No PSOB for contract pilots and crew

Up until fairly recently, I only had a vague notion that the families of police officers, fireman, and other public safety officers who died in the line of duty received death benefits. Further after receiving the lump sum death benefits under the Public Safety Officers’ Benefits Program (PSOB) (current benefit is $303,064), spouses and children are eligible for educational assistance under the Public Safety Officers’ Educational Assistance Program. Finally public safety officers’ who receive injuries in the line of duty that result in permanent and total disability are eligible for disability benefits under the PSOB program.

The PSOB program and its benefits, as described in this document, can not take away the pain that comes with the death of a loved one in the line of duty. It can not take away the physical and emotional pain that comes with a permanent disability. But these monetary benefits can take away some of the sting. With these benefits comes acknowledgement as well as financial benefits.

But there is a catch, one group of firefighters who do not receive PSOB benefits: those who work under contract to public firefighting agencies and are not employees of federal, state, or local (public) agencies involved with wildland fire management and suppression. As I understand it, the Bureau of Justice Assistance within the U.S. Department of Justice, the agency that administers the PSOB program, has ruled that air tanker pilots and crew are not eligible for benefits under the PSOB program because they are contractors and are not direct employees of federal, state, and local (public) wildland fire fighting agencies.

In 2007 two U.S. Senators, Enzi (R-WYO) and Feinstein (D-CA) introduced the Aerial Firefighter Relief Act of 2007 that would of provided benefits under the PSOB program to aerial firefighters (pilots and crew) working under contract for public agencies and suffer death or disability. Similar legislation was introduced at the same time in the House of Representatives. For more information on this attempted legislation see this newspaper article and Sen. Feinstein’s press release about the legislation. To the best of my knowledge, this legislation was not passed.

For years, organizations involved with aerial firefighters, including but not limited to the California Fire Pilots Association and the Associated Airtanker Pilots have been trying to get PSOB Program benefits for aerial firefighters. To date their efforts have not been successful.

To the best of my knowledge, no aerial fire fighters dying in the line of duty have received Public Safety Officer Benefits. Aerial firefighters and other contract public safety officers deserve the same benefits as policeman, firefighters, and other public safety officers. All I can say is that I think it is wholly unacceptable that aerial fire fighters and other contract public safety officers are not eligible for PSOB Program benefits. As I say this, my words feel wholly inadequate.

What these aerial firefighters, male and female, do is very dangerous, and many have died. To read about the stories of the experiences of the families of a couple of air tanker pilots who died in the line of duty, read this 2002 msnbc report. I point you to this report so that you may read about the experiences of these affected families. The experiences of the families are still relevant, but the various State level politics that msnbc reports on may be dated. See also this 2004 testimony of an air tanker pilot widow before Congress.

I hope that this changes and there may be hope on the horizon. You may recall that I wrote here about the tanker 09 crash killing the pilot and crew. Tanker 09 was flying a CAL FIRE fire when they crashed. The Chief of CAL FIRE, Del Waters, has signed the PSOB applications of the tanker 09 families. Good for him. See this thread on the Associated Airtanker Pilots website for more information. There is hope that this will mean that the Dept. of Justice will approve the tanker 09 PSOB applications. Time will tell. We can only hope.

Nor have I forgotten about the families of tanker 42 that crashed in late April of this year while on a firefighting mission resulting in the death of the pilot and crew. They too deserve PSOB Program benefits.