{"id":515,"date":"2019-03-04T14:25:46","date_gmt":"2019-03-04T22:25:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/marileavitt.com\/?p=515"},"modified":"2020-03-02T14:26:55","modified_gmt":"2020-03-02T22:26:55","slug":"national-guard-could-see-pay-bump-for-wildfire-response","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/marileavitt.com\/2019\/03\/04\/national-guard-could-see-pay-bump-for-wildfire-response\/","title":{"rendered":"National Guard could see pay bump for wildfire response"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"single-post\" role=\"main\">\n<article id=\"post-8834\" class=\"main-content post-8834 post type-post status-publish format-standard has-post-thumbnail hentry category-home category-news category-northwest\">\n<div class=\"entry-content\">\n<p><strong>OLYMPIA \u2014<\/strong>\u00a0State representatives passed a bill in a 94-0 vote on Friday to increase the pay of National Guard members for their wildland fire response duty.<\/p>\n<p>House Bill 1137 is co-sponsored by 15 bipartisan representatives and introduced by Rep. Mari Leavitt, D-Lakewood. The bill was requested by the state Military Department.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWashington has a wildfire crisis,\u201d said Leavitt at the floor hearing. \u201cPeople are losing their property, their lands and even their lives.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>According to Leavitt, the state hit a record number of wildfires last year, resulting in 440,000 acres burned. The National Guard has been assisting in wildland fire response, stemming from the increase in fires, she explained.<\/p>\n<p>The legislation aims to update the pay structure for wildland fire response so that it is equal to other state agencies handling wildfires. The director of the state Military Department would be responsible for establishing the pay structure, subject to approval by the Office of Financial Management.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIn 30 years, we have not updated the compensation statute for our National Guard members,\u201d Leavitt said. \u201cWe are failing them.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>National guard members are paid less than minimum wage to protect our wildlands and homes, she said. HB 1137 would require pay and allowances equal to that of the United States Armed Forces or state minimum wage.<\/p>\n<p>The measure was Leavitt\u2019s first bill to be passed by the House. The companion Senate bill, SB 5196, will be considered next.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<footer><\/footer>\n<\/article>\n<aside class=\"sidebar text-right\">\n<article id=\"ai_widget-2\" class=\"widget ai_widget\"><\/article>\n<article id=\"ai_widget-3\" class=\"widget ai_widget\"><\/article>\n<article id=\"ai_widget-4\" class=\"widget ai_widget\"><\/article>\n<article id=\"ai_widget-5\" class=\"widget ai_widget\"><\/article>\n<\/aside>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"row module-adjacent-posts show-for-medium\" data-equalizer=\"pnz89n-equalizer\" data-equalize-on=\"medium\" data-resize=\"pnz89n-equalizer\" data-mutate=\"pnz89n-equalizer\">\n<div class=\"small-6 adjacent-prev columns\" data-equalizer-watch=\"\"><\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>OLYMPIA \u2014\u00a0State representatives passed a bill in a 94-0 vote on Friday to increase the pay of National Guard members for their wildland fire response duty. House Bill 1137 is co-sponsored by 15 bipartisan representatives and introduced by Rep. Mari Leavitt, D-Lakewood. The bill was requested by the state Military Department. \u201cWashington has a wildfire &hellip; <a class=\"more\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"http:\/\/www.tukwilareporter.com\/news\/national-guard-could-see-pay-bump-for-wildfire-response\/\">READ MORE<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"acf":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/marileavitt.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/515"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/marileavitt.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/marileavitt.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/marileavitt.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/marileavitt.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=515"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/marileavitt.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/515\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/marileavitt.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=515"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/marileavitt.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=515"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/marileavitt.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=515"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}