Incarcerated individual hand crew members: wages.

Assembly Member Bryan's legislation establishes wage requirements for incarcerated individuals and youth serving on firefighting crews, requiring payment of $7.25 per hour during active fire incidents. The measure applies to adult inmates assigned to hand crews as well as youth placed at the Pine Grove Youth Conservation Camp, with rates subject to annual updates.

The bill maintains existing provisions that allow qualifying inmates to earn two days of credit for each day served when assigned to conservation camps or firefighting duties, rather than the standard one-for-one credit ratio. Inmates who complete firefighter training continue to receive additional credit reductions from their terms of confinement, with these enhanced credits remaining available only to those eligible after October 1, 2011.

Designated as an urgency statute, the measure would take effect immediately upon enactment to ensure wildfire response readiness. The Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation would oversee implementation of the new wage requirements within existing budgetary frameworks, coordinating with conservation camps and correctional facilities to establish payment systems for fire incident deployments.