. That's, that's, you know, congressionally mandated on, uh, making the agreements process easier so that we can bring people. Just through business [02:16:00] processes that are more nimble.
[02:16:01] Grant Beebe: So, so, you know, we're not turning people away cuz we can't figure out how to pay 'em. That's, uh, that's criminal. So, yeah. Yeah. And that's one we can fix without Congress telling us to fix it. So yeah, that's an administrative kind of, that's an administrative thing and, and we gotta get out of our own way, uh, as, as the federal bank rollers of much of the system.
[02:16:20] Grant Beebe: Right. That's, that's our responsibility. So we need to figure that out. Uh, we shouldn't, we shouldn't necessarily have to wait for the commission to tell us. We should figure that out or Congress to tell us. We should figure it out. No, I agree.
[02:16:32] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: Okay. So we kind of talked on this subject as well, but the obvious issues with stagnation and upward mobility from the GS three to GS eight level.
[02:16:40] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: So let's, this is the pipeline that we're referring to earlier. Let's talk about that. Like what are some of the new things that are really sticky that stand out and with the new pipeline that's gonna be hopefully in implemented here with the oh
[02:16:52] Grant Beebe: 4 56? Well, yeah, I think what we just talked about, like tying a flying a job is a 3 45.
[02:16:58] Grant Beebe: So, you know, [02:17:00] you come in as a, say a, a career or seasonal appointment maybe at the four level. So maybe we can get you a 4 56 position. You come in and, and. Uh, you apply. Once you go through the system, you, you get to the sixth level and it's not until then after a couple years, a couple three years, that you have to actually, you know, think about applying for another job.
[02:17:20] Grant Beebe: Applying competitively too. Uh, yes. Yeah. So, so, so, so you've got that built in where you can just say, you know what, if you come into us at this pay grade, you will come out, talk about transparency. You, if you stick with us this long, we'll achieve this pay grade in this amount of time. Um, you know, that's your expectation.
[02:17:36] Grant Beebe: That's, that's where you can go. I mean, we can do that in this new series way better than we could before. So it needs to happen. It, it, it will happen. Good. Frankly, it will happen. Cuz if nothing else, it saves us administrative burden on hiring people and processing applications, all that kind of crap that slows us down.
[02:17:52] Grant Beebe: So, um, so that'll happen and, and frankly, that, that. Can go from the GS 3, 3, 4, 5 67. You can go all the way up to the eight [02:18:00] level, I think. And they're, they're all essentially, you know, one, one job series that just carries you all the way through. So, um, that's a great opportunity as long as the place you're, you're at has, you know, enough positions at the higher grade levels.
[02:18:12] Grant Beebe: Um, so that's great. Um, the other career pipeline we need to make better use of our internships or academies, you know, call it what you like. Um, we're flying these 4 99 internships, they're called, they're, uh, they're fire interns. Mm-hmm. But we have another one in the works that, uh, should be a DOI standard coming out soon.
[02:18:29] Grant Beebe: Same sort of thing. So like a, it's like, it's an, it's an internship, frankly. And, and so, you know, it's another career progression thing. And, and foot in the door. Foot in the door, yeah. And try to get people varied experience, you know, all that kind of thing that we used to do at the Jack Academy in California that forester's still doing, along with some DOI partners.
[02:18:46] Grant Beebe: So, um, so those opportunities are out there. Um, that's great. And then finally, uh, the four, oh, the disappearance of the 4 0 1 qualification up at the, up at the upper upgrades. Uh, is a great thing so that people can carry their 4 56 [02:19:00] qualifications all the way up into, uh, GS 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, if they want to, if they stick with us without changing series, without having to go back to college, without having to worry about their transcripts, you know, and all that kind of, all that kind of stuff that they have to worry about.
[02:19:14] Grant Beebe: Now. Um, we're gonna take people at their, at their value, right? Not at their academic degree, but, but really for, for what they bring to the job, from their background. You know, it could be background in business, it could be background in education, it could be just high school education, you know, it could be otj as well, it could be O T J, which, uh, and right now we still make people go through kind of silly exercises to, you know, get an academic stamp where um, they don't necessarily need it.
[02:19:41] Grant Beebe: So that's gonna be a great thing. Um, that's gonna be huge. It's gonna be huge, and we're working on that. Now. Not everybody wants to be a, you know, what we call a four oh one, but for the people who do, at least they can see themselves in that job more readily. I think So, um, we're rolling those out soon.
[02:19:55] Grant Beebe: We're just putting the last touches on some of the F M O jobs, the PDs that are, that are, that [02:20:00] are going with those, you know, we have a deadline of June to really start implementing these 4 56 s so we're, we're scrambling to make that happen.
[02:20:07] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: Yeah, that 4 0 1 series thing, that, that's gonna be a huge thing cuz now people actually have.
[02:20:12] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: Without going to school necessarily. Like, I mean, honestly a degree in, I don't know, biology is probably not gonna teach you much about fire management because that's a lot of stuff that you have to learn in the field. And granted, there is an educational component in there where you can apply some of that stuff, but to re, I guess, remove it, Is probably one of the best decisions out there for, you know, having that glide path to those upper levels
[02:20:35] Grant Beebe: of management.
[02:20:36] Grant Beebe: Yeah, I'm, so, I'm, I'm actually one of those people who went to college for that. So I went to a land grant school to Colorado State and got a wildland fire management, uh, master's degree. It's very specific though. It was, and it, and it, and it was before 4 0 1 and it was because I was interested and because I thought, well, I wanna be an FMO one day, and so this will be handy.
[02:20:55] Grant Beebe: Um, not knowing whether it would be useful or not, you know, frankly, it was just like, well, what am I, I'm going to school anyways. [02:21:00] I've got my off-seasons off. I'm gonna go do this and it'll probably come in handy. It did come in handy with the 4 0 1 for sure, and I learned stuff that, uh, I wouldn't have learned other places, but does does it make me a better fire manager?
[02:21:11] Grant Beebe: You know, not, not necessarily. I learned, I could have learned some similar things going to business school or going to architecture school, or not going to school at all, and, and doing an internship at. Design house in New York City, right. Could have learned in a lot of different ways. So there are a lot of different paths, and I'm glad we're doing that.
[02:21:28] Grant Beebe: But for people who have an interest, it education is a great thing. It's like, it is. I would never tell people, don't go to co school. I'd just say go to school for something that interests you, not for something that somebody else is telling you should interest you. Uh, that's, that's the primary thing.
[02:21:40] Grant Beebe: Just kind of meet people where they are. And, uh, I, there's so many MBAs out there that we, that had to go back and get forestry units credits and, and then they come back to work and are using their MBA skills more than anything else. It's like, man, we got this backwards going can just screwed the pooch on this one.
[02:21:54] Grant Beebe: Yes. But it was, it was, it was a good attempt to, to make, to, this was an old attempt to [02:22:00] professionalize the workforce. Same thing we're doing now. And it was, it was an attempt by some folks to say, you know what, if you're gonna be part of these teams that are helping manage the land, you need some academic background and land management.
[02:22:10] Grant Beebe: It's not a stupid thing. It's not, but, but what we know now is that managers have so much more to do and it's, it's, they be as well served to go to, you know, psychology classes than, uh, than anything else. So a human, human thing. Yeah. In 20 years from now, I guarantee you the conversation you and I are having right now is gonna look incredibly stupid to the people.
[02:22:27] Grant Beebe: Then they're gonna say, you know, listen to what these jack asses were saying. They probably, they didn't know what they were talking about. And it's gonna be absolutely true. But, uh, that just, that just goes with the territory of, uh, of, you know, Making of saying something out loud. I guess our problem is we're saying things out loud.
[02:22:43] Grant Beebe: Thinking out loud, saying loud, thinking out, thinking out loud is where I get into trouble. Yes. Yeah. Me,
[02:22:46] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: you and me both, brother. Yep. Well, that's pretty much all the, uh, questions that have been submitted from, uh, our, listen, my listeners, uh, the anchor point listeners. Um, now I kind of wanna pick your brain [02:23:00] about some of the finer details and we can make this quick.
[02:23:02] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: I under understand you gotta go here pretty soon, but as far as the presidential budget that was released, the details of that, can you give us a top level overview of what that was and what it means for the firefighters on the ground? Cause I know this is not b i l, this is something that isn't passed yet.
[02:23:18] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: So let's talk about that briefly. Mm-hmm. What you know about it. I don't wanna get too off into the weeds with it and specifics because there's not a lot of specifics
[02:23:26] Grant Beebe: to be had yet. Well, there are a couple good things in the president's budget. Um, uh, housing is one right off the bat that we should highlight.
[02:23:33] Grant Beebe: Yes. So there's an additional 20 million Now I'm, I'm drawing this from memory, I think it's 20 million more. Um, anyways, there's a sizable investment in, in our facilities, fire facilities accounts in our, in the D u I side of the house, particularly to fund projects that, that, um, have to do with firefighter housing.
[02:23:53] Grant Beebe: So, um, that would be a great thing to have that, um, those projects, there aren't a lot of 'em, and honestly, that's not the solution, [02:24:00] you know, to our housing problems. It's bigger than that. Yeah, it is huge. Right. We have. We, I don't know, 170 million worth of worth of fire facilities investment, we could do, but you know, we're not gonna turn it down.
[02:24:10] Grant Beebe: So, um, so that would allow us to tick off some needed investments in firefighter housing. So that's a great thing. Uh, obviously we talked about the pay supplements of the money to make, to, to do the pay supplement for fire folks without having to make cuts elsewhere is in that President's budget. Um, so if we got, if somebody said yes, this pay table that we're talking about, the one that's posted on a grassroots, if this pay table got implemented, we have to, we'd have to fund it some other way.
[02:24:38] Grant Beebe: We'd have to figure out funding that we would, we would take from, so we would've to take from some other part of the program to fund that pay supplement without the new money that's in the president's budget. The president's budget also allows us to do more workforce transformation, so do more of.
[02:24:51] Grant Beebe: Fewer temporary seasonals and more permanent positions. So it allows us to knock off more of that. Mm-hmm. Um, or what we'd really like to do, say add couple crew [02:25:00] members to your basic 20 person crew. So, uh, say your hot jack crew, your veterans crew on the BLM side could go out with 24, or not necessarily roll with 24, but hire 24 if we could, if we could find 24, right?
[02:25:12] Grant Beebe: Yeah. Uh, staff up your engines, better staff up your heli attack better given, um, more opportunity for p for folks to actually, you know, duck out for a couple days and take a couple days off. If the crews staff more fully, then maybe people have an opportunity to flex a little bit more. So that's the thought.
[02:25:27] Grant Beebe: So we'd like to nec not necessarily hire a bunch more crews or more engines, but staff more fully the stuff we have so that, so that people have a little more breathing room, uh, on their, on their crew. So that would, that would get. Um, more fuels work, you know, all that, all that kind of stuff that, that's all included in the president's budget.
[02:25:45] Grant Beebe: But those investments in our workforce and the, and the pay and that housing are key parts of that president's budget that we are, we would love to see, make it into some kind of appropriations bill. Sometimes this stuff doesn't work exactly the way it seems. So sometimes people will [02:26:00] always say, oh, the president's budget, it's dead on arrival.
[02:26:01] Grant Beebe: Right? You, you hear that all
[02:26:02] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: the time. Not necessarily, but that's a jaded thing.
[02:26:05] Grant Beebe: Yeah. Well, I mean, yeah. In its entirety. Yeah. It's sometimes you consider the president's budget a statement of statement of policy intention more than it is a blueprint for an actual budget. But the, but the great part about this budget is that it sets out some, some very concrete things that, um, that an appropriator could put in an appropriation bill and say, yeah, you know, see this thing that they were talking about with firefighter housing, let's make sure that makes it in the appropriations bill.
[02:26:29] Grant Beebe: So it's not necessarily the budget itself gets accepted, but elements of it can creep into appropriations bill that we see finally in the permanent law even. Exactly. Well, and, and appropriations, you know, bills are essentially law, right? Yeah. Because they, they are laws, um, even though they don't seem like it.
[02:26:44] Grant Beebe: So, um, absolutely. And so that pay table could just end up in, in, in approach bell and find no grassroots. They're, um, they're talking full-time to appropriators about how to make some of this stuff happen. So I'm, I'm not allowed to have those conversations, but, uh, but I think they are, and I think a bit of a conflict.
[02:26:59] Grant Beebe: I think that's [02:27:00] their job. Um, but, but. You know, so I'm sure there's some conversations going about what's in those budgets. And on the forest side, I'm not so familiar with exactly what's in their stuff, but it's probably, probably similar. I know the facility stuff I think is, is in theirs as well. Yeah.
[02:27:13] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: I know there's a bunch of gripes right now with the B, the b i l versus the presidential budget and one of them was the pay rates.
[02:27:19] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: I know that there's gonna be a lot of talk about how some of these folks are actually taking a pay cut comparatively speaking to the b i l. And now I wanna play devil's advocate here with you, with the folks out here listening, right? And are you gonna take the long-term gains over the short-term bandaid as you so eloquently put it earlier?
[02:27:41] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: Cuz that's exactly what b i l is, is a band-aid, right? Mm-hmm. So how do we one, avoid people chasing hazard pay and overtime with this new proposal? And two, how do we kind of redirect the dis the discussion to make it more [02:28:00] equitable? Cuz people are expecting like the, uh, bipartisan infrastructure law pay in this new presidential budget.
[02:28:06] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: Right? Right. So yeah, this is, this is gonna get into the
[02:28:10] Grant Beebe: weeds real quick, but Yeah, ahead. This is gonna, this is gonna get into the math. Um, so the math is if what, what, right now the bill does just in your base pay is not just in base pay in the, in the solution. Yeah. In the 24 budget. It's a combination of, um, more overtime.
[02:28:30] Grant Beebe: More overtime paid on, off, on, off district or off unit assignments and, uh, and kind of paid, um, as guarantee on assignments. Not questionable. Yeah, yeah. Right. It's 15 and nine concept that when, uh, you know, if you run off on a 14 day assignment, you are paid from the hour, you leave till the hour, you come back and you're paid 15 hours of straight time and overtime, and then nine hours of standby rate flat out.
[02:28:55] Grant Beebe: So, um, so on the, on the plus side, that kind of thing, when you go off on off-duty [02:29:00] assignments allows you to actually not push the envelope on the assignment itself. I mean, you know, just frankly from a firefighter point of view, if you think about it, it's like, all right, I'm, I'm paid 15 and nine regardless, so I'm not gonna hang out here on Division X, uh, for a couple extra hours sharpening tools.
[02:29:16] Grant Beebe: I'm gonna go back to camp or wherever. I'm gonna go to my, wherever my spike base, my spike camp and, uh, get rested and bed down. Um, so that's a good thing, right? It takes the incentive away from stupid, stupid logging, uh, on incidents like everybody is. Not that that happens, but, but did you show a lunch?
[02:29:32] Grant Beebe: What do you mean? Did you show a lunch? Did you show a lunch? Okay, come on. Can, can I, can we stop hearing about showing lunch? Right? So you don't have to show a lunch, you don't have to worry about it. In fact, you don't, in fact, you don't even have to do time sheets, as far as I know. You just say, I mean, you gotta do time sheets for your home unit, but you don't have to tune in a ctr No, because you're just paying 15 and nine.
[02:29:49] Grant Beebe: Awesome. Save the administrative burden, save a lot of the paperwork for everybody, and then, and then know that. You know, if, if indeed your, your assignment on Division X [02:30:00] is over at nine o'clock, then you can go back to camp. Now you, you may, sometimes somebody may say, yeah, can you hang out for another hour?
[02:30:06] Grant Beebe: We need to tie off this piece of line. You may say, sure, and you may get screwed out of one hour of overtime because you're only gonna get paid halftime. You're gonna get paid a standby rate for that half hour, you know, for that hour that you stayed out longer. But in the, in the long run, you're, you're getting, you're making fifteens flat out fifteens, and you're making nines on top of it.
[02:30:23] Grant Beebe: So just from firefighter math, you figure, ooh, that's probably in most cases gonna equal more pay than we did before. For those assignments we take, plus it gives us incentive to get adequately rested because we're not, you know, we're not getting paid for those nine hours. We're getting paid to, yeah, we're getting paid to sleep because our time is not our own when we're off duty off.
[02:30:42] Grant Beebe: No, you're stuck in camp. Stuck in camp, what people have been complaining about all along. It's not my own time. So, so the math on that is the, the base pay is not the same as Bill. It's not $20,000 or 50%, whichever is less, but um, but the combination of the base pay that they are adding [02:31:00] plus the increased overtime, Calculated on, you know, on people not making 1200 hours of overtime, but making something more like 700 hours at most, something like that.
[02:31:11] Grant Beebe: So they're, they're calculating it based on people not having to work as much overtime and still coming out to close to equal to what the bill is paying. It doesn't say you're gonna make that regardless. No overtime whatsoever, because I think the reality is that people are gonna work overtime cuz that's the job.
[02:31:28] Grant Beebe: Yeah. Um, you know, we, you, it's just, it just goes with territory that you're gonna, you're not gonna be working nine to five, five days a week. Um, that's, that's not the life of a firefighter, but, but hopefully the pay is better and people have a longer season. And enough money over what they used to make that they can, um, feel free to, to within reason, turn down some assignments, you know, be a, be a little more flexible with the, the time they take, not be chasing every single fire assignment.
[02:31:55] Grant Beebe: I mean, Frank, if you're on a crew, you're on a crew. Yeah. And the, the crew's gonna go, crew's gonna go when the crew [02:32:00] goes. Yes. Yes. And within, you know, if screw's got 22 and they can live without you and you ask, uh, you know, ahead of time and get your leave in there and, and you wanna miss a roll, you know, that's, that's one thing.
[02:32:10] Grant Beebe: But, you know, often you're on a crew, you don't wanna miss a roll with the crew either. So those are crew dynamics. Those are, those are, that's a cultural thing though. Yeah. You're gonna talk with crews later today. You can ask them about that. So, um, so I know how that goes. But if you're more independent resource, like a jumper for instance, or working on a heli tech crew where you imt I m t for sure where you have more flexibility, you control your own time more than, than definitely you, you can, um, it feels like you would, you would be able to, um, say, well, I'm making enough money, I can turn down, uh, a week's worth of overtime to go to a family reunion.
[02:32:41] Grant Beebe: Um, hopefully people can make that choice. But we're never gonna legislate away from people wanting to chase overtime. Sometimes there are people out there, every hour is, every hour I don't make is an hour I'm not gonna make Right. And those, that's just in their, that's in their nature. I'd hate to be the one who says, You may not work more [02:33:00] than X hours of overtime, because that feels unduly restrictive.
[02:33:03] Grant Beebe: But I, but at some point, managers do need to step in and say, you know what, you're, you're going too hard. You need to, you need, need to ratchet back. But there are folks who are motivated by making as much money as possible. Um, you know, within reason. I think they're part of the culture as well. And, and, uh, you know, as long as they're not endangering themselves or other people, you know, we gotta, we gotta, we gotta see that that's a, that's a lifestyle as well, right?
[02:33:25] Grant Beebe: And, and that's part of the culture. And we probably need to live with some of that stuff. But that doesn't, that shouldn't be the model for everybody out there in the world. That's not a healthy lifestyle. Oh,
[02:33:35] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: a hundred percent, man. So I guess one question that I have following up with that is, how does this affect, like initial attack?
[02:33:41] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: Say you do initial attack on an emergent incident and then it rolls into a two week assignment. Now that first, like say operational shift, you go up to 32 hours or whatever, right? You cap, you cap out. How does that standby pay get affected? Does it, is it [02:34:00] affected
[02:34:00] Grant Beebe: at all or, you know, I, I understand it there question.
[02:34:03] Grant Beebe: I understand it probably as much as you do. And, and my, our initial concern was for initial attack folks, and you're not, you're not telling folks that they're gonna IA fire and then at the end of 15 hours, you're on standby. You're on standby. That's bullshit. It's, people are gonna be pissed. Well, it's, it's, it's, um, not gonna help us contain fires.
[02:34:22] Grant Beebe: Right. If people, no, you know, because you've, you know how it goes. You've worked since nine in the morning and, and at, at seven o'clock at night, um, the lightning storm rolls through and that's when you start work, right? If you're gonna stop at 15 hours or stop getting paid at 15 hours, that's not gonna work.
[02:34:36] Grant Beebe: So it doesn't work that way. So it says if you're on initial tech, it's hours as worked up until blah, blah, blah hours. Right? Um, so, so that's fair. You know, it, it separates initial attack from, from really those, those off unit assignments understand it. Exactly. It makes, makes a distinguish between the two.
[02:34:52] Grant Beebe: So, so for initial tech firefighters who spend most of their time in their home unit, they're paid the way they always have been paid my understanding. But the rates might be a little bit different. [02:35:00] So, um, so I, I think, I think the bill, this, this bill, I'm calling it the bill solution, but this solution in the 24 budget really does.
[02:35:08] Grant Beebe: It, it kind of, um, thinks about over time and fire assignments in those 14 day off-duty, off unit assignments. Um, which is not our bread and butter in the BLM or No, we're really initial attack organization. So I I, I haven't really figured out the ins and outs of how that would work for, for a crew that doesn't spend as much time on the road that, you know, typical, typical engine crew that's, uh, locked down at home more.
[02:35:32] Grant Beebe: I'm, I'm hoping the math works out for those folks as well, but I haven't really explored it to, to great length. It's
[02:35:37] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: really hard because there's a lot of what ifs. There's a lot of what ifs. There's a ton of what ifs. And that's every season. I mean, you can talk, I mean, what was it last year when we were talking about predictive services and it was gonna be dooming gloom.
[02:35:47] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: It was gonna be 20, 20, 20 19 all over again. Right? Right. And it didn't show up. Nothing happened. No. Didn't show up. No. That's just part of the dice where we roll. It's feaster famine in this industry. And it's, I don't think that's really ever going to change. Can we make some, uh, [02:36:00] administrative and legislative changes to help remove that?
[02:36:03] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: We can, but it's never going to be, it's never gonna be perfect. There's no such thing, but we shouldn't let Perfect get in the way of good.
[02:36:10] Grant Beebe: Well, I'm, uh, so I'm not a firefighter anymore. I, I wonder what the, what does the slow season look like anymore? Right? Is it 500 hours? I, I don't know. Yeah, I don't even know.
[02:36:19] Grant Beebe: I mean, I mean, my take is there's no such thing as a slow season anymore, really. It's just like there's a, there's what used to be, what used to be a, a moderate season is now just kind of the average low season. I think everything's moved up one phase. It feels like it. Mm-hmm. But, um, but I think, I think your listeners probably tell me better than, than I could say, but, you know, my experience is that people are working, um, a lot and, uh, maybe not as much as they always want to, but, but plenty.
[02:36:43] Grant Beebe: And in most cases, in many cases, you know more than they want. Yeah. So I, I don't think, you know, the, a slow season really, um, hurting people doesn't feel like it's in the cars. It just doesn't, it doesn't feel like we can have a season that's so slow. Like some of the, I experienced when I was growing up, you know, some, some [02:37:00] really low overtime seasons, which were really hard to survive on.
[02:37:03] Grant Beebe: Uh, I, I just doesn't feel like we're gonna see one of those in a long time. I don't think we will,
[02:37:09] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: especially with the, I mean, I guess we have to do more with less in the context of like, we have more frequent, more intense fires. We have more starts both human and I guess more lightning as well. Yeah. More natural causes.
[02:37:22] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: But also we are having less people as well that we have to work with. So we are forced to being Right. Doing what? More with less. Right? Right. So as long as these PO folks out there, they're one, not endangering themselves, and two, they're being, I guess I wanna say, rewarded for their efforts. I mean, yeah, you got all the glory and being a firefighter, this is a kick ass job.
[02:37:44] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: And I wouldn't replace my time, my 11 years in the B l m, in the forest service for anything. It's maybe who I am today. But if we can make it even better and keep progressing those issues and progressing further into a more modernized organization, organizations. I think that it's gonna be
[02:37:59] Grant Beebe: [02:38:00] awesome. Look at that.
[02:38:00] Grant Beebe: You just summed it up nicely.
[02:38:04] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: Every once in a while I'll say something. Alright, well Grant, I know you gotta get outta here, man. Um, so we're at the end of the show now, and I just wanna say thank you so much for coming on the show and answering all of these questions. You are directly answering the boots on the ground questions that are just the hot button ticket items right now.
[02:38:21] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: So I definitely appreciate you taking the time with me and I'm very thankful for your, uh, being
[02:38:26] Grant Beebe: here, man. It's cool. Appreciate, appreciate you asking me. Uh, you know, let me just say that none of these questions were surprised, so, so that's good. That means that I'm hearing these same questions through other channels as well, but, uh, appreciate the opportunity to talk more directly to folks and, um, I'll just, you know, put it out there that people can always pick up the phone and, and call us as well, you know, got a beef, got a compliment, whatever, um, give a, give a call.
[02:38:51] Grant Beebe: I'm sometimes there, always there, but, uh, no, we're always, we're always listening. We're always trying to pay attention. There's usually more to the story, but, uh, well, it's complex too. [02:39:00] Yeah. Sometimes, sometimes it's really simple and sometimes people need to just tell us how simple it is. So, you know, there is, there is that too.
[02:39:05] Grant Beebe: Yeah. But at
[02:39:06] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: least you're willing to be at the position that you're at, to listen to the, uh, your subordinates, if you will. I mean, that's, that's huge. That's, that's a good leadership quality
[02:39:16] Grant Beebe: to have. Yeah, I, they're not my subordinates. They're, they're my peers. So, um, I think we're all in this together, right?
[02:39:22] Grant Beebe: Get to represent them sometimes. So, um, so I appreciate that. It's an honorable position to be in, but yeah, I, I just feel like we're all in this together, so. Oh, 100%. Yep.
[02:39:30] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: Cool. Well, at the end of the show, I was given an opportunity for you to give a shout out multiple, multiple shout outs to some homies, heroes, mentors.
[02:39:38] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: Who do you got for us? Oh
[02:39:39] Grant Beebe: my gosh. Chuck Sheely, man. He's, uh, he's out there. He is. He's the person who got me into the business. So, um, so Chuck, if you're listening, uh, power to you. Yep. Thanks for all you did for me.
[02:39:51] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: Right on, man. Well, grant, thank you so much for being on the show. Hope everybody enjoyed.
[02:39:55] Grant Beebe: All right, thank you.[02:40:00]
[02:40:01] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: And boom. There we go, ladies and gentlemen. Another episode of the Anchor Point podcast is in the books with Grant Bebe. Yeah. So Grant, I just wanna say thank you for, uh, being on the show and not polling any punches. Um, even though I'm sure, uh, a lot of people are gonna be watching this, uh, I'm glad you that you had the courage and came onto the show and got real with people and described yourself and talked about yourself.
[02:40:24] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: And then also all the other things. I mean, I did have a very extensive list of topics, uh, to, uh, give you, and they were all crowdsourced from the boots on the ground. So, uh, Let's, uh, try and make things better for the folks, uh, moving into the future. And once b i l expires, let's have, uh, let's hopefully we can actually have something to continue on.
[02:40:47] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: Cuz once you take it away, it's gonna be hard to come back. Yeah. Might lose a couple folks. Anyways. Yeah, like I said, folks, uh, I do not agree with everything he said. I do agree with some things [02:41:00] and I'm pretty sure he's gonna be in the same, uh, boat now if he agrees with some of the stuff I said, Aaron disagrees with some of the stuff I said, well, that's just common discourse and it's important that we have these conversations because how in the hell else are we going to identify what it is and also direct change to where it matters for the most people.
[02:41:20] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: With that being said, take this episode as you will, as you may, and if you wanna love it, hate it, crap on it, crap on me, crap on Grant. That's completely up to you. However, I encourage everyone out there that's listening that if they do like something or don't like something, I highly, highly, highly encourage you to one, go and join grassroots.
[02:41:42] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: Two, if you have the opportunity, go join NiFi. Three, make your voices heard in a respectful way because if you don't present solutions for a problem, then there ain't shit that's gonna get done. And it's also important to make your voice heard in the right way. So with that, [02:42:00] uh, I just wanted, once again, give a shout out to the Bureau of Land Management, the state of Nevada Bureau of Land Manage.
[02:42:05] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: Gotta show my love for my homies. I gotta give a shout out to my buddy. Booze. Of course, dude killed it with the, uh, with the, uh, seminar man, the social wellness seminar. That was awesome. But I'd like to also give another special, uh, special thank you to Brock Youli and Vanessa Marquez because they're the ones who invited us down here and uh, made this all possible.
[02:42:26] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: So once again, thank you everybody. Special shout out to our sponsors. We got Mystery Ranch built for the mission. Go over to www.mysteryranch.com and check out that backbone series cause you'll be able to hopefully win one of those thousand dollars grants to continue your education and improve your state in fire.
[02:42:43] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: We also got Aja Brewery kick ass coffee for the kick. His asist cause Kickin his asist. I don't even know. Anyways, this kick ass cause kick ass coffee for a kick ass cause and a portion of proceeds will always go back to the Wildland Firefighter Foundation. So go over to [02:43:00] www.hotshotbrewing.com and check it out.
[02:43:01] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: We've got the ass movement Bob Boa booze changing the way we bury our turd. Trying to educate the public on with the finest of PR poo bearing propaganda. Geez, I cannot talk today. Go to www.thefirewall.com and check out the as movement. And then last, but not least, not a sponsor of the show, but a, I am a huge supporter of what they're doing over there.
[02:43:24] Anchor Point Podcast Host - Brandon Dunham: And that's gonna be none under then, the a w e or the American Wildfire Experience. Go to www.wildfireexperience.org and check 'em out. Bethany of a kick ass organization over there. Keep it up. As for the rest of you, y'all know the drill. Stay safe, stay savage. Peace.