Old news for some, however it’s time to say good job to NFFE and Forest Service leadership to agree in the recently revised master agreement on hazard pay (25%) for Forest Service employees when performing RX duties. This is all pending OPM implementation guidance which hopefully arrives soon.
MHB
If we could keep the retention allowance AND get the pay raise, then we would be making progress!!!
Hard for me to be happy for this. Yeah I get a few more thousand dollars that will count as salary and retirement. But there are going to be A LOT of unhappy folks when they see that base 80 check go down several $100 a pay period. folks will have to work a few 100 hours of OT to make up the difference between the “pay raise” and the retention allowance. Even if the $9k incident pay is maxed out folks will fall short of the BIL payments. I appreciate the effort everyone put into this, and its a START. but it falls short in giving us more financial compensation.
I have heard, but not confirmed, that once the FFer pay scale is implemented, agencies can adjust it without congressional action.
I do agree with Halley8.
I did some rough math regarding my pay and guessing what my pay raise will be considering I’m a WG.
Yes I lose about $200 a PP off my base check with the BIL however I would have still made more this year with the new pay scale, and that’s not even factoring in the incident pay of 1 time payments of 450% of my new hourly rate. And not to mention with myself being on the downslope to retirement it is still a big deal.
I agree with all. I don’t like the sliding percentage scale that makes it more appealing for gs4’s-5’s. Yes, their current pay is atrocious, but I feel the agencies goal is recruitment not retention, and the current pay change only closes the gaps between pay grades. An even percentage raise across the board would have been more effective, not diluting the percentage for gs8s. It’s as though they think we won’t leave. The BLM is eating up FS personell right now just by offering 20k + sign on bonuses
Welcome to the world of Salery compaction. With minimum wage in California currently at $16/hr and increasing again on Jan 1, 2025 to $16.50. Top step CF FF1 make more than bottom step Engineer’s. The Top Step to Top Step spread is currently 13.6% but will decrease to 9.7% on Nov 1. Plus there is another ballot measure to raise the California Minimum wage to $18/hr across the board on Jan 1, 2025.
Well, thanks to the agencies dragging their feet through the red tape of govt we probably just lost our chance at any permanent pay fix with the new administration coming in. Years of trying to “figure” things out and “doing it the right way” have probably now come to bite us. It may be fair to say the the USDA, DOI, USFS, OMB and members of congress failed hardworking firefighters. I know there was more variables to this action getting passed but let’s just call it what it is… So unless I’m missing some type of hail marry in the next two months, the “DOGE” implementation may be the end of it? Or maybe Elon can figure things out and see that we finally need to be centralized under a Federal Wildland fire agency?
Elections have consequences
That smoke and mirrors crap they played us for votes with worked out in no one’s favor. It will be interesting to see how it goes forward. Maybe the Senate will pass the budget that Congress gave them before the election. That gave some permanent protection. Very interesting times ahead.
Has anyone received an update on the Forest Service Hazard Pay for RX? Last we read the Forest Service agree to this in the Master Agreement with NFFE and sent it over to OPM for implementation guidance. Be good to get this implemented sooner rather than later.
It will only matter for the last few folks that remain, if any indication that things aren’t going as planned, is the fact the Union President for 1650 is resigning and headed to work for NFFE national, albeit a good thing for those still in the fight, but a pretty telling sign that we are dead in the water as far as an agency is concerned
Feds like to play games with their employees all talk no action it’s a shame
Last I heard is that all southern forests in R5 were waiting to hear what the Angeles is doing with schedules, anyone else hearing the same thing?
Rumor is 5-8s year round
