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The prisoners fighting wildfires in California (bbc.co.uk)
92 points by darrhiggs on Sept 24, 2015 | hide | past | favorite | 43 comments



One of the hardest part with integrating former prisoners back into regular life is not only the lack of jobs but the restrictions on jobs they can take. Far too many states are regulated to the point the even trades many consider simple exclude felons. Even fire fighting in many states is not possible with convictions.

So besides giving them an opportunity to serve while incarcerated we need to make sure that incarceration does not keep them from rejoining society upon release simply because government rules tell them no.


This is in fact a problem with this program. The participating inmates are released back into society with firefighting training, experience, and a desire to continue doing the job. Unfortunately, they are unable to obtain jobs as firefighters because of their previous felony convictions.

So they go back to whatever they were doing previously because having any sort of decent career is extremely difficult.


Uh, what? The forest service had a ton of ex-cons who came through the prison program. Two of my bosses were ex-cons.


> Even fire fighting in many states is not possible with convictions.

There seems to be a reasonable case for thorough background checks for firefighters. You might be able to persuade me that "any felony conviction" is too broad and only certain kinds of felonies should be excluded.


You could always find a reasonable case to screen felons, but the first step to reintegrating people into the society is trusting them. It does involve risk.


There are acceptable risks and unacceptable risks.

Hiring a tax evasion convict as a truck driver sounds fine.

Hiring a fraud convict as a CPA sounds pretty risky.

Hiring a murder convict as a beat cop sounds unacceptable.

Positions of trust and power over others will always deserve scrutiny for the sake of the life & liberty of ordinary people...


> Hiring a murder convict as a beat cop sounds unacceptable.

I could go either way on this. Certainly you don't want someone who has control problems as a cop. But, someone who got convicted of gang stuff very young and then got his shit together could be a really effective beat cop. He knows the people and the neighborhood while serving as an example of doing good.

The problem is that a cop has to give legal testimony. And that would get challenged if he has a prior. Perhaps when cops all have to wear video so we don't have to rely on human testimony that will change.


I agree. But the status quo is that it's hard to get any decent job after serving time.


Unless there is a shortage of equally skilled workers, why would a business trust a felon when they could hire a non-felon?


Because a felony is damn easy to get and almost impossible to get rid of.

Pissed on a wall or mooned somebody when drunk in front of a cop? Felony AND sex offender--just for good measure.

Had sex with your 17-year-old girlfriend when you were 18? Felony although some jurisdictions make exceptions and try to reduce this to misdemeanor depending upon age difference.

Picked up for drunk and disorderly and had a knife on you that exceeds specifications? Felony. Side note: there is a reason so many people like MagLite flashlights--they are similar in size to a billy club or truncheon but are legal.

Picked up with a small amount of marijuana while your friend was in possession of a much larger amount in the car. Felony.

Every single male I know has done something sufficiently stupid when he was young that could have been a felony.

In addition, if a cop picks you up, they can probably find a felony somewhere in the law that will stick unless you are a teetotaller.

The real problem is that non-violent felonies need to go away after a while. I seem to remember some research showing that if a felon manages to stay out of trouble for 5 years he is less likely to get in trouble than even the general population.

So, to answer your question, felons who stay out of trouble for more than 5 years are actually a better pool to hire from than the general population.


Indeed, they have no economical reason to extend this trust and shoulder the risk, however small it might be. But this dynamic creates a problem for the society, therefore it needs to be worked around. Sealing criminal records is one way of doing it (not sure how effective it is though, given that jail time still leaves a gap in your CV).


Society has a good reason to want felons to be accepted in normal life, so it's up to society to create conditions where felons aren't discriminated against (i.e. they're out, they've paid their dues, let them live again).


If you want to make a survivable wage after prison, you pretty much have to become a drug dealer. There are very few jobs open to someone who has been to jail.


Perhaps we should not only give prisoners the opportunity to work in prison, but pay them a real wage and offer them continued employment when they get out. It would be far easier to reintegrate if you already have a job you're familiar with and several months' rent in the bank.


In Israel, prison jobs pay minimum wage. So, businesses do not suffer from competition with slave labor as in the US, and prisoners learn the value of labor.


The federal prison system runs prisoners through a 6 month halfway-house that helps them find a job and a place to live. In fact, if you don't have these, they will hold you past your release date until you secure them.


> You might be able to persuade me that "any felony conviction" is too broad and only certain kinds of felonies should be excluded.

I think you hit the nail right on the head. The article even notes for this particular program:

> Inmates convicted of crimes categorised as "serious" or "violent" felonies are not eligible, says Bill Sessa, a spokesman for the state's department of corrections and rehabilitation (CDCR). That rules out those convicted of murder, kidnap, rape and other sex crimes, violent assault, and - unsurprisingly - arson.

They didn't really say what these particular inmates were convicted of, or if they were even felons, but there are plenty of crimes in the US that are treated way more severely than they should, and in some cases shouldn't even be considered crimes at all.


This is treating a symptom though...

The US is a full blown police-state-for-profit.

The changes we need to do are far more fundamental than what you mention -- even though everything you say is 100% valid.

The US is a broken, defective, state. (regardless of how stable/profitable/functional it may be)


And which state is not broken and defective?


>(regardless of how stable/profitable/functional it may be)

None, thus this line in my comment...


There is no better way to reform a man than to give him a purpose. Firefighting and other volunteer services are definitely a good way to go.


Reminds me of Sikes fighting the fire in Oliver Twist:

http://www.online-literature.com/dickens/olivertwist/49/

(search on page "And here he remained" for the start)

(spoiler alert?)


You are so right, wish more people saw the potential for reform more clearly!


We still have slave labor in the USA, just throw people in prison and strongly suggest to them their lives will suck less if they work for 30 cents per hour. If they want to go outside, they can get $1 an hour but they risk death.


It's voluntary. So long as prison conditions are humane enough to make remaining in jail a viable option, this can help prisoners.

The real danger would be the possibility that this is incentivizing the government to increase the prison population in order to reap the fruits of greater prison labor.

Of course, that's all to say nothing about the national disgrace that 5% of the world's population has 25% of the world's prisoners.


>It's voluntary.

It is not. The power differential between the prisoner and the state is so great that any consent is null and void. As such it can never be voluntary. It is the same reason a prisoner cannot voluntarily have sex with a guard, except the relationship between prisoner and state is even greater of power difference than that between prisoner and guard.


> It's voluntary. So long as prison conditions are humane enough to make remaining in jail a viable option, this can help prisoners.

California prisons are horrifically overcrowded, literally they are under court order to reduce it, so your qualifier fails.


I will certainly accept that the qualifier fails; I am well aware of that our prisons have serious problems.


It's worth reading an interview with Chomsky, talking on this subject in 1998: http://www.chomsky.info/interviews/199804--.htm


Great link.

Taking the drug war into account, it does become painfully clear that the present system is morally reprehensible, arguably even amounting to a continuation of African-American slavery, in a modern form.

In my original comment, I only had the hypothetical scenario of prison work in mind. It should have been a lot more obvious that actual context summarily demolishes any argument for it.


Prison-industrial complex up in this :(


In general I agree with you that prison industrial complex is a huge problem in this country. However, in this case it sounds like they can already afford to be somewhat selective with which inmates they choose, so I'm not too worried they'll jail people so they can get cheap firefighters anytime soon.


> I'm not too worried they'll jail people so they can get cheap firefighters anytime soon.

You do know that the private prison system is literally leaning on state governments and threatening them with breach of contract for not keeping prisons full, right?

... and that not only does the US have the highest per capita incarcaration rate of any country in the world, but California has an even higher per capity incarcaration rate?

... and that many US corporations have business models which rely on prison labor?


People I know closely who work in non-profit prison policy reform do not feel this way. They see private prisons as a problem, but nearly as big of a one as you make it out to be. And they're quite supportive of initiatives such as the firefighter program for prisoners.


> You do know that the private prison system is literally leaning on state governments and threatening them with breach of contract for not keeping prisons full, right?

Assuming you are correct, I retract any sympathy my other comment displayed toward these kind of work programs.


I don't know if this counts as a reputable source, but here's a related story: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/09/19/private-prison-quot...

Cursory DuckDuckGoing yields many more.


Yes it is slave labor, but it is legal to an extent. From the article:

David Ball, an assistant professor in criminal justice at the Santa Clara University School of Law, says inmate firefighters are part of a long history of prison labour in the US, pointing out that when Congress passed the 13th Amendment in 1865, which abolished slavery and involuntary servitude, it made a specific exclusion for penal servitude by including the phrase "except as a punishment for crime".


> Yes it is slave labor, but it is legal to an extent.

As outright slavery - the treatment of human beings as property - once was.

An argument is often made that if a prisoner is contributing work that is essential to the operation of the prison, that is easier to accept than an economy which relies on prison labor.

There are wildfires in California every single year. That means that every single year, some prisoners - likely nonviolent - will be asked to risk their lives for $1 a day.

$1 a day.

I bet some of those folks only crime was selling weed.


FYI: The article says the rate of pay is $2/day + $1 per hour.

-not saying I am in support of the situation (or that I'm not) ...


Most people don't realize slavery is still legal in the US. Highly controlled and with the state effectively holding a monopoly, but still legal.


The conversation here about slave labor made me think of my Air Force enlistment. I couldn't even get a sunburn during my enlistment without getting in trouble for "damaging government property."


I'd choose firefighting over sitting in a cell.


I have to wonder, based on the restrictions on who they accept, how many of these people would have been better off just getting a job like this instead of going to prison?




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