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With 'firefighter fiscal cliff' weeks away a push for permanent pay raises intensifies

In this May 14, 2021, photo provided by the High Desert Museum, U.S. Forest Service firefighters carry out a prescribed burn on the grounds of the High Desert Museum, near Bend, Oregon. The prescribed burn is part of a massive effort in wildlands across the West to prepare for a fire season that follows the worst one on record.
Kyle Kosma/High Desert Museum via AP
In this May 14, 2021, photo provided by the High Desert Museum, U.S. Forest Service firefighters carry out a prescribed burn on the grounds of the High Desert Museum, near Bend, Oregon. The prescribed burn is part of a massive effort in wildlands across the West to prepare for a fire season that follows the worst one on record.

The deadline to prevent steep, across-the-board pay cuts to federal wildland firefighters is now just weeks away.

Some members of Congress are pressing Senate leaders to back a bipartisan bill that would avoid what some advocates have termed the “firefighter fiscal cliff.”

Federal infrastructure funds gave firefighters a temporary pay raise in 2021 of $20,000 a year or 50%.

But that funding is set to dry up Oct. 1 unless a permanent pay raise is approved by Congress.

Officials fear the cuts could cause mass resignations and deepen recruitment and retention challenges in the 19,000-person workforce.

Low pay and longer working hours during increasingly extreme fire seasons has strained firefighter ranks and caused many to find work elsewhere.