RESILIENCE
BY AMBER LYNN SCOTT
On the opening day of the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection (CAL FIRE) Annual Aviation Safety Conference in January, CAL FIRE Director Joe Tyler reiterated a comment he made during a news conference in July: There is no longer a California “fire season” – only a “fire year.”
That same day, Santa Ana winds fueled the most catastrophic wildfire to occur in Los Angeles. Viewing wildfire risk as ongoing rather than seasonal inspired California’s government to propose a year-round CAL FIRE staffing model, better situating the organization to respond to wildfire risk.
In many ways, the recommendation reflects CAL FIRE’s proactive efforts over the last decade to adjust to the emerging new operational environment, such as the acquisition of new technologies that predict and support fire responses year-round.
While many of the post-LA fire news stories about CAL FIRE’s possible staffing changes have primarily centered on cost-versus-risk calculations, another important advantage for the organization was less prominently featured but worth highlighting – the potential for staffing model changes to improve firefighter resilience.
Resilience – an individual’s ability to maintain a stable equilibrium in the face of difficulty –is an ongoing discussion and research focus amongst many members of the larger wildland fire community.
Ongoing exposure to traumatic events such as the Los Angeles fires puts all first responders, including wildland firefighters, at high risk for physical and mental health injuries, including post-traumatic stress disorder. In a typical career, first responders can experience between 500 and 800 traumatic incidents, with each event serving as a potential site of emotional, physical, or mental difficulty, but also an opportunity to build resiliency.
In the last decade, many organizations have funded programs to bolster individual resiliency, such as CAL FIRE’s employee assistance program, which can help people overcome negative impacts of traumatic experiences, and its behavior health and wellness program, which supports wellness units and support services. These programs and services are commendable and represent positive steps in the collective effort to address the impact of frequent traumatic incidents on first responders. However, some health researchers have noted these programs may be underutilized by the requirement of traumatized individuals to proactively seek or engage help. In response to this concern, researchers and first responder communities are investigating how broader resilience considerations may align with planned organizational changes, and how these potential changes could support resiliency in this era of megafires and gigafires.
For example, from my organizational communication scholar perspective, I see CAL FIRE’s proposed shift to year-round fire fighting from a seasonal operations model presenting an exciting opportunity for the organization to embrace resilience processes beyond its current programming by restructuring its day-to-day operations to embrace the new normal.
Communication scholars have identified five processes that support resilience: crafting normalcy; affirming identity anchors; maintaining and using communication networks; constructing alternative logics; and foregrounding productive action while backgrounding negative feelings.
The process of crafting normalcy, defined by U.S. communication researcher Steven Wilson as “talking / acting / interacting so as to help create a sense that things are ‘normal,’ ” can be particularly challenging for organizations using a seasonal fire staffing model in locations now experiencing wildfires throughout the year, rather than their former predictable seasonal pattern.
The Los Angeles fires occurred in January during CAL FIRE’s base staffing period, which includes equipment maintenance cycles, annual training programs, and reduced seasonal wildfire staffing levels. The traditional organizational structure worked well during wildfires that presented seasonally but creates a unique resilience challenge for organization members unexpectedly and repeatedly faced with catastrophic fires outside the usual fire season.
When members must respond to wildfires with resource models built on an old norm of fire seasons, the ongoing occurrence of large wildfires outside the traditional fire season can present challenges to reconciling a new normal.
It is exceptionally difficult for people to adapt to a new normal when resources reflect an old normal model. Thus, the mismatch of staffing and resources with wildfires may also create more significant resiliency challenges for those attempting to craft normalcy. On a positive note, the proposal to potentially adjust the CAL FIRE organization to a year-round staffing model may not only improve the tactical response to California’s wildfires but might also situate the organization to increase member resilience by crafting the new normal that matches resources and staffing with California’s wildfire reality.
Beyond staffing changes, there may be other opportunities for wildfire organizations to build resiliency beyond mental health programming. Some resiliency practices exist in first responder organizations but may be taken for granted or not easily recognized as important resiliency contributions. For example, including regular discussions of personal experiences managing large wildfire responses during training or debriefing sessions supports the development of multiple resiliency processes. Having team members share their experiences with traumatic wildfire events can support ongoing organizational learning and facilitate the normalization of open, honest talk about catastrophic fire trauma impacts.
Incorporating open discussions into training can also encourage organization members to develop, use, and maintain communication networks, another important resilience process. The creation of communication networks may also impact other resiliency processes, such as affirmation of identity anchors, when individuals relate to each other and bond over their shared experiences of managing catastrophic fire.
Unfortunately, catastrophic fires have impacted every facet of the global wildland fire community, and my initial research indicates the impacts of these ongoing catastrophic fires also show no sign of lessening soon.
The increasing number and magnitude of fires can make it difficult for organizations to prioritize long-term resiliency efforts when resources are already stretched perilously thin. However, the scholars, practitioners, and leaders who comprise the greater wildfire community can help facilitate resiliency in organizations by sharing ideas, experiences, and stories like those included in this issue of Wildfire magazine.
By prioritizing regular discussions of member resiliency as part of the overall effort to manage wildfire risk, the scholars, practitioners, and leaders who comprise the greater wildfire community can collectively identify and support opportunities to build more resilient organizations despite the increasing number of traumatic wildfire events unfolding.
