General Discussion
Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsPrisoners are fighting the California fires - $1.00/ hour
1,500 prison fire fighters!
IcyPeas
(21,866 posts)Equinox Moon
(6,344 posts)WhiskeyGrinder
(22,334 posts)Demovictory9
(32,454 posts)USALiberal
(10,877 posts)WhiskeyGrinder
(22,334 posts)Last edited Sun Nov 18, 2018, 07:47 PM - Edit history (1)
USALiberal
(10,877 posts)WhiskeyGrinder
(22,334 posts)USALiberal
(10,877 posts)alphafemale
(18,497 posts)I wish some would stop thinking these people didn't make this choice.
Can you imagine being pitied when you made a choice to do this?
I would spit on the people wanting to pity me.
UniteFightBack
(8,231 posts)Small-Axe
(359 posts)to send them to Harvard.
Very expensive labor, actually.
This program rehabilitates people and gets them out of prison sooner.
grantcart
(53,061 posts)On the list and got a call 2 months ago from him and he was overjoyed at getting to the fire camp.
1) he was sharing a room with 18 people and there were fights every day
2) He was then housed with a psychotic man that screamed in his sleep.
3) He now is
A) getting good training as a cook
B) is able to take a shower and use the bathroom in private
C) is at a camp without walls and can walk freely ( no one leaves because the add on to their sentence is 4 years and they are down to about 1 year
D) They get 2 days off for every day assigned to the camp
E) when at camp and not in training they have unlimited access to basketball and weights.
Money isn't really an issue as family members contribute to canteen accounts.
WhiskeyGrinder
(22,334 posts)grantcart
(53,061 posts)Hundreds of thousands of dollars each time.
Doctors for two of the people said that they died abruptly when they learned what he did.
About 40 victims whose entire life savings were gone.
Their children robbed of their birth right so grand children that will lose the college education that their grand parents had saved for.
He told me that after listening to the victims impact statements for 2 days that if he had been on the jury he would have given himself the death penalty.
A month later he was back to "Wasn't my fault, I didn't know my partner didn't really invest the money"
He is finishing his third year and even though he is a repeat felon got out. He is still in because when he got to Mexico he called the prosecuting attorney's office and told them to "F off" in a 20 min call that included 100 f bombs.
Only his sister talks to him and everybody who knows him and the facts of the case thinks he got off easy although because of his attitude he got twice what the 'mastermind' did.
All of the above is a little off poin because the real point is no matter how bad the camp is the prisoners say it is 100 times better than being back in prison. Presumably all of the prisoners could opt back to prison if they wanted too but no one ever has.
WhiskeyGrinder
(22,334 posts)on it. Got it!
grantcart
(53,061 posts)He is serving time in prison
Fire camp is better.
Your focus on the dollar amount they ate paid focuses on the most irrelevant point possible.
They get actual training for real jobs, in his case a cook
They get much better (and safer) living conditions
They are only on fire related about 4 or 5 days a month
But none of that compares with the biggest benefit which is 2 fold:
Everyday they are in camp (fire or now fire) they get 2 days subtracted from their sentence, and instead of living as a prisoner in a cage they are addressed by their name, walk around freely and get an enhanced sense of self worth because they are, for the first time In a long time doing something for the larger good.
Your pathetic snark is only matched by your over bearing paternalism. You assume that all of these guys are unable to make decisions in their self interest and that you know better. They believe that they have made an informed decision and are fortunate. On the other hand you believe that they made a terrible decision and are being exploited. What a wonderful world you live in where your decisions are perfect and people that make different decisions are exploited and coerced.
In my friends case increased pay doesn't make any difference because what ever he makes In prison is garnished to pay back the $ 1.2 million he stole from 80 year widows, the people that were actually exploited and coerced.
Cicada
(4,533 posts)They risk their lives
Small-Axe
(359 posts)Small-Axe
(359 posts)to reduce their prison terms and to give back to society.
What is more redemptive than saving lives, homes, and peoples' dreams?
Regaining self-respect and feeling like heroes is redemptive.
Downtown Hound
(12,618 posts)They actually converted the horse stables at our local fairgrounds into a makeshift prison to house them during their rest time. They helped save a lot of lives and property. They deserve more than $1 an hour.
keithbvadu2
(36,793 posts)Inmate firefighters
.
ProudLib72
(17,984 posts)But in a bitterly ironic twist, once inmates leave prison, they often cant work as firefighters, despite their frontline experience. In California, nearly all counties require firefighters to become licensed emergency medical technician (EMTs) a credential that can be denied to almost anyone with a criminal record.
https://www.usatoday.com/story/opinion/2018/08/20/californias-volunteer-inmate-firefighters-denied-jobs-after-release-column/987677002/
Demonaut
(8,914 posts)they are paying a debt to society, in most cases they are not first line troops and they are Volunteers
Small-Axe
(359 posts)if they were paid $15 an hour it would take 5,000 hours to cover the cost.
Not cheap labor.
Iggo
(47,552 posts)It should be goddamed expensive.
Small-Axe
(359 posts)JCanete
(5,272 posts)compensation to prisoners willing to do this, if maybe we didn't over-incarcerate as a state and as a nation.
Small-Axe
(359 posts)One year of incarceration costs far more than hiring a professional firefighter.
Reducing time served and gaining self-respect is worth more than a few bucks an hour.
JCanete
(5,272 posts)75,000.
As I said in another post, I think jobs programs are good, but there is no reason we shouldn't offer a reasonable pay to people we incarcerate, and incarcerating people SHOULD be painful to our budget. We do WAY the fuck too much of it. Its out of hand. We should not be proud to be global leaders in prisoner population, but sadly, we are that because there are lobbying incentives to be that.
Do you know how hard it is to get started once you've been in prison? Why not let the prisoners who volunteer make something of it that could help them financially on the other side? Yes, the work experience is good. The money would also be more than welcome. We can afford it, and it may even help against recidivism...though on that I'm just wildly speculating.
Small-Axe
(359 posts)is far more valuable than making trinkets.
The firefighting inmates learn to work in teams and feel respect from other firefighters and the public. That's redemptive.
JCanete
(5,272 posts)Small-Axe
(359 posts)Listen to interviews (not conducted by Amy Goodwin) for the self-pride that inmates felt during these fires. And hope people responded to them.
I heard many who were quite emotional about feeling like heroes.
PufPuf23
(8,774 posts)The jobs defray the costs of incarnation, puts commissary $ in their pockets, may be job training, and is volunteer, even considered a privileged job. I spent 16 year as a USFS employee, and while not normally in my regular job, have fire experience and experience with the prisoner crews. They always seemed to have very high morale.
There are environmental work camps in CA for prisoners besides for fires and this is the source of the fire labor. They are referred to as "honor" or "conservation" camps and have been used since at least the 1960s. There is a CA Youth Authority Camp at the Whiskeytown NRA (where Carr Fire started).
It is silly to consider this slave labor as the prisoners involved like these jobs, though can be very hard work. Most of the work on fires is in support (kitchens, supplies, etc) or as holding or mop crews but not the crews that directly attack the fires. They have more freedom and receive better food while in the camps or on fires.
I have great respect for the prisoner crews. I think Amy Goodman missed the mark here casting asperations that the convicts are slave labor.
Small-Axe
(359 posts)Amy Goodman really did miss the mark.
JCanete
(5,272 posts)prison itself is such an abhorrent place to be that of course the outdoors is preferable. Of course after being cooped up behind bars, this is the best end of the deal, but the prisoner has no bargaining leverage in this equation, just a chance to be out of a cage.
Second, these could be jobs that California paid workers outside of jail. That it is using "volunteer" labor instead of other workers doesn't make me feel warm and fuzzy. Prisoners should be paid a wage closer to that of those who would otherwise be paid, and even if it cost us, these programs should still remain, because I do think these are good for the reasons you did describe.
Third, if we want to bitch and moan then about how costly all of this is, well we over-incarcerate. Too many people go to prison and too many people are stuck there. We have the highest per-capita AND total prison population in the world(at least by the last time I checked).
And because of all the ways our system works, there are too many damn incentives to keep them there...there's the prison lobby...there's the private prison lobby, there's the pharmaceutical lobby....
so no, I don't want us looking to prisons as a way to put bodies in jobs....as a work program? Hell yeah...and pay these people so that they have a nest egg when they get out and need to start a life.
Small-Axe
(359 posts)to be incarcerated. It's much more complex than that.
Being on fire teams gets people out of prison much sooner. They get 2 days off their sentences for every day fighting fires IMS and they come out feeling like they did something really positive. That's a double win as far as I'm concerned.
JCanete
(5,272 posts)are also things that can fill any of our number of types of prisons, and thus our resources are spent here at the penitentiary level rather than at the level of education, opportunity and prevention. I'm still not sure I buy your argument that this feeling positive about doing something good has the coat-tails you are applying to it. Some of the things that way into self-worth and pride are feelings of being valued. Nothing about this system actually makes these people valued...thanked sure(as by Brown)...like we thank our troops too. Or I should say, I don't personally see how whatever value they have in the pecking order in prison, translates at all to when they get out. The work itself? The opportunity to mention that you were in that program even as a convict? Sure.
But these prisoners are on the front lines. They are risking their safety for a chance to get out of prison earlier.
Yes, it saves our state 100 million dollars a year to put these guys out there instead of to hire firefighters. What would it save us to not be so flippant in our incarceration? Our sentence times? To be better about an actual reform and rehabilitation agenda?
Also, do you understand that the rate originally settled on was decades ago?
Small-Axe
(359 posts)of what is happening with the inmate firefighting programs. Including benefits for both the inmates and the people who are in jeopardy of losing their home and their lives.
The inmate fire crews are mostly supporting professional firefighters. No inmate firefighter died in these fires.
I entirely disagree that "nothing about this system actually makes these people valued." I'd search for interviews with participants. They tell a very different story.
JCanete
(5,272 posts)it was argued in court that we shouldn't go forward with a big parole change because it would impact our access to cheap labor. That was the State's argument. Thoughts?
Small-Axe
(359 posts)The few people in prison the happier I'll be.
I'd rather see people coming out of prison feeling restored than not. I think being part of these teams is valuable for those who serve on them.
And it reduces their sentences and gets them out of prison sooner. A win-win.
JCanete
(5,272 posts)And how does it save us 100 million dollars?