Firefighters Will Get Overtime Pay for Extra Hours Put in on ’87 Blazes

It appears that about 1,500 federal firefighters will receive overtime pay that was denied them last year for time spent fighting last fall’s wildfires in Northern California and in other states.

The firefighters are middle-level supervisors who, because they were putting in such long hours in the battle against the fires in September, reached a statutory salary limit.

A one-time payment totaling $902,000 in overtime pay has been approved by Congress, and federal officials this week established procedures for disbursing the money, an Office of Personnel Management official said.

Happy About Decision

“I’m real happy about the decision,” said Michael Bergdahl, manager of the Angeles National Forest’s communications center, who reached the overtime ceiling several times last year. “But I’ll be even happier about the money.”

Under law, no federal supervisor can exceed, in any one pay period, the normal biweekly pay of upper management officials classified as GS-15, who earn $69,976 per year. The cut-off for a two-week period is now $2,682.40.

During the first two weeks in September last year, when as many as 86 fires were raging in Northern California, with others in Idaho and Oregon, some federal firefighters reached that level within nine or 10 days. Many of the firefighters, who are employees of the U.S. Forest Service, were called upon to put in 24-hour shifts in fighting the fires, which blackened 800,000 acres in 17 national forests in the Western states.

Vicente Romo, an Angeles National Forest fire suppression officer who supervises four men on a truck that carries 500 gallons of water, reached the pay limit nine days after he arrived to fight a wildfire along the eastern edge of the Shasta-Trinity National Forest, 600 miles north of Los Angeles.

Worked as ‘Volunteer’

For the next five days, including successive 20-hour shifts and one round-the-clock stint, he had to work as a “volunteer.”

Romo, who earns $22,642 a year plus overtime, estimates that he now has about $1,100 coming to him. “I’ll be happy when I see the check,” said Romo, who has two sons in college.

Firefighters will be paid at their time-and-a-half rate, based on their normal salaries. Last month, after protests from the firefighters and an article in The Times, Congress approved the one-time appropriation as an amendment to the continuing resolution, which authorizes annual operating funds for the federal government. “It is inexcusable that bureaucratic technicalities actually force some firefighters to work for free,” said Sen. Mark O. Hatfield (R-Ore.), one of the measures’ sponsors.

Finding Those Eligible

A spokeswoman for the Forest Service said that she could not estimate when the overtime checks will be issued. “We’re still trying to work out the process whereby we can pull these guys out of the computer and find out who they are,” she said.

The amendment permits overtime payment to workers “assigned to, or in support of, work on forest wildfire emergencies.”

“What we’ve been doing is trying to define ‘in support of,’ ” the Forest Service spokeswoman said.

This week, the two federal departments and the Office of Personnel Management agreed to reimburse all who were involved in the effort, whether they were on the front lines or in the home base.

May Extend Payments

Hatfield and Sen. Pete V. Domenici (R-N.M.) have now proposed an amendment to the Government Code, permitting unlimited overtime pay to firefighters working on wildfire emergencies. Rep. Norman D. Shumway (R-Stockton) is considering sponsoring similar legislation in the House of Representatives, though he is apprehensive about a new spending bill during a period of “fiscal conservatism,” according to press secretary Tracy Smith.