Washington state pioneers program to turn inmates into wildland
firefighters
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[June 06, 2024]
By Matt McKnight
SPOKANE, Washington (Reuters) - The inmates of Washington state's prison
system tramp through the forest, their yellow uniforms and helmets
bright against the brown branches and green leaves.
They are Arcadia 20, or ARC 20, an elite group of firefighters based in
Spokane who have been recruited from existing firefighting prison camps.
The aim? Teach the inmates the skills needed to help prevent forest
fires - and in the process, give them an opportunity to start on a path
to a new career.
Recruited by the state's Department of Natural Resources and Department
of Corrections, the program seeks to provide the dozen or so inmates
with enough training to prepare them for jobs as civilian firefighters
once they have completed their sentences.
"I do believe one thing for sure, that people deserve a second chance,"
said Kenyatta Bridges, 34, who joined the ARC 20 team for training in
the middle of last year while serving a 10-year sentence for
manslaughter in a 2014 gang-affiliated shooting in Pasco, Washington.
Bridges started a job in a civilian fire crew on June 3, following his
release.
Reuters was granted exclusive access to ARC 20 over three months,
including a visit last August to the Tonasket Rodeo Grounds, a rural
community in northeast Washington near the Canadian border. Bridges and
the ARC 20 crew were setting up their tents after a day of helping
contain a fire.
![](http://archives.lincolndailynews.com/2024/Jun/06/images/ads/current/peasley_sda_PROMGRAD_2024.png)
Crew members learn how to conduct prescribed burns, how to handle
dangerous equipment, and how to ensure fires that have been contained
stay that way. And when necessary, they are on the front lines of a
fire, digging lines to help reduce the chance a fire will continue to
spread.
"Team work, communications skills, an accountability for one's actions
and others as it relates to duties and providing for safety" are an
integral part of their mindset, according to ARC 20 management.
"The fellas that I've worked shoulder to shoulder with, they're
amazing," Bridges said. "We all made bad decisions in our life. Some of
us got caught, some of us didn't. But we learn from our mistakes."
EARNING ABILITY
While states across the American West have inmate firefighting crews,
Washington's ARC 20 program is the only one of its kind in the U.S.,
recruiting incarcerated individuals from full confinement into a reentry
center where they continue to build skills in firefighting and prepare
for life after release.
They also earn more. Inmates in Washington state's regular prison
firefighting camps, who number around 230, are paid up to $1.50 per
hour, based on experience, for their daily duties. When dispatched to an
active fire zone, they are paid the state's minimum wage of $16.28 per
hour plus overtime.
Elite crew members who have joined the ARC 20 team are paid a base
salary of up to $3,796 per month with potential overtime pay on fire
assignments. This year-round crew has a maximum of 20 team members.
It had 13 people on the team during its first full year in 2023 and
expects to have 12 as Washington state's fire season ramps up at the end
of June.
The Pacific Northwest is struggling with the effects of climate change,
with higher-than-normal chances of wildfires and a longer season this
year, according to meteorologists at the Department of Natural
Resources, the state agency charged with wildfire prevention and
management.
According to DNR officials who manage both fully incarcerated camp crews
and the ARC 20 team, a high-earning member of the camp crew received
approximately $11,000 in 2023, whereas an ARC 20 crew member earned up
to $60,000.
The ARC 20 team is trained to join "hand crews" — teams of 18 to 25
firefighters who work and camp near the front lines of active wildfires,
often hiking long distances and carrying their own gear to reach remote
areas. They also conduct prescribed burns and chainsaw trees to the
ground as part of the state's fire mitigation and forest management
efforts.
ARC 20's crew superintendent Ben Hood is on the team that selects
participants.
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![](../images/060624PIX/news_a57.jpg)
Kenyatta Bridges, 34, an inmate and member of Arcadia 20.
REUTERS/Matt Mills McKnight
![](http://archives.lincolndailynews.com/2024/Jun/06/images/ads/current/guzzardos_lda_GENERIC_040524.png)
"We call it getting bit with the fire bug... Once you get bit with
it, you're hooked in," said Hood. "It becomes part of, kind of who
you are, becomes more than just a job. It kind of becomes a
lifestyle."
When the team isn't traveling the state fighting fires, they are
housed at Brownstone Reentry Center, a minimum security facility in
downtown Spokane. Residents participate in work or training programs
and are granted additional freedoms like wearing normal clothes or
owning a cellphone.
ARC 20 crew members are paid higher wages than some staff in the
state's correctional system, including the facility where they live,
according to Brownstone's manager.
RUNNING A KITCHEN
Reuters visited another crew of fully incarcerated individuals in
September at a Department of Natural Resources facility at Cedar
Creek Corrections Center, southwest of the state's capital city,
Olympia.
They had just returned from a weeks-long assignment running a mobile
kitchen for almost 1,000 wildland firefighters per day, who were
fighting two of the 2023 season's biggest fires in the state.
Timothy Bullock, 32, an electrician jailed for second-degree assault
stemming from a domestic dispute, said he has changed his life goals
and wants to become a wildland firefighter.
"I used to drink quite a bit... it was a terrible mistake on my part
that affected other people, people I cared about. So it's hard
dealing with that," said Bullock, acknowledging a prison sentence
may have been needed for him to change his path. "I just know that
I'm never going to make those types of mistakes ever again."
Bullock has been a standout member of the Cedar Creek Corrections
Center camp crew, according to his bosses at DNR. He has submitted
his application for ARC 20 and is being considered for a spot in
late 2024.
"I'm getting real close to getting out. It's kind of working out for
the better, you know, to get back on my feet and then have an
opportunity when I get out," said Bullock.
Washington's model could be a 'stepping stone' for state agencies
across the U.S., according to transition crew liaison Roy Hardin,
who helped form the crew with Hood.
"If a person is employed, has a really good job right when they get
out of prison, they're not homeless, they're probably not going to
come back," said Hardin. He said four crew members from ARC 20 have
gone on to take jobs as members of the state firefighting agency –
one engine leader and three engine crew members.
![](http://archives.lincolndailynews.com/2024/Jun/06/images/ads/current/moriearty_sda_PROMGRAD_2024.png)
Kenyatta Bridges is one of those crew members.
On June 3, he started fighting fires with DNR's Arcadia Engine 7405
near Spokane, in one of the most wildfire prone areas of Washington
state.
"He's hard working. He's motivated," said superintendent Hood, who
recruited Bridges. "He's becoming one of those leaders. He's good
with the chainsaw. He doesn't know how to quit working; he's
physically capable of the job. He's what you want in a firefighter."
Bridges is elated for this new chapter of his life. Since his
release from Brownstone he has been living in transitional housing
with other formerly incarcerated individuals in Spokane, and on May
20 his partner gave birth to their son.
"I feel like I couldn't ask for nothing better," Bridges said,
discussing his life post-release. "To have everything so quickly, it
feels like every gear is rotating and spinning just on point."
(Reporting by Matt McKnight; Editing by Mary Milliken and Claudia
Parsons)
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