Covid Limits California’s Efforts to Fight Wildfires With Prison Labor - The New York Times
▻https://www.nytimes.com/2020/08/22/us/california-wildfires-prisoners.html
Prisoners have helped California fight fires for decades, playing a crucial role in containing the blazes striking the state with more frequency and ferocity in recent years.
This past week, though, Mr. Martin and hundreds of other inmate firefighters were absent from the fire lines. They had already gone home, part of an early release program initiated by Gov. Gavin Newsom to protect them from the coronavirus.
That has highlighted the state’s dependence on prisoners in its firefighting force and complicated its battle against almost 600 fires, many which continued burning across Northern California on Saturday. Experts worry that dry thunderstorms forecast to begin on Sunday could wreak more havoc, further stretching the resources needed to fight what are now the second- and third-largest fires in modern state history.
To critics the prison program is a cheap and exploitative salve, one that should be replaced with proper public investment in firefighting; to others it is an essential part of the state’s response to what has become an annual wildfire crisis. Some have complained that participants were released just when the state needed them most.