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[Ecology] - Review of the California Ecology Corps (hearing before Committee on Efficiency and Cost Control, June 1972) (1 of 3)
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[Ecology] - Review of the California Ecology Corps (hearing before Committee on Efficiency and Cost Control, June 1972) (1 of 3)
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Ronald Reagan Presidential Library
Digital Library Collections
This is a PDF of a folder from our textual collections.
Collection: Reagan, Ronald: Gubernatorial Papers,
1966-74: Press Unit
Folder Title: [Ecology] - Review of the California
Ecology Corps (hearing before Committee on
Efficiency and Cost Control, June 1972) (1 of 3)
Box: P34
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https://reaganlibrary.gov/archives/digital-library
To see all Ronald Reagan Presidential Library inventories visit:
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Contact a reference archivist at: [email protected]
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REVIEW OF THE
CALIFORNIA ECOLOGY CORPS
HEARING
BEFORE THE
COMMITTEE ON
EFFICIENCY
AND
COST CONTROL
STATE
PORNTA CALIFO EST JUSTAS LEGES TORUM
ECC 72-7
June 23, 1972
CALIFORNIA STATE ASSEMBLY
COMMITTEE ON EFFICIENCY
and
COST CONTROL
ASSEMBLYMAN MIKE CULLEN, CHAIRMAN
ASSEMBLYMAN ERNEST MOBLEY, VICE CHAIRMAN
ASSEMBLYMAN KENNETH CORY
ASSEMBLYMAN VINCENT THOMAS
ASSEMBLYMAN RAYMOND T. SEELEY
ASSEMBLYMAN BOB WILSON
JAN SHARPLESS, ASSOCIATE CONSULTANT
DEAN CROMWELL, LEGISLATIVE INTERN
MARGARET CUMMINGS, COMMITTEE SECRETARY
STATEMENT OF PURPOSE
The Assembly Committee on Efficiency and Cost Control shall
exercise general legislative oversight in order to determine
the extent to which programs, policies and actions of govern-
ment fall within and adhere to the expressed intent of the
Legislature, including but not limited to the:
I.
Determination of programs which duplicate
or overlap other programs in existence; the
II.
Determination of programs which no longer
fulfill an intended or necessary need; the
III.
Determination of agencies which are conduct-
ing programs or functions not within the
intent of the Legislature; and the
IV.
Determination of agencies failing to conduct
programs or functions intended by the Legis-
lature.
LETTER OF TRANSMITTAL
State Capitol
Sacramento, California
June 23, 1972
The Honorable Robert Moretti
Speaker of the California Assembly
State Capitol
Sacramento, California 95814
Dear Mr. Speaker:
Your Committee on Efficiency and Cost Control hereby
transmits its hearing record supporting the findings
and recommendations concerning the California Ecology
Corps report which we submitted to you on June 7th.
Mabe Cullon
MIKE CULLEN
Chairman
CONTENTS
Hearing on
Page
Tuesday, April 4, 1972
1
Statement of
Stearns, James, Director, Department of Conservation,
Accompanied by Mr. Joe Griggs, Administrator of the
California Ecology Corps, and Mr. William Haussler,
Assistant Chief of Operations, Department of Parks and
Recreation
2
McKay, Paul, Corpsman, Inyo Ecology Center, Accompanied
by Mr. Nathanial Stone, Corpsman, Humboldt Ecology
Center, and Mr. Timothy White, Corpsman, on Assign-
ment to the Department of Conservation
35
McCann, Major William D., Chief, Alternate Service
Program, California Headquarters, Selective Service
System, Accompanied by Mr. James Stearns, Director,
Department of Conservation, and Mr. Joe Griggs, Admin-
istrator of the California Ecology Corps
72
APPENDICES
Appendix A - Statement of James G. Stearns, Director,
Department of Conservation
109
Appendix B - Statement of William Penn Mott, Jr., Depart-
ment of Parks and Recreation
131
Appendix C - Statement of Nathanial Stone, Corpsman,
Humboldt Ecology Center
133
Appendix D - Statement of Paul McKay, Corpsman, Inyo
Ecology Center, presenting a petition signed by members
of Inyo Ecology Center
138
Appendix E - Report on Problem Areas in the Ecology Corps,
Timothy White, Corpsman, on assignment to the Department
of Conservation
147
Appendix F - Selective Service Regulations which pertain to
the Administration of the Alternate Service Program for
conscientious objectors, provided by Major William McCann,
Chief, Alternate Service Program, California Headquarters,
Selective Service System
160
Appendix G -- Statement of Dr. F. Duane Blume, Assistant
Director, White Mountain Research Station, Bishop,
California
175
Appendix H -- Statement of Grant A. Morse, Assistant
Regional Forester, Division of Information and Education,
Forest Service, United States Department of Agriculture,
San Francisco
177
Appendix I -- Memorandum to the Chief Park Ranger, Sequoia
and Kings Canyon National Parks, from John P. Bowdler,
Fire Control Officer, regarding the California Ecology
Corps, Ash Mountain
178
Appendix J -- Letters from James Stearns, Director of the
Department of Conservation, to Assemblyman Mike Cullen,
Chairman of the Assembly Committee on Efficiency and Cost
Control, regarding cost to state of paying the corpsmen a
minimum wage
180
STATEMEMTS, LETTERS, ETC., SUBMITTED
Committee Members: Letters and response
Honorable Bob Wilson, Assemblyman
Letter to Joe Griggs, Administrator, California Ecology
Corps, dated April 6, 1972
183
James G. Stearns, Director, Department of Conservation,
Letter to Hon. Bob Wilson, responding to questions
asked in his letter of April 6, 1972, dated
April 18, 1972
185
Honorable Mike Cullen, Chairman of the Assembly Committee
on Efficiency and Cost Control,
Letter to James G. Stearns, Director, Department of
Conservation, dated April 19, 1972
188
James G. Stearns, Director, Department of Conservation,
Letter to Hon. Mike Cullen, responding to questions
asked in his letter of April 19, 1972, dated
April 26, 1972
190
Honorable Mike Cullen, Chairman of the Assembly Committee
on Efficiency and Cost Control,
Letter to James G. Stearns, Director, Department of
Conservation, dated April 20, 1972
198
James G. Stearns, Director, Department of Conservation,
Letter to Hon. Mike Cullen, responding to questions
asked in his letter of April 20, 1972, dated
May 1, 1972
200
Griggs, Joe, Administrator, California Ecology Corps,
Enclosure to prospective applicants to the California
Ecology Corps
205
Memorandum to Ecology Center Directors concerning a pay
raise for corpsmen, dated January 10, 1972
206
McFadden, Dave, Field Secretary, Western Regional Office,
Central Committee for Conscientious Objectors,
statement to the Senate Finance Committee, dated May 15,
1972
207
Tuesday, April 4, 1972
The Committee met at 1:45 in Room 6028, State Capitol,
Chairman Cullen presiding.
Present: Assemblymen Mike Cullen, Ernest Mobley, Raymond
Seeley, Vincent Thomas, and Bob Wilson.
Staff Present: John W. Billett, Senior Consultant, Jan
Sharpless, Associate Consultant, and Dean Cromwell, Staff.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: The Chair would like to welcome Bob
Wilson of San Diego, newly assigned to this committee. I'm not
sure whether you'll find the committee work interesting. We take
more testimony than some of the members would prefer.
ASSEMBLYMAN MOBLEY: That's right.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: And our decisions don't always come out
every month or so, but it's a different committee than the others
or to what you have become used to.
ASSEMBLYMAN WILSON: With a lawyer on here you are liable
to get more testimony.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: Right. Good afternoon. Today the
committee will conduct hearings on the operation of the California
Ecology Corps.
In announcing the hearing on March 21, I mentioned that
charges had been brought to our attention that the Ecology Corps had
not perhaps fulfilled the public purposes for which it was created.
The purpose of this review is to provide a public forum for con-
sideration of those critical charges and to compile some reliable
-1-
data upon which we can assess the progress or the necessity of
the continuance of the California Ecology Corps.
One of the charges of this committee in reviewing various
government agencies and programs, some 250 government departments
and some 2500 programs, is to ascertain whether the programs are
functioning in accordance with legislative intent; whether they are
duplicating other programs in state government or in the private
sector; and whether or not there's any legislative authority
whatsoever.
So often in government programs a department will get started
on a shoestring and before anyone realizes it they have several
hundred employees. And it's very difficult to stamp out that type
of creature, which tends to perpetuate even though the original
need may long since have vanished.
At my direction, two members of the staff of this committee
visited the Ecology Corps Centers in Paynes Creek and in Weott last
week. This hearing will hopefully provide a combination of the
information gathered at those visits, and a basis on which reasonable,
sound recommendations can be made. The reports and recommendations
of the committee should be published within 30 days and transmitted
to the two finance committees and to the budget conference committee
for their consideration in completing the structure of the budget.
At this time, may I ask Director Stearns, Mr. Griggs, the
Administrator of the Ecology Corps, Mr. Haussler, from the Department
of Parks and Recreation, and is Mr. Smith in the audience?
APPEARANCE OF MR. JAMES STEARNS, DIRECTOR, DEPARTMENT OF
CONSERVATION, ACCOMPANIED BY MR. JOE GRIGGS, ADMINISTRATOR OF THE
CALIFORNIA ECOLOGY CORPS, AND MR. WILLIAM HAUSSLER, ASSISTANT CHIEF
OF OPERATIONS, DEPARTMENT OF PARKS AND RECREATION.
-2-
Gentlemen, as you can see, we use an attractive reporter
who requires that you identify yourself and spell your name the
first time out. Occasionally should you speak too rapidly, as one
is want to do from reading from a prepared statement, she'll either
say something or raise her hand and ask you to slow down. I don't
think it will be an inconvenience. It's worked out very well so
far.
Is there any objection among the members of the committee to
the news media taking pictures or recording?
Permission will be granted for that.
Director Stearns.
MR. JAMES STEARNS: Mr. Chairman, I am James Stearns. I am
Director of the Department of Conservation. I do have a prepared
statement that the reporter can use. I'll confine my initial remarks
very close to the text of it. (Appendix A)
I would ask permission to go through it completely because
it's designed to pretty much set the tune as far as chronological
events that lead up to this hearing. And with your permission I'll
be as fast as I can and if the reporter gets behind, our text will
be available to her.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: All right. In the event you deviate, let
the girl know you are deviating and we'll incorporate the printed
statement.
MR. STEARNS: In this instance I'll promise not to.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: Go ahead.
MR. STEARNS: The Department welcomes the opportunity to
give a thorough review of the chronology of -
-3-
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: There are many people here that will be
interested in what you have to say.
MR. STEARNS: If you have the time.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: We'll take the time. Okay.
MR. STEARNS: That's a problem I've had all my life.
The California Ecology Corps is the solution Governor Reagan
has adopted to meet California's continuing need for a reserve of
trained manpower to confront the ravages of wildland fire and to
meet this state's commitment for preserving the environment.
The Corps was officially established in an executive order
(Attachment A of Appendix A) issued by Governor Reagan on April 27,
1971. That event marked the beginning of the Corps as a legal entity,
but it was by no means the first step.
To find the first step we must go back in time more than 20
years ago when California's conservation camp program was inaugurated
and even before that, back many decades to the days when state and
county fire wardens conscripted citizens off the street or out of
a sawmill to fight forest fires. In the intervening years, science
has produced modern methods of fire control and fire suppression,
but these new tools have not eliminated the need for trained manpower
is organized crews.
Over the years, the Division of Forestry, the state's wild
land fire fighting force, has, of necessity, increased in efficiency
and in manpower. Today, some 3,000 men, whose job it is to meet
the challenges of the wildland fires, are on the state's payroll.
This force is augmented each summer by 1800 young men who are employed
as seasonal fire fighters. Together, they man the fire stations,
-4-
bulldozer crews, and air bases that are three of the basic compon-
ents available to us for wildland fire fighting.
In the late 1940's the need for trained hand crews became
evident to the state's professional wildland fire fighters as the
fourth component. In cooperation with the State Department of
Corrections and the California Youth Authority, the conservation
camp program became a reality and was formally organized.
This program enabled foresters to utilize minimum security
inmates as fire fighting hand crews and to assist in the construc-
tion of our fire defense system, working out of a new camp environment
in the state's forest lands. Working with the leadership of forestry
personnel, the inmates have proven to be a tremendous asset.
And then came social changes - and new concepts in penology
and dealing with prison inmates. A new probation subsidy program
was initiated in 1966, providing for payment to the counties on a
per case basis so that county probation staffs could be beefed up
and the less serious felons who formally ended up in conservation
camps could be dealt with at home.
Since the probation subsidy program started in 1966, the prison
population, of course, the camp population, began to decrease
rather rapidly. In recent years, the prison population had dropped
from 28,800 to under 20,000, as of this week.
A study was conducted in 1970-71 to find the alternative man-
power sources necessary to replace the dwindling camp population. A
partial solution was to contract with counties to use local prisoners
to provide the manpower. San Diego County n W supplies manpower for
-5-
two camps; another camp will soon be manned by county prisoners from
Shasta and four other Northern California counties.
As this narration indicates, the Department of Conservation was
faced with a problem, and with an obligation to find broader solutions.
California Ecology Corps is one of the solutions. But it is
more than that. It is a unique experiment in bringing concerned
young men into the field of conservation in this state to provide
the work experience and job training that can open career doors in
many conservation fields.
Although we in the Department of Conservation had long been
aware that some day the conservation camp program would no longer
provide the total answer to the manpower reserve problem, and
although we had been searching for alternatives for a long time,
the need became acute just over a year ago when, simply stated,
there were not enough inmates to adequately man the camps then in
existence.
Looking at the program as it then existed, it was obvious,
from a purely financial point of view, that as many as five of the
conservation camps must be closed by June 30, 1971. That prospect
was not satisfactory to Governor Reagan or the Legislature. The
question remained, what shall we do?
In our earlier examination, we had thought of some type of pro-
gram where young men who had completed their high schooling and yet
who had not decided where their lives would lead them could serve
for, hopefully, up to two years. Such a program, we decided, would
be patterned after experience in other programs we have administered
-6-
using young men, except that we would have these young people in
our employ on a year-around basis rather than just during the
critical months that we know as the "fire-season".
On the other hand, we knew that this program would augment
the conservation camp program to the extent that the young men would
engage in a variety of ecology and conservation-related work projects
similar to the federal government's Civilian Conservation Corps
of the pre-World War II era, including work on federal land where
inmates can only work on an emergency basis.
Thus, with this concept in mind and the problem at hand, the
California Ecology Corps became a fact. To implement a new program
would obviously require considerable attention to detail, including
recruitment. We asked ourselves, "Where can we find young men who
are readily accessible, who are unemployed, and who could be put to
work quickly within the limits of funds available to us?"
It was at this point that we turned to the Selective Service
System and specifically to those with conscientious objector
classifications.
Let me remind you that the executive order signed by Governor
Reagan and subsequently ratified by the Legislature as part of the
Budget Act of 1971 did not limit the California Ecology Corps to
conscientious objectors. The language of the executive order does
not, in fact, set forth any qualifications for persons employed in
the program.
Nevertheless, we did ask that the Corps be designed as an
alternate service for young men who had been classified as
-7-
conscientious objectors by local draft boards. Conscientious
objector officials from the California headquarters of the Selective
Service System studied our request and visited the facilities we
proposed to use to house the corpsmen. Dr. Curtis Tarr, Director
of the Selective Service System in Washington, D.C., also made a
personal inspection trip, as did various representatives of con-
scientious objector associations.
In the spring of 1971 there were approximately 5,000
conscientious objectors in California, and many of them were looking
for alternate service. Alternate service, incidentally, is easily
defined as a twenty-four month period when conscientious objectors
must work for a non-profit or public service agency, thus serving
a time comparable to the time a draftee into the armed services
must serve.
And SO to meet the immediate problem, namely the prospect of
closing five conservation camps, we had a program and we had an
immediate source from which to recruit. In the meantime, we had
arrived at satisfactory arrangements offsetting the additional costs
of the new program (camp overhead, corpsmen pay, and subsistence)
through cooperative agreements with other conservation agencies
of the state and federal governments.
Basically, these agreements allowed the Department of
Conservation to charge the other agencies on a man-day basis for
the environmental and conservation work to be done by the new
California Ecology Corps. The net cost of the ecology corps to the
State of California in 1972-73 is budgeted at $814,398 based on a
-8-
corpsmen population of 340. (See Attachment B of Appendix A for
a list of projects; See Attachment C of Appendix A for budget
summary.)
The agreements were negotiated, and we decided to convert
inmate-manned conservation camps in Humboldt, Tehema, and Calaveras
counties into centers to house the new Ecology Corps. These sites
were selected because they were the closest to the work projects
that were the subject of the various agreements that had been
negotiated. A fourth center was later added in Inyo County.
We set July 1, 1971, as the date to officially launch
the Ecology Corps; but, as it turned out, this was not a good day
insofar as the nation's draft law was concerned. The law expired
on that date, and it would be months before Congress would agree
on a new law. In the meantime, although many of the conscientious
objectors did respond and select the California Ecology Corps as
their alternate service, many others concluded that in the absence
of a draft law, they were under no selective service obligation
whatsoever. Consequently, we did not fulfill our earlier expectation
of quickly filling the new ecology centers with minimums of 80 men
each.
The availability of conscientious objectors remains questionable.
Despite this, there is no plan to phase conscientious objectors out
of the California Ecology Corps, but rather continue the Corps as
qualified alternative services for those who volunteer.
On December 1, 1971, in keeping with the original concept
of the Corps, I authorized the recruitment of any qualified young
-9-
men for six-months enlistments; and this meant that we would no
longer rely solely on our original source for recruitment, the
conscientious objectors. We have been successful in the weeks
since December 1 in recruiting young men and more than doubling
the size of the corps.
The attached gragh (Attachment D of Appendix A) illustrates
our recruitment success, and I particularly call your attention to
the increase since the first of the year. I am confident that
each of the four centers will be at minimum capacity within a
few weeks, thereby giving us at least 340 men.
As of today, there are slightly over 100 corpsmen who are
conscientious objectors. These are men whose average age is twenty-
two, who average two years of college. These are the "seniors" in
the program; and the majority are, and have been, highly-productive
and dedicated workers whose extra effort made the whole idea work.
Many of the new members of the Corps are in the program
as a result of other forms of recruitment. Some are, for example,
young men out of high school --- and out of work. There are some
Viet Nam veterans in the program now, and more are expected.
Corpsmen are not regular state employees, they are exempt
contractees. They do receive some benefits comparable to our regular
employees, such as vacations, holidays, and workmen's compensation
insurance. A comprehensive health benefit program will be implemented
August 1, 1972.
Since the beginning of the program, we have provided corpsmen
with food, lodging, clothing, and personal care items and have paid
-10-
them $40 each month. Beginning July 1, 1972, corpsmen will receive
at least $100 per month plus the other items I have listed. On
February 1, the overtime rate for most emergency work was set at
$2.80 per hour.
Corpsmen are entitled to approximately the same grievance
procedure as allowed regular state employees, including the permanent
employees of the Department of Conservation. A corpsman with a
grievance discusses the problem with his immediate supervisor
(generally a crew foreman of the Division of Forestry) and, failing
to receive acceptable adjudication at this level, can appeal to
the center director, the corps administrator, and ultimately to me.
During the summer fire season, corpsmen must remain at their
duty post for a continuous five-day period. At other times, they
are required to perform their normal eight-hour work shift, Monday
through Friday. These requirements are not unique to the Ecology
Corps, but are the same requirements applied to all fire station
personnel.
The California Ecology Corps has much to offer the young men
who participate. Educational institutions, such as the North
American School of Conservation and Ecology, for example, are working
with us in recruiting corpsmen. Several of that school's recent
graduates are now corpsmen obtaining actual on-the-job experience
in ecology and conservation work. Already, some corpsmen have
gone on to employment for public and private environmental agencies,
since service in the Corps qualifies as job experience for civil
service examinations and for other employment.
-11-
Community colleges are looking at the California Ecology Corps
as a possible supplement to their environmental and forestry curricu-
lum for the same reasons.
Let me also emphasize the potential the Corps offers the State
of California as a training resource for future employees of the
Division of Forestry, the Department of Parks and Recreation, and
other units of all levels of government concerned with environmental
protection.
As I have said, four centers are now in operation. The centers
and a brief description follows:
Tehama Ecology Center. Located 25 miles east of Red Bluff
in Tehama County near the community of Paynes Creek, corpsmen are
performing a valuable service of habitat improvement on the nearby
Tehama winter deer range for the Department of Fish and Game.
Calaveras Ecology Center. This center, four miles from
Angels Camp, houses corpsmen who are engaging in numerous conser-
vation projects in the Sierras for several agencies, primarily the
United States Forest Service, National Park Service, and Department
of Parks and Recreation.
Humboldt Ecology Center. Situated in the midst of California's
state parks, corpsmen at this center are performing vital work in
recreational development for our state park system.
Inyo Ecology Center. This center is 10 miles from the city
of Bishop. The corpsmen here will be involved in trail construction
and other conservation projects in the High Sierra for National Park
Service, Bureau of Land Management, and Department of Parks and
Recreation.
-12-
In addition to the centers, several spike camps are in
operation. Corpsmen assigned to these camps, such as those at the
Sequoia-Kings Canyon National Park Headquarters at Ash Mountain and
at El Portal near Yosemite Valley are engaged in special work projects
for the National Park Service except when they are needed for fire
dispatch. (Photographs of the projects are shown in Attachment E
of Appendix A.)
The corpsmen have performed, and performed well, in a wide
variety of projects since July 1, 1971. Representatives of several
of the contracting departments have prepared testimony for your
information, and a complete list of current or completed projects
as of today is attached.
I'll depart now and say the members of most - representatives
of most of the agencies we contract with are available to you today.
They are in the audience if you want to call them later.
Beyond its mission in ecology work and emergency fire fighting,
the Corps performs yet another valuable service. A skilled, trained
mountain rescue team is now available to local authorities through-
out the state to assist in the rescue of persons trapped in
mountainous areas and cliffs.
There may be some confusion between the role of the California
Ecology Corps and that of the Youth Conservation Corps, established
last year, and/or the California Youth Conservation Corps, which
was authorized in legislation proposed last year by Assemblyman
Mobley.
The programs and the concepts are entirely different. The
California Ecology Corps is a permanent year-around program
-13-
employing men who are at least eighteen years old. The other pro-
grams are primarily designed as a summer work program for younger
people, both boys and girls. Both of these programs have definite
roles in the protection of California's environment and, as a
matter of fact, each should compliment the work of the other.
To summarize the present situation with the Ecology Corps, I
would like to refer again to the situation the Department found it-
self in just about a year ago.
We had five fine state facilities about to be vacated, and
a continuing and pressing need for the trained hand crews that
have become a part of the state's resource management and protection
system.
A continuing success of the Department of Corrections'
rehabilitation program made it plain that it was vitally necessary
to establish a work force of free people to continue these worth-
while public efforts into the years ahead.
We have succeeded in establishing the Ecology Corps in less
than a year and have found that we can recruit and organize into
productive crews the young men that have participated up to this
point. We can look beyond work projects now contracted for to a
substantial expansion in the program as other public agencies turn
to these crews more and more to accomplish the purposes for which
they receive public funds.
The comparison must be drawn when we look to the future with
the old Civilian conservation Corps we all remember from the
depression. That agency built practically the entire network of
-14-
roads and trails and campgrounds available to the Forest Service
and Park Service today, and opened an area of employment for
thousands of young men whose opportunities were extremely limited.
Some of those same men are high in state government positions today,
as they are in conservation agencies across the country.
With careful management, the Ecology Corps can fulfill those
purposes in California again and at the same time we can continue
our partnerships with the Department of Corrections, California
Youth Authority, and the counties to the end that existing
facilities can be utilized, and the vital work can go on.
I will say again, the California Ecology Corps was developed
to make up the difference between the inmates and wards available
to us and our manpower needs, and not to supplant them. These
proven programs will continue, with the California Ecology Corps
a new and exciting element.
I would ask your support and understanding to that end.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: All right.
MR. STEARNS: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: All right, sir. Thank you.
At the time of the 1971 budget estimate, there were approxi-
mately 5,000 conscientious objectors?
MR. STEARNS: Yes.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: And Alan Post has advised the Legislature
that during the -- or at the end of the first six months of the
authorized program, you have been able to recruit 123?
MR. STEARNS: That's approximately right, yes.
-15-
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: Was that a disappointment?
MR. STEARNS: Yes, it was. Yes, we had presumed that the
draft law would continue in some form, but we went about four months
last summer when there was no federal draft act at all and, there-
fore, there was no compelling reason why anyone with this status or
draftee status either should volunteer for anything at that point
in time. These people who came, volunteered largely to - because,
I think, they anticipated that the draft act in some form would
be put in and they wanted to go ahead and accomplish their two
years and have it behind them.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: What if none of these men had volunteered?
None of these 123? Would these posts have been available for the
emergency job act - the Federal Emergency Job Act to put welfare
recipients in such jobs?
MR. STEARNS: Well, we are looking forward to the time when
this can be done, but the machinery hasn't developed yet. As far
as welfare recipients that is one source of manpower.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: That is the PEP program?
MR. STEARNS: The PEP program. We have working in our depart-
ment, we have some 280 positions in the PEP program. They are
almost all fire fighter positions, positions we use to man the
fire trucks and we did not -
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: What is the starting wage under the PEP
program?
MR. STEARNS: The fire fighter's starting wage is $415 a
month. In fact, in any PEP position the state has to pay a comparable
-16-
wage, what you would pay in that classification. We have
some
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: How are you able to avoid not making these
comparable positions? How did you avoid that?
MR. STEARNS: Well, first we tried to put it on a volunteer
basis, the funding of a separate conservation -
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: First. Start after first of all.
MR. STEARNS: I'll state it again. The balance of our
conservation authority and with the Department of - the Department
of Conservation in point of view, it was about a fifty-fifty
situation with the Department of Conservation putting up the crew
leadership, maintenance of the facility, the necessary tools and
rolling stock and, the Department of Corrections putting up the
supervision in camp, the food, the in-camp supervision, the whole
thing. All the logistics that go with maintaining an able man --
eighty-man facility.
When the Department of Corrections drops out of one of these
facilities, they have their budget funds put in on other rehabilita-
tion programs in other parts of the program. So, we begin with
fifty percent of -- we have the leadership. We have the equipment.
We have the camp. But in order to feed, cloth, and pay the new
people that come in, it requires a substantial chunk of money.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: Are you talking in the past tense? Have
they dropped out?
MR. STEARNS: No. We still have 23 conservation camps in
partnership with the Department of Corrections and the Youth Authority.
But when they dropped out and they had to close the five last year,
-17-
we had just half enough money. We had to operate -- money enough
to operate with everything except the corpsmen.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: All right. When and if you are able to
hire welfare recipients under the auspices of the federal PEP
program, that will augment your work, will it not?
MR. STEARNS: If we had done it under the PEP program, we
would have had --- we went to the Department of Labor with it and
they said we would have to have enough PEP positions to cover
practically the whole thing as far as wages were concerned with
the Corps. And the Department of Labor wouldn't go along with
that. They - the conversion was too much and the decision was
made to use those positions for fire fighter support positions
instead. We tried to make that deal with the Department of
Labor, but we were unable to.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: I gather from your presentation that the -
that the objective of the administration was to maintain and operate
these five base camps for fire fighter purposes. What difference
would it make then whether or not the PEP positions went to the
Department of Forestry for fire fighting positions? Who would
work out of these base camps?
MR. STEARNS: If we could get that many bodies we could. But,
too, I think the PEP program is designed -- it has fundings for
about a year and a half. The balance of this year and one further
year. And, frankly, we are trying to establish a program that will
continue on through the future years and make up the difference on
-18-
a greater or lesser basis between the inmates available to us now
and in the future. And the PEP program is not designed to be a
permanent program, we understand.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: We are advised that some convict labor
is paid 16 cents an hour in the prisons. How much do you pay these
volunteers an hour?
MR. STEARNS: Under the new scale I think it figures --
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: Under the old scale, when you first started
out.
MR. STEARNS: Twenty-five cents, under the $40.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: Twenty-five cents an hour. And your welfare
recipients under the federal PEP program, how much would they make
an hour?
MR. STEARNS: Under the PEP program -- not all welfare.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: It's a fair question.
MR. STEARNS: Well, $415 a month for a five day week.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: One seventy-five or something like that?
About $3 an hour? Two and a half?
MR. STEARNS: I have five days. I couldn't answer. We
can have 24 hours a day.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: Two thirty-six. I'm just trying to put
your labor force in perspective. Up there on page 7 of your report
you, at the bottom, you've said that these corpsmen are not regular
state employees and, I think, that's emphasized by the - how much
an hour? What did you say?
MR. BILLETT: Two thirty-six an hour.
-19-
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: Then you say they do have some benefits
such as vacations, holidays, and workmen's compensation insurance.
Now, as I recall, Mr. Wilson probably is closer to the fact
of law then I would be. Workmen's compensation is in the event
of injury or death; is that correct?
ASSEMBLYMAN WILSON: That's correct.
MR. STEARNS: On the job.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: Or within the scope of employment?
MR. STEARNS: Yes.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: Now, at these camps, are these men con-
sidered within the scope of employment while they are attending the
camps and not while they are home on weekends?
MR. STEARNS: Yes, that's just about right. If they are
in the camp, engaging in camp activities, there would be, indeed,
insurance. If they are off the camp, they would not. We had a
couple of bad accidents that brought this home.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: That's what I am getting at. One of my
constituents from Long Beach arrived at one of the camps on July
1st and drowned on July 11th. And yesterday I got a letter from
the parents saying that apparently there was no assistance available
for burial expenses or anything else.
MR. STEARNS: In that particular instance.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: The letter was from Mr. and Mrs. John
Bennington.
MR. STEARNS: It was donated by a funeral home down there,
as I understand it.
-20-
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: Of course I don't know the circumstances.
MR. STEARNS: We felt pretty bad about it.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: If a man was at the camp because of his
employment and he met with death accidentally while at the camp
outside of regular working hours, maybe it was swimming call,
I don't know. Apparently it is the position of the state that
he is not entitled to workmen's compensation benefits?
MR. STEARNS: I also have in my statement, Mr. Cullen, on
the first of August we are going to be able to work out the funding
for a health benefit program that will have a death benefit whether
off the job or wherever. I think it has a $5,000 death benefit,
if that is right.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: No provision now?
MR. STEARNS: We haven't up until now.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: Is there any comparable situation? What if
a - well, I suppose if a forester, a state forester, drowned after
supper while taking a dip in a mountain pool, he's entitled to
some sort of death benefit under workmen's compensation, is he not?
MR. STEARNS: Not under workmen's compensation. If he has
a regular state health policy that is offered, he would have. That
would be his coverage there.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: Then your foresters are not considered to
be on 24-hour duty?
MR. STEARNS: If they are on the duty, they are covered as
these people would be on duty. If they are off duty, they are not.
-21-
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: Aren't foresters on 24-hour duty? Isn't
that part of their particular job?
MR. JOE GRIGGS: I'm Joe Griggs, Administrator of the
California Ecology Corps. Mr. Bennington was several miles from
the center on a Sunday and he had been on a day off when he drowned.
MR. STEARNS: I think our information says they have regular --
prescribes if it is an 84 hour duty and if during that span of time
when they are on call, why, they are protected by workmen's
compensation. If their duty week has expired and they are on
their three days off, they are not covered.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: Mr. Griggs, are you suggesting that this
lad may have taken his departure from the camp on a leave, so to
speak, and wasn't required to be back until a time certain, a day
or two later?
MR. GRIGGS: Yes, sir.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: Is that right?
MR. GRIGGS: Yes, sir.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: Now, on page eight you mention that you now
pay overtime for most emergency work at $2.80 an hour. More often
than not the bills that come before the Legislature place overtime
at time and a half, and $2.80 appears to be about a multiple of
ten if they are making 25 cents an hour. But you pay overtime of
$2.80 an hour; how did you arrive at $2.80?
MR. STEARNS: The $2.80 an hour is the rate we pay pick-up
labor in an emergency situation and it's the - any man that we
pick up to fight fires like cat-skinners or anybody in these crews,
-22-
this is the rate the state will pay to fill sandbags or whatever
and forest fires and various emergencies. It's the regular state
rate and we set this.
This wasn't fully explained, but it would come for all
emergency work beyond an eight hour day except search and rescue.
And we did except search and rescue and there's an excellent reason
for that.
The cost of that ultimately usually comes back to the parents
of a lost child and we thought that unless there was some means of -
available to us to pay wages for search and rescue, that we could
consider this just a part of our job.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: What if you have to augment your work
force up there in the absence of an emergency? Perhaps you are
just making a fire break and you are short half a dozen men.
Do you turn to the hiring halls and offer then 25 cents an
hour or $1.80 an hour?
MR. STEARNS: It would be $2.80 an hour if they come out of
the halls, for example. Yes, sir. It would be $2.80 an hour.
The Forest Service has a comparable rate. I'm not too
sure what it is.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: You mentioned with some pride that you
contemplate that these positions are almost in the sense of an
internship for ultimate work with the government or with the United
States Forest Service. You looked to the comparable accomplish-
ment of the Civilian Conservation Corps. I just thought that was --
well, these interns are being offered 25 cents an hour while the
pick-up labor is being paid $2.80.
-23-
MR. STEARNS: I should say that our ultimate goal will be
to get the balance between the funds available to the Department
of Conservation for its fire protection mission and sufficiently
funded work projects on the outside to achieve at least a minimum
wage. This is the goal that we have laid out. We have not seen
fit to come to the Legislature for this substantial - and it
would be a substantial amount of funds necessary to put this on
an instant basis. We are working towards it.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: Do you have the authority to adjust the
wages yourself?
MR. STEARNS: Up to the minimum wage.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: Well, the only minimum statute in this
state has to do with women. How do you handle men?
MR. STEARNS: Well, we would use that as a goal.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: And how much is that?
MR. STEARNS: I would think $1.65, and Congress is working
on it again now, I think, to raise it.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: Mr. Wilson.
ASSEMBLYMAN WILSON: Isn't it true that you paid approximately
25 cents an hour and didn't go up to the $1.65 an hour minimum wage
because you were really looking to conscientious objectors who
had no alternative and that they were really forced into accepting
this wage?
MR. STEARNS: I don't think that's quite correct, Mr. Wilson,
now, because we are accepting volunteers other than conscientious
objectors. And we have about 100, and 125 applications pending, so
-24-
there are people. They know that there's going - the wages are
going to be $100 minimum on the first of July. They are $40 now,
but they will be $100 then, plus the emergency work.
ASSEMBLYMAN WILSON: But it appears to me that your agency
has been willing to pay more money after the fact was established
that there wasn't the conscientious objectors available to fill
the jobs. It seems like there's a -- if you don't get the C.O.'s
to do it, then you raise up the wages and it seems to be a problem
to me that when the military has it such that a buck private gets
$268 a month, I believe, and then if a person is a conscientious -
is opposed to war and an alternative for him is to work in this
Corps, he receives 25 cents an hour, which doesn't seem fair to me.
MR. STEARNS: Well, Major McCann from the Selective Service
Bureau is here today. We have a very wide scale of jobs and pays,
all the way from competitive wages to almost nothing. And he has
the regulation with him that covers that.
Since from an employer's point of view we tried not to
use threats or coercion in recruiting these people, we tried
to put it on a volunteer basis. We are trying to create a volun-
teer basis. I didn't answer Mr. Cullen's question a while ago. If
nobody had shown up, what we could have done on that basis. It
would have all caved in before we began, I'm afraid. But we have
had the time to work through the transition. As a matter of
fact, last summer we had a very easy fire season. We had lots of
fires start. We didn't have the large fires that required the hand
crews. It does appear we are in this situation -
-25-
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: If that had not happened, might you not
have gone down to the hiring halls where last year there were
700,000 unemployed men and hired them even though you would
have had to come to the Legislature for augmentation?
MR. STEARNS: We would have come to the Legislature for
augmentation to pay those wages.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: You did not want to shut down these camps?
As a matter of safety in the mountains, these camps are
necessary?
MR. STEARNS: The dispersion of these camps is important.
The fire dispatchers, too, and we have 33 of them altogether spread
out all over the state. And they have certainly in the construction
of the field break system, in responding to these separate fires,
have gotten to be very, very valuable. They are the best hand crew
fire fighting source in the United States now because they are
year-around. They are well trained in the use of tools and are in
fine physical condition and they can take care of a much more
fine line than any kind of pick-up crew you could get anyplace.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: Are you finished, Mr. Wilson?
ASSEMBLYMAN WILSON: Mr. Stearns, I'd like to continue on
the line of questioning about the conscientious objectors. You set
out in your report today the procedure by which people can make
their grievances known.
It seems to me that if you are a conscientious objector
that you are locked into this system and so that we are really
talking about something that is an illusion, that isn't really there,
-26-
because those people have no alternatives. They are forced into a
situation where they take 25 cents an hour, where occasionally they
can be forced to work 24 hours a day, and the grievance procedure
isn't really there, because they have no other place to go.
MR. STEARNS: Well, there has been some turn-over in that
we have released quite a few who found other alternate service for
themselves and asked to be released to accept that service. It
hasn't been a sentence in the sense that they had to keep this and
nothing else for the balance of their two year enlistment. They do
sign it if they have other alternate service, they have a good
family reason, any substantially good reason for release. We have
given those releases.
ASSEMBLYMAN WILSON: Now, you talked on the record about a
six month enlistment. What do you mean by enlistment for six
months?
MR. STEARNS: This is volunteers and we ask this because of
the amount of training that has to go into the training of people
and the physical condition that goes into making them collectively
as a crew and effective force.
They - we did so that we could accomplish this without a
very rapid - rapid turn-over. Another reason is that it will
qualify them for civil service examinations as six month work
experience. This is very difficult for some young men to get now,
to find work experience that will qualify them. They are coming out
of community colleges especially with their - without the work
experience. They have the courses, you know, in forestry and
-27-
conservation and these courses, but they haven't been able to find
a job. There just aren't that many jobs for young people.
ASSEMBLYMAN WILSON: Well, one thing, when you talk about
enlistment, that seems to have the connotation, at least in my
mind, that is something that you join and you don't have ready
alternatives to quit and look elsewhere.
MR. STEARNS: It's a contract, really, is what it is. And
we are administering that the same way. If they find a better job,
if they had a good legitimate reason for leaving, this is fine.
If they refuse to work and we have to fire them, the - their
separation paper will indicate if they performed satisfactorily or
whether they have not and naturally not all do. Some simply refuse
to work or won't get up in the morning or something and they are
dismissed like any other job. So, it's an agreement between two
people, really; between them and the center administration that they
will stay six months.
ASSEMBLYMAN WILSON: And if they do not, they receive a letter,
a bad letter of recommendation?
MR. STEARNS: They don't receive a positive one. If we get
an inquiry as for a recommendation on this man for a job, we'll just
tell the truth.
ASSEMBLYMAN WILSON: How do you go about recruiting people
for this program?
MR. STEARNS: We are still in the process of developing a
formal recruiting system. Up until now we worked through the
forest center directors, who have worked with the HRD office in
-28-
their areas. It is one of the referrals that Human Resources Development
is making open to people coming, looking for work. And their
recruitment has varied somewhat from center to center, pretty much
depending on the openings.
Humboldt Center is full and there is a waiting list, but
Humboldt has a large unemployment rate and from that point of view
is about the worst part of California for that. At Bishop, on
the other hand, the opportunity for recruitment hasn't been all
that good and we are just now beginning to work up a recruitment
program in Southern California for the Bishop Center.
The other two are in the - Tehama and the Calaveras Centers
have been recruiting in the valley floors, in town. This is the
HRD office in the valley floors and have just begun to make these
programs work. People haven't heard about it.
ASSEMBLYMAN WILSON: Now, one of the things that disturbs me
is your report set out that the average age is 22 years, that the
average level of education is 14 years, and the average pay is 25
cents an hour.
Now, when I hear all those facts, something tells me that
there's some type of force and it must be the Selective Service
System that's the impetus for a person to go into a situation like
this with 14 years of education on the average. Now, you are tell-
ing me that you are willing to increase this to the minimum wage.
Now, something about it tells me that this is indecent when you
have a person go in and work for 25 cents an hour when you have a
force pushing him into that, when if he went into the military
-29-
he would have received much more, and you have a person who is a
conscientious objector being punished financially, being forced to
work for 25 cents an hour when you have a person in the military
working for substantially more and I think that's not fair.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: That's not a question, Mr. Stearns, I
don't believe. Is that a question?
ASSEMBLYMAN WILSON: No.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: That's not a question.
Are you finished, Mr. Wilson?
ASSEMBLYMAN WILSON: Yes, I am.
ASSEMBLYMAN THOMAS: May I ask a question?
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: Mr. Thomas.
ASSEMBLYMAN THOMAS: May I ask this. May I ask the consultant
or the chairman, really, in the executive order of 1971 is it the
contention of the consultant there's been a change in procedure
and purpose of the executive order?
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: Mr. Billett.
MR. BILLETT: Mr. Thomas, based upon the conversations that
we've had with people administering the program and based upon our
visits to two camps, it would be our impression that -
ASSEMBLYMAN THOMAS: Have they -
MR. BILLETT: Item three in that executive order is being
very carefully fulfilled. It states, quote, "Assist in fire pre-
vention and fire protection." With regard to items one and two in
the executive order -- I -- someone with a better understanding of
ecology perhaps would come to a different conclusion than what
the staff might as to whether it's been fullfilled or not.
-30-
ASSEMBLYMAN THOMAS: Well, has the program been diverted
substantially from the order of the Governor? Has it been diverted
in doing so other than what the order says?
CHAIRMAL CULLEN: That's the point of inquiry, Mr. Thomas,
whether or not the intent of the Legislature is being pursued or
achieved. Now, in this instance, I'm not sure what legal effect
the Governor's executive order had until such time as the Legislature
prepared funds earmarked according to this executive order.
During the recent meeting of the subcommittee of the Senate
Finance Committee, the validity and the effectiveness of the Ecology
Corps was challenged, which was one of the reasons we are providing
this public hearing here today. As with our other hearings, it's
hoped that we'll arrive at the determination as to whether or not
this particular governmental program should be curtailed, eliminated,
or perhaps expanded to the -- to the size of the C.C.C. camps during
the depression. Are they doing what they set out to do; is it worth
a million dollars to have 123 and 250 youths training in this field;
is a certain rescue team within the confines of this executive order
which only mentioned people once and stresses the preservation of
the natural resources throughout.
What is the source of the authority for this bonded search
and rescue team? Is it within the executive order? If so where?
That sort of thing.
ASSEMBLYMAN THOMAS: My last question is the intent. If
you do expand the services that you would include welfare recipients
to - someone to that extent?
-31-
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: This is the question put to the Director
as to whether or not recipients of welfare are being deprived of
jobs because of these positions which have been paying 25 cents an
hour, for the welfare recipients perhaps are being paid five times
that much and they are unengaged in gainful employment. I think
that's a valid comparison, Mr. Thomas:
Any further questions of members of the committee?
ASSEMBLYMAN THOMAS: I would at this time - how many
witnesses have we today? I would like to hear before we adjourn
today the petitioners here as I see who have complained about the
procedure of the operation.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: I notice that the petition takes, Mr.
Stearns -- are there any statements?
MR. STEARNS: I have no statement to make.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: Wait, excuse me. Mr. Stearns, did you
want to make any further response? I rather cut you off when Mr.
Wilson gave his -
MR. STEARNS: No. But I'll say through this hearing, Mr.
Chairman. If you want to recall me, you can.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: All right, now, sir.
MR. WILLIAM HAUSSLER: Yes, I'm William Haussler, Assistant
Chief of Operations, Department of Parks and Recreation.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: H-a-u-s-s-l-e-r
MR. HAUSSLER: And the Director wanted me to represent him.
He expresses his regret at not being able to attend and he asked me
to read a short statement concerning our experience with the Ecology
Corps program. (Appendix B)
-32-
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: All right, sir. Go ahead.
MR. HAUSSLER: At the beginning of this fiscal year, 1971-72
we contracted with the Division of Forestry, Department of Conser-
vation for $203,400 of work to be performed by the Ecology Corps.
$105,400 of the work was financed directly by our department and
$98,000 is to be furnished by the United States Bureau of Outdoor
Recreation from the Land and Water Conservation Fund on a reim-
bursement basis.
Work to be accomplished for us through this program is as
follows:
1. Construction of the following facilities for state-
wide distribution to units of the State Park System: 1,000 picnic
tables, 750 camp cupboards, 750 camp stoves, 200 fire rings, 1,000
assorted signs. Of the above facilities, 50 tables are complete
and the material for another 200 has been cut and prepared, and 30
cupboards have been completed. The balance of the facilities are
expected to be completed by July 1st.
2. Construction of a roadside rest at Franklin K. Land Grove
in Humboldt Redwoods which includes clearing, fill, parking area,
restroom building and water line. This will be complete by July lst.
3. Relocate a 50 unit campground from Reynolds Wayside
Camp in Mendocino County to Benbow Lake State Recreation Area in
Humboldt County. This work is 50 percent complete and will be
finished by July 1st.
4. Construction of trails in Calaveras Big Trees State Park.
96 man days have been expended to date and 510 man days remain to
be used before July lst.
-33-
Construction of a 54 unit campground at San Simeon State
Beach which includes brush clearing, site preparation, tables, stoves,
restroom buildings, water tanks, and campsite posts will be
completed by July 1st.
Cooperation in the development and implementation of this
program by Division of Forestry Headquarters and field personnel
has been outstanding.
The Department of Parks and Recreation believes it will
be accomplishing about twice as much work and receiving at least
double the facilities through the Ecology Corps program. The above
programs have been accomplished by the Department of Parks and
Recreation personnel or day labor forces from the Office of
Architecture and Construction in the past. The campground con-
struction is of the primitive type; the restroom buildings of the
vault or chemical toilet variety.
Extreme care and understanding have been exhibited by the
Ecology Corps regarding the effects of the development of this
primitive campground upon the environment and in providing a better
public service for recreation needs.
And Director Mott would like to thank you for the opportunity
for me to appear.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: Any questions, from the committee?
ASSEMBLYMAN THOMAS: In other words, your department contends
this is a successful operation?
MR. HAUSSLER: From our standpoint, from the standpoint of
the agency contracting with another to have facilities constructed
in a reasonable manner and on time, it is.
-34-
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: All right. Thank you, sir.
Mr. Stearns, Mr. Griggs, we would appreciate it, if you are
able, to remain. We'll postpone some questions we have until we
hear from some other witnesses.
Mr. McKay, Mr. White and Mr. Stone, please, come forward.
Mr. McKay is one of the signatures of the petition referred
to by Assemblyman Thomas and he and the other two men have asked
leave to give testimony before the committee. I believe all of them
are or have been members of the Ecology Corps.
At this time may I ask if there are any other members of
the Ecology Corps that may feel they should give testimony, and if
there are, this is the time to be seated around the table.
All right. You come up and take a seat, sir.
All right. Mr. McKay, why don't you identify yourself?
APPEARANCE OF MR. PAUL McKAY, CORPSMAN, INYO ECOLOGY CENTER,
ACCOMPANIED BY MR. NATHANIEL STONE, CORPSMAN, HUMBOLDT ECOLOGY
CENTER, AND MR. TIMOTHY WHITE, CORPSMAN, ON ASSIGNMENT TO THE
DEPARTMENT OF CONSERVATION.
MR. McKAY: Mr. Stone has asked if he could talk first.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: Okay. Identify yourself.
MR. NATHANIEL STONE: My name is Nathaniel Stone. I'm from
the Humboldt Ecology Center and I have just a few short things to
say. My testimony before the Senate Subcommittee on -- on the
Department of Conservation is in your possession now, I think. And
I'm not going to cover anything that's in that. I just wanted to
mention a few other things, the discrepancies that exist in the
corps.
One thing is the contention that we do have a grievance
procedure is actually pretty much an illusion because we are being --
-35-
well, our foremen are the same foremen that were there when it was
a prison camp and they have admittedly a hard time making the
transition from considering us as prisoners in a newspaper inter-
view that was one at the Humboldt Ecology Center last week or the
week before. I'm not sure which, by the Times Standard in Eureka.
One of our foremen was quoted as saying that the prisoners
were much easier to work with. If they didn't want to work and if
they did not, they could just send them back to prison. And that
they have a hard time with us, and he said the prisoners were ideal
people to work with.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: With respect to the grievance procedures,
what are the grievance procedures at Humboldt?
MR. STONE: Well, when it was just C.O.'s we used to have
a meeting virtually every week. At times it was only every other
week, when the forem .n and representatives of the corpsmen and the
director of the camp would all get together anddiscuss problems.
And there was a real feeling of working together to change things
for the better. Well, that has since fallen away. And the meetings
now, which are very sporadic and nowhere near once a week and no-
where -- not even actually once every two weeks, don't - the meetings
now seem to have the purpose of just having them tell us what policies
they have. You know, what new policies they have decided and any
grievances we have are virtually ignored.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: Well, let me give you a hypothetical
case. Say that you are assigned to do some work within the confines
of the base in circumstances which appear to you unsafe or would
-36-
be considered unsafe of what you would be doing on the same job in
downtown Sacramento. To whom do you relate this observation?
MR. STONE: Well, safety is no problem there.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: I said a hypothetical.
MR. STONE: Let me give you an example.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: I thought I was giving you one.
MR. STONE: Well, with safety, the foremen are very
conscientious about that and there's not problem with safety. But
for example, we do have a problem there now, since the non-C.O's
have come, of thefts and over $100 has been stolen out of people's
lockers and two radios and a tape recorder and many other items
like that have been stolen. And we ask - we went to the director,
to the foremen and asked them, you know, what they, you know, if
they would have anything that they could do to prevent that.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: I'm trying to find out, do you start with
the foremen or do you start with the director?
MR. STONE: There's no set - set procedure. If it goes
through a meeting, we talk to the director. If it doesn't go
through a meeting, we talk to the foremen and then to the director
or else just to the director without going to the foremen.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: So there are no posted procedures for
bringing something to the attention of the camp supervisor or the
ecology director?
MR. STONE: There is through the meeting, but the meetings
are not - it's ignored.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: Is that posted on any bulletin boards that
you know of?
-37-
MR. STONE: It used to be.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: That there will be meetings and minutes
taken and forwarded to the ecology director?
MR. STONE: Not with minutes forwarded. This was posted.
We had meetings. When we started they told us it would become
virtually a self-run thing and that we would ---- the foremen
would have very little to do with working out our problems and
with telling us what exactly was going to be done and the corps-
men leaders would take most of the responsibility for that.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: I'm just trying to narrow in on the
grievance procedures as to whether there were any and if there
were, --
MR. STONE: Like I said, there used to be, but they have
pretty much fallen away. We are being treated, I think, more
and more like prisoners.
To get back to what I was saying about the thefts, their
solution was that we should stake out and catch the thief and
take him out and beat him up. And that was their solution to the
problem.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: Who was that?
MR. STONE: The foremen at Humboldt.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: Their solution, not the director's?
MR. STONE: No. Their solution, not the director.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: You said the foremen can be -
MR. STONE: Lou Harris, one of the -- Lindley told us that
that is what we should do. They say the prisoners used to take
care of it and we should take care of it the same way.
-38-
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: Are these men state employees?
MR. STONE: Yes, sir.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: From what department?
MR. STONE: They are with the Division of Forestry.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: All right. Go on.
MR. STONE: Another point that I wanted to bring up is when
the Selective Service Act passed in the early 1950's, the Congress
made a specific note in it that there should not be national work
camps and by their definition a national work camp is any place
where C.O.'s are ordered from different places in the nation to work
there. You know, under something like the C.C.C. Well, until
people were ordered from out-of-state, the California Ecology Corps
was not considered a national work camp, but recently people have
been ordered from Washington state and from Minnesota and, I think,
Michigan, but I'm not sure on that. And these are not - I'm not
talking about people that were given a choice of places to go and
decided to go there and received an order, I'm talking about people
that were out-and-out ordered there without any choice.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: Well, Mr. Stearns just testified that this
is a volunteer program and that there are alternate programs that
may be selected and this is only one of those, and that on a number
of occasions men have asked to be released from this so that they
can register into another alternate program. Can you give us the
names of the men who have been ordered into Humboldt and can you
tell us who they are?
MR. STONE: I can only give you the name of one presently.
I can send up the other names.
-39-
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: Give us the name.
MR. STONE: Charles Ira Workman from Washington.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: Who ordered him to Humboldt?
MR. STONE: The State Director of Conscientious Objectors
Division of Washington State, Selective Service Headquarters.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: All right.
MR. STONE: Ordered him to go there.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: Have you -- have you spoken to anyone who
knows what the current state of the Selective Service law is?
MR. STONE: Yes. Dave McFadden from the Central Committee
for Conscientious Objectors office in San Francisco. I had a talk
with him and he said it's definitely illegal.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: He believes the law remains unchanged in
that respect?
MR. STONE: Yes.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: That conscientious objectors may not be
ordered to work camps?
MR. STONE: Right. From out-of-state to national work
camps. There's a difference if they were from California or all
from California. It's apparently very legal. But according to
what Dave McFadden told me, if they are ordered from different
states to one place, one work camp, then it becomes a national work
camp, which was specifically forbidden.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: And about how many out-of-staters do you
think might be involved in the California camps?
MR. STONE: I wouldn't care to estimate.
-40-
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: Mr. Thomas.
ASSEMBLYMAN THOMAS: Are you a conscientious objector?
MR. STONE: Yes, sir. I am.
ASSEMBLYMAN THOMAS: That is the reason you are at the camp?
How long have you been there?
MR. STONE: Since September 1, 1971.
ASSEMBLYMAN THOMAS: And what is your earnings per month?
MR. STONE: Well, in September I made $40 plus $4.28 over-
time. Every other month I have made $40.
ASSEMBLYMAN THOMAS: What are your fringe benefits?
MR. STONE: I get the use of the clothes I'm wearing. I'm
supposed to turn them back in when I get released. I get free
haircuts.
ASSEMBLYMAN SEELEY: You're not getting your money's worth,
are you?
(Laughter)
ASSEMBLYMAN THOMAS: Do you have any health facilities there?
MR. STONE: At Humboldt Ecology Center the medical care is
not really much of a problem. If somebody gets hurt, they take
him to the doctor and they care - take care of the bills. For
example, I had myself a tooth that started. The cavity - the
filling started falling out. It was hurting and they sent me to
the doctor, the dentist, and they took care of the bill.
ASSEMBLYMAN THOMAS: When can you leave the camp? How much
time must you serve there?
MR. STONE: I have been notified that May 24th of this year
is my release date. I served 15 months at different jobs before
this, so my release date is May 24th of this year.
-41-
ASSEMBLYMAN THOMAS: How many have you at the Humboldt Camp
now?
MR. STONE: How many C.O.'s?
ASSEMBLYMAN THOMAS: Yes.
MR. STONE: At the last count, the last time I counted, was
at the time of the Senate Hearings a couple of weeks ago and at that
count there was 31. There isn't that many now.
ASSEMBLYMAN THOMAS: Well, how many are not conscientious
objectors?
MR. STONE: How many at the camp are not?
ASSEMBLYMAN THOMAS: Yes.
MR. STONE: There's a little less than 30 conscientious
objectors, a little more than 50 non-conscientious objectors.
ASSEMBLYMAN THOMAS: Are you all treated the same? You get
the same wages?
MR. STONE: Virtually.
ASSEMBLYMAN THOMAS: You get the same wage?
MR. STONE: Yes.
ASSEMBLYMAN THOMAS: There's no partiality, treating one
group different?
MR. STONE: No. None at all.
One thing I would like to say about the health benefits is
the workmen's compensation that we are promised, apparently when
it doesn't suit the state, it doesn't come though. One person had
part of one finger cut off and the finger cut wide open while he
was working, doing state work, working, making picnic tables on
state time. And they paid for his medical bills, but he's unable
-42-
to work while his finger is healing. But rather than give him the
workmen's compensation, they just said, "We'll pay your full month's
salary."
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: They'd have to give him more.
MR. STONE: Workmen's compensation would be more, yes. They
decided rather they'd pay a full month's salary.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: What is his name?
MR. STONE: His name is Scott Sodaquist.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: Is he still there?
MR. STONE: Yes.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: Mr. Wilson.
ASSEMBLYMAN WILSON: I'll just ask if you know if the rating
disability was made on this man?
MR. STONE: I don't know what that means.
ASSEMBLYMAN WILSON: Well, from two or three months ago
when I used to practice law, what happens on a rating disability
is a person is brought in to see a doctor. At that time the
disability rating is made. If you have an injury to a finger it
might be a one percent and there's a projection made in compensa-
tion made according to the amount of disability.
MR. STONE: I heard an estimate. I have been gone for a week
and a half and I just got back yesterday. And I heard an estimate
before I left. It was going to be like one dollar a month for
life or a lump sun of $2,000. But I don't know whether that
estimate -- how real that estimate was or if it's -- anything has
been decided since then. I don't know.
-43-
ASSEMBLYMAN WILSON: One thing, I heard your wage is 25 cents
per hour?
MR. STONE: Right.
ASSEMBLYMAN WILSON: How much education do you have?
MR. STONE: Me, I have got 60 semester units of college.
Just about a year and a half.
ASSEMBLYMAN WILSON: In addition to 25 cents per hour, you
get your room and board. Is that correct?
MR. STONE: Right.
ASSEMBLYMAN WILSON: Can you describe the type of accomodations
you have?
MR. STONE: We - one thing we were told is that if they were
to pay $100 a month, they would consider the room to be one dollar
a month and I can't disagree with that. It's - there's -
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: You were told by whom?
MR. STONE: By the director of our camp, Moses Estrada,
that they would.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: Moses Estrada?
MR. STONE: Estrada.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: Estrada.
MR. STONE: What it is, it is basically two buildings. The
corpsmen living in one building is for the leaders and it has, if
I'm not mistaken, seven rooms and they put the leaders two persons
per room in that. The other building houses everybody else and it's
shaped like a gigantic F with the bottom part of it being the lava-
tory and my room is at the very end of that because I'm a laundry man.
But everyone else sleeps in the one large L-shape thing. And what
-44-
it is, they put metal lockers, two metal lockers and one wooden
locker between them in a series out from the wall and they separ-
ate one room from another room and then most people put a board
across the top and arrange blankets from it to separate the hall-
way from their actual cubicle. And I think it's two people in one
of those rooms. Those rooms inside of the dimensions created by
the lockers comes to about, I'd say, 10 or 12 feet by 10 or 12 feet.
ASSEMBLYMAN WILSON: Can you tell us what an average day is
like? What time you get up? What time you eat?
MR. STONE: There's a notice on the bulletin board that every-
body will be out of bed by 7:30 a.m. ostensibly so the barracks can
be cleaned before people go to work. And everybody has - everybody
who works out of the camp has to be out at the bus at 8:00 a.m. If
they are working in the woodshop, they have to be in the woodshop
at 8:00 a.m. The in-camp jobs, those are staggered depending upon
the job. I, being laundry man, I can't give you a very accurate
picture of what it's like for most people in the grade crew.
Now when I was on the grade crew, there was six people on
the grade crew and now there's 45. So, I can't really give you an
accurate picture of what that's like.
ASSEMBLYMAN WILSON: When I was going through basic training
at Fort Bragg, North Carolina, with the Green Berets we had an elabor-
ate meal set out in the front of the mess hall everyday, but when
you go in the meal would be different than that which was set out.
Do you have any problems like that?
MR. STONE: No. The food at the Humboldt Center as opposed
to the other ones is very good. There's -- I mean, relatively,
-45-
for institutional food, it's not as good as what I was eating be-
fore, but for institutional food, I have to recommend it over almost
any other.
They give us granola for breakfast if we want it and as
many eggs as somebody wants for breakfast. Fresh -- there's always
a big bowl of fresh fruit out there. Fresh milk and it's not as
good as the food at home, but there's not much that can be complained
about.
ASSEMBLYMAN WILSON: You said as opposed to other centers?
MR. STONE: Paul can tell you what the food at Inyo is like.
ASSEMBLYMAN THOMAS: I can tell you some restaurants that
have very poor food in Sacramento. Anyway, I'd like to come out
there. I think we should go out and visit these camps.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: All right. Mr. Thomas, the statement of
March 15th by Nathaniel Stone will be incorporated into the record
at this time. (Appendix C)
Mr. Stone, would you tell us what you meant when in your
statement you say the director of the center has said the California
Ecology Corps is not really meant to be and I quote, "Ecology Corps,"
unquote. Its function is to fight fires! Would you elaborate on
that?
MR. STONE: Moses Estrada told us many times at the meetings
that we used to have last fall that he has asked his superiors to
change the name from California Ecology Corps to quit misleading new
recruits. And, you know, like when we were asking, "This is the
California Ecology Corps. Why aren't we doing ecology work?" At
that time all we were doing was splitting logs.
-46-
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: What do you consider to be ecology work?
MR. STONE: Protecting and preserving the environment for the
environment's sake, not for the sake of man.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: With respect to the mountain counties, how
would you relate that into physical terms?
MR. STONE: Some of the projects that we have asked to do
and have been - which have been refused are to work with Dr. Becking
of Humboldt State College, who has a grant to work in the Rockefeller
Forest and Bull Creek Basin area of Humboldt Redwood State Park
to preserve the redwoods there, which are in danger since the flood
caused by the clearing in 1920 in the Bull Creek Basin. And we
have asked to work with Dr. Becking to make studies on these red-
woods to see what could be done, what would make them healthier
and preserve them and also to replant and try to stop the erosion
that's happening in the watershed area that comes down into that
basin.
To date one crew took one day to plant in the Bull Creek
Basin compared with the two or three crews working every single day
the last few months on making camp sites. And at an earlier time
one crew took half a day to reforest a burned off area and there's
a lot more areas that need work like that done to them besides the,
you know, just trying to find out what will help the redwoods.
We have also asked to get more involved in recycling of
recyclable materials in Humboldt County. And so far they allow
one man to take one day a week to go to the recycling center in
Arcata and work with them there. And there are many other people
who are willing, but they are told, you know, we're not funded to
-47-
do that kind of work.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: Well, in the executive order, Governor
Reagan said that the Corps shall, "Utilize its members in con-
servation and emergency projects to effect full utilization and pro-
tection of the natural resources for the greatest possible number
of people."
Now, have any of these tasks, are any of these tasks
enumerated by you outside of that function set forth by the Governor?
Preparation of camp sites, isn't that so that people can utilize the
natural resources, the hiking trails, and what-not?
MR. STONE: Well, sure. The preparation of camp sites, I think,
is relatively good. It keeps people from trampling, you know, people
that don't know how to act in the woods. Keeps them from trampling
and destroying a lot of -- a large part of the virgin woods and
keeps them in one place where they can just throw their litter where
it can be picked up easily rather than all over the hillside. So,
it does have a somewhat beneficial effect; but, I'm not cutting
down anything that any of the - any of the work that we are doing
so far. I think it's good. But I think it doesn't go far enough.
It doesn't do enough to protect the environment. It's like - it's
treating symptoms more than problems.
ASSEMBLYMAN THOMAS: May I ask one more question before the
witness leaves. After your working hours, are you free to leave
the camp and go back any time you want?
MR. STONE: Other than in fire season, yes. During fire
season we cannot. We have to be there 24 hours a day, five days a
week.
-48-
ASSEMBLYMAN THOMAS: So, actually it's not similar to
prison, is it?
MR. STONE: Well, there is one thing that keeps us there
at the camp and economically we are prisoners. All of the camps
are located in such a place that the nearest town is quite a ways
away and usually the nearest town is not a very big town. If
you want to go to a show or see a concert or things that people
our age usually do, you have to drive a long ways and it costs a
lot of money for us. To go to the nearest town of any size, which
is about 25,000 people, near us, it costs me $5 to go up there
and back. And for you people $5 wouldn't be a lot. It's an eighth
of a month's pay.
ASSEMBLYMAN THOMAS: How much an hour are you getting?
MR. STONE: Twenty-five cents.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: Mr. Seeley.
ASSEMBLYMAN SEELEY: Yes. My question of Mr. Stone is, I
have listened to your complaints and I don't really see where there's
very much in the way of a complaint. You say you think you should
be doing more in the way of ecology. You have only been there since
September. Do you feel yourself a qualified man to make those
statements that you should be the one to change the system?
MR. STONE: I think if any of - anybody thinks that they
have a better idea, then they should consider themselves qualified
to try and do something to make it better.
ASSEMBLYMAN SEELEY: Well, I've been here in the Legislature
for over a year and I see a lot of things that could be changed
that would be better, but I don't imagine I'll be able to change
-49-
them quickly.
ASSEMBLYMAN THOMAS: You are not supposed --
MR. STONE: I don't imagine I have been trying --
ASSEMBLYMAN SEELEY: That isn't a legitimate complaint. I
was here for the purpose of listening to complaints you had about
your treatment up there and I haven't heard you say anything as
yet that would be - where you had been mistreated.
MR. STONE: Like I say, I'm leaving out most of the things
that I said March 15th merely for the fact it's in the record
already and I figured it would be just a lot easier. I can enumerate
things that I consider to be unjust treatment.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: I think that may be covered by Mr. McKay.
Are you going to get into that also?
MR. PAUL McKAY: The petition will be the basis to my testi-
mony plus the notes I have made.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: Well, perhaps we can interrupt Mr. Stone
at this point and go to Mr. McKay.
MR. McKAY: I'd like to say at this point Mark Bonander
is from out-of-state and was ordered into the Ecology Corps by
his draft board.
ASSEMBLYMAN SEELEY: May I ask a question. Does anybody know
how this takes place?
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: Mr. Bonander, Mr. Seeley would like to
know how this takes place.
APPEARANCE OF MR. MARK BONANDER, CORPSMAN, INYO ECOLOGY CENTER.
ASSEMBLYMAN SEELEY: How is it that out-of-staters come here?
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: Where are you from?
-50-
MR. MARK BONANDER: Minneapolis, Minnesota. I quit my job
in a hospital. I was a nurse's aid. And the draft board wrote
me a letter and said they wanted to talk to me and they offered
me a job in the ecology center. And I said, "Well, I'll do it."
So, they wrote me up my orders and put me on a bus and I ended up
at Bishop.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: Where were you initially?
MR. BONANDER: Minneapolis.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: And who in Minneapolis offered you a job
in the California Ecology Corps?
MR. BONANDER: Let's see. He's the director of the C.O.'s
for the Minnesota Selective Service.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: Was there any kind of literature shown
to you by way of invitation from the State of California?
MR. BONANDER: Yes. There was a pamphlet shown to me, a
mimeographed copy describing the California Ecology Corps.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: Mr. Seeley.
ASSEMBLYMAN SEELEY: Well, does that mean you were ordered
here or did you come on your own free will and accord?
MR. BONANDER: Well, it's kind of a settled thing, I'd
say. It's either we - you go to the Ecology Corps or we'll start
court proceedings for draft evasion or whatever. I don't know.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: Who said that?
MR. BONANDER: This is the Selective Service.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: Mr. Seeley.
ASSEMBLYMAN SEELEY: I would assume then that you accepted
this? This is what you would rather do? It's still not an
-51-
order. It's not a sentence or anything?
MR. BONANDER: Well, yes. It's my choice to court and
possibly jail.
ASSEMBLYMAN SEELEY: That's all.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: All right. Mr. McKay.
Excuse me. We're going to have a five minute break.
(Recess.)
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: All right. Now, I'd like now, if I may,
to ask Mr. McKay, is it not Mr. McKay who is to present his position?
I don't know whether you'd rather summarize it or have it incorpor-
ated in the record.
MR. McKAY: I'd rather read it.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: Sir?
MR. McKAY: I'd rather read the petition. Why don't I
read it unless you are stuck for time?
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: I want everybody to have the best presen-
tation possible. There are others in the audience who are en-
titled to respond and, therefore, it is - well, this is an open
and public hearing. Just a minute, please.
All right, sir. Go ahead.
MR. McKAY: As you can see, it's a copy of a document we
delivered one original signed copy to Governor Reagan's secretary
this morning. You have one of the original signature copies
(Appendix D), and I think Mr. Griggs has one.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: Excuse me, Mr. McKay. Mr. Griggs, do you
have one for Mr. Stearns?
MR. GRIGGS: Yes.
-52-
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: You had a copy left with Governor Reagan
this morning. All right. Now, begin. (Appendix D)
MR. McKAY: To: The Honorable Ronald Reagan, Governor
of the State of California. From: Members of the California
Ecology Corps, Inyo Ecology Center. Petition.
The purpose of this petition is three-fold. It will show
that dissatisfaction among the members of the California Ecology
Corps (CEC) is more widespread than the Governor has been led to
believe. It will ask that the original intent of the CEC be re-
called and reviewed. It will request a discussion of executive
support for state funding of CEC projects.
1. Since its inception, the CEC has shown a trend toward
a low corpsmen population and a high corpsmen turnover rate. Low
morale has led to disputes, resignations, and general dissatisfaction
within the Corps.
Such negative aspects tend to overshadow positive elements:
satisfaction in work accomplished and pride in readiness for emergency
are undermined by anger and frustrated depression over a lack of
response to questions and grievances. The undersigned believe
that behind these grievances, and the low morale engendered by them,
are several definite causes.
The main function of the Ecology Corps is to provide trained
hand crews for the fighting of wildfires, according to Mr. Joe
Griggs, Director of CEC. Wildfire fighting is difficult and dangerous
work, yet corpsmen have no life insurance, no health insurance, and
receive meager wages. Corpsmen receive a minimal food allotment.
During fire season corpsmen remain on call 24 hours a day, five
-53-
days a week without compensation.
Although workmen's compensation provides some death benefits,
Corps personnel who are not working or on base are not covered in
case of accident. Two corpsmen have drowned since the beginning
of the program and neither left any bequest for the simple reason
that they could not afford insurance premiums. Life insurance is
a distressing subject, but it would seem only right that corpsmen
be provided some coverage over and above workmen's compensation
as death can occur at any time.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: May I interrupt at this point, please,
and go on the record. With respect to not being able to afford
insurance premiums, would you know whether there's a deduction
made from the $40 for state disability insurance and whether this
is optional with the corpsmen?
MR. McKAY: As far as I know there's no deduction there.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: We'll ask the director that later. Thank
you. You may resume.
MR. McKAY: Our only health plan is workmen's compensation,
which has never been fully explained to us. Direct injuries
incurred on the job or at the ecology center are fully covered; but,
even though we live in state barracks, only one visit per man to
a doctor has been allowed in the case of illness, and medication
or further visits to a doctor must be paid for out of the corps-
man's $40 a month compensation. Corpsmen need a more comprehensive
medical health plan, and should be provided some dental care. In
the case of a prolonged illness a corpsman is discharged for being
ill. Discharged corpsmen are not given any severance pay.
-54-
Despite the fact that our room and board and other essentials
are provided by the state, our wages are inadequate compensation
for the type of work corpsmen do. Our day-to-day projects are largely
manual labor. For this work we receive $2 per day. When on the
fire line, corpsmen receive only 25 cents per hour (60 cents after
July 1, 1972) for the first eight hours, after which we receive
$2.80 per hour overtime wages. This totals $13.20 per day ($16
after July 1), or $1.10 per hour ($1.33 after July lst) averaged
over a standard 12 hour shift. CEC Director Joe Griggs has
publicly stated that corpsmen should receive the legal minimum
wage at the very least.
Our food allotment of .534 cents per man, per meal, remains
static while food costs rise. While our likelihood of strenuous
fire duty increases, our nourishment decreases. (See Food Price
Sample Chart Attached to Appendix D)
ASSEMBLYMAN WILSON: May I interrupt here?
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: On the record. Mr. Wilson.
ASSEMBLYMAN WILSON: Am I to understand that you are allowed
to see the doctor once with a particular illness?
MR. McKAY: Yes. That's our paid visit is one visit.
No medication and no further visits.
ASSEMBLYMAN WILSON: Then if subsequent visits are required
for the same illness, you have to pay for that?
MR. McKAY: That's right.
ASSEMBLYMAN WILSON: So am I to understand if a person has
a leg broken, their first visit to the doctor to have the leg
set would be paid for. The second visit to, say, take off the
-55-
cast would be paid at your expense. Is that correct?
MR. McKAY: If the injury was incurred outside the con-
ditions of workmen's compensation, that's my understanding of how
that would be paid. We haven't had any injury of that type that
wasn't covered by workmen's compensation. In fact, we haven't had
any serious injuries, I don't believe, at the Inyo Center. I know
of a case of ear infection.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: I suppose it's difficult carrying on a dia-
logue with a couple of lawyers?
MR. McKAY: Yes.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: But you responded if the injury occurs
outside the area of workmen's compensation, yet in your petition
here you have said direct injuries incurred on the job or at the
center are fully covered.
MR. McKAY: Yes.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: "But even though we live in state barracks,
only one visit per man to a doctor has been allowed in the case
of illness, and further visits to a doctor must be paid for out
of the corpsman's $40 a month compensation."
Now, are you trying to make a distinction between injuries
that occur on the job or at the center as opposed to illness that
may be -
MR. McKAY: Illness and injuries out of the center or off
the job are one category not covered.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: Are those the -- is that the situation
where you are limited to one visit per man to a doctor?
MR. McKAY: As far as I know any illness and injuries
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outside the center are limited to one visit per man.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: If it occurs on the job, there's no limit?
MR. McKAY: Or at a Corps'function. For instance, we've
had a few injuries playing basketball locally. They have been
taken care of because it's a team representing the Ecology Corps.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: I think I have it clear now. Thank you.
MR. McKAY: During the eight months fire season, corpsmen
must remain on base for 120 hours; five consecutive days on
stand-by alert without compensation for the 16 daily hours off
work, but still confined to the center. This situation, according
to those who have experienced it, leads to boredom and irritability.
This might be alleviated by a general improvement in the areas
previously mentioned.
At the Inyo Ecology Center the corpsmen are unanimous in
their concern that the above points be resolved, and that their
dissatisfaction with current conditions be known.
2. The work performed by corpsmen at the Inyo Center is
largely the same as was performed by the previous inmate population
under the California Department of Corrections. Corpsmen fight
fires; are leased to other agencies for manual labor projects, such
as the building of rock and earth dams; and perform camp chores.
With few exceptions, these are the tasks which Inyo corpsmen per-
form in the name of ecology. These tasks were all performed at Inyo
by inmates under CDC's Conservation Center program.
The undersigned request a discussion with the California
Division of Forestry and the Office of the Governor to define
the types of work, ecologically oriented or not, which are to be
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expected of CEC. We believe that "ecology" is a misnomer for the
work the corps performs.
3. At the present time, the Ecology Corps is a self-
supporting state agency. Because of the limited funds of other
state and federal agencies to which corpsmen are leased, it is
impossible to achieve the previously mentioned requests without
state funding. The undersigned ask the Governor to consider
executive support in the Legislature oriented toward general funding
of the Ecology Corps to cover higher wages, health and life in-
surance, and a larger food-cost allotment. We also ask the Governor
to support limited funding for specific ecology-oriented projects;
such projects might be suggested by faculty members of state
colleges and universities. We believe that these measures would
appreciably improve morale, work quality, and sense of pride in the
Corps.
4. Conclusion. We request that the items mentioned in
the first section be carefully considered by the Governor, the
Legislature, and the California Division of Forestry, and that
response be made to each.
We request that the CEC's work profile be defined by the
executive branch and CDF.
If CEC work remains in the field of conservation, we request
that the word "ecology" be dropped from the Corps' name, and that
a more realistic one, such as "Forestry" or "Environment" be
substituted.
We request that prospective corpsmen be shown lists of
projects completed or on-going, and that the projects be in order
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according to man hours spent on each. There should be a separate
listing for each ecology center.
We request a regular quarterly meeting be held between the
CEC director, the center directors, and corpsmen representatives
from all centers.
We request a direct response to this petition from the
Governor of the State of California.
The undersigned believe in the present and potential worth
of the California Ecology Corps. We believe that CEC can do
much in the field of environmental protection. However, we
also believe that poor wages, poor food, lack of severance pay,
and lack of insurance must be corrected; these factors limit the
Corps' attractiveness as employment.
We hope that the California Ecology Corps will expand and
improve as a force for ecology in the State of California.
Copies given to: The Honorable Ronald Reagan, Governor of
the State of California. Mr. Joe Griggs, Director of the California
Ecology Corps. Assemblyman Mike Cullen and members of the Assembly
Committee on Efficiency and Cost Control. Members of the Press.
It's signed by, in person, by 38 members of the Corps at
the Inyo Ecology Center, and I have signed it and presented it.
More would have signed it from all I have talked to extensively
for weeks about the Corps, and I believe they would all have signed
the petition had they been there and that's the entire population
of Inyo.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: What is your educational background, Mr.
McKay?
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MR. McKAY: High school.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: On the third page you alluded to an eight
month fire season where corpsmen must remain on base for 120 hours,
five consecutive days?
MR. McKAY: That's per week.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: Without compensation. Is that every week?
MR. McKAY: Yes, five days a week. Two off. The weekends
are staggered between all of us so there's available crews for
fire fighting. So one crew will have Saturday and Sunday off. One
crew will have Monday and Tuesday off.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: I see.
MR. McKAY: But it's consecutive days, five and two.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: Do you have any questions, Mr. Wilson?
ASSEMBLYMAN WILSON: Yes. Paul, you mentioned in your petition
poor food. Could you spell that out for us?
MR. McKAY: Our food, a good proportion of it, is starch
food, potatoes or bread. Our meats are mostly chicken, fish,
and low, very low, grades of beef. Our vegetables are almost
entirely canned vegetables. We get one glass of fresh milk a day
which is all we are allowed. The rest of the time we drink mixed
milk.
We get for lunches -- and we are doing very heavy work. I
want to remind you at least the two major work crews have been
mostly building rock dams, work that is strenuous for a while now.
For lunches we get two sandwiches, a piece of fruit and some cookies
or something like that. Usually it's gone at the coffee break, you
know. A little bit left over, maybe.
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We feel that we need better food, higher quality food,
more food. And one thing is that this varies from camp to camp.
At one of the camps, I believe it is Humboldt, you can
have a quart of milk to take to lunch with you. Is that correct?
MR. STONE: There's no limit to what you can take to lunch
with you.
MR. McKAY: Now, our cook or chief cook, a guy named Walt,
has tried very hard to stay close to that budget. He's averaged
about 56 cents per man per meal cost. And he's kept that pretty
close to that, but food costs are rising and because he's trying
to keep within his allotted money, the quality of food is going
down, you know. The price of meat went up during the wage-price
freeze. It's really incredible, during that time.
There are some things, for instance, each month we can't
afford to order. Sometimes some kind of vegetable. We have very
little fresh vegetables, for instance. There's no provision for
any kind of vitamin supplements.
ASSEMBLYMAN WILSON: You mentioned that you are leased
out to the federal government occasionally. Is that correct?
MR. McKAY: We have done work for the U.S. Forest Service.
ASSEMBLYMAN WILSON: On those times, when you are leased
and maybe you can't answer this --- does the federal government pay
your wage when you are leased to the federal government, or does
the state pay for the work done for the federal government?
MR. McKAY: Like if we work for the U.S. Forest Service
building a fence, the Forest Service will pay for it out of their
budget.
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ASSEMBLYMAN WILSON: The U.S. Forest Service?
MR. McKAY: Will pay for that out of their money.
ASSEMBLYMAN WILSON: Is that in addition to the 25 cents
an hour that you receive?
MR. McKAY: I'm not sure, but I think we receive our 25
cents an hour out of that. It's something like $8.50 a day which
we receive $2. In July the overall amount, I think, is going up to
$12.50 a day. Our wages are going up.
ASSEMBLYMAN WILSON: So that if you are leased to the federal
government, the government pays your 25 cents an hour rather than
the state?
MR. McKAY: Plus other monies, $8.50.
ASSEMBLYMAN WILSON: But if you work for a month for the
federal government, would you still receive $40 a month?
MR. McKAY: Yes.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: Mr. McKay, has the head cook converted
that 56 cents into calories? Has he tried to turn over this?
MR. McKAY: He's tried to keep as much good food, as much
vegetables and meats. He's done miracles with the food.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: Has anyone done a calorie count? You are
talking about hard work.
MR. McKAY: No. I lost weight for the first couple of weeks
I was there. Then I gained it back in muscle. I don't know. I
seem to be maintaining a balance, but I'm also buying my own vitamin
supplements. Lots of people are.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: Do you know whether a dietitian has been
near any of the camps?
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MR. McKAY: No. I don't know anything like that. It is
the - one thing I'm trying to point out in West Acres, I'm not
an expert on nutrition or anything like that, but the food costs
are going up and the food allotment is remaining steady. Some-
thing has to give somewhere. It looks like the food, either in
quality or quantity. That's, I think, what is said somewhere,
you know.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: Do you have any questions, Mr. Seeley?
ASSEMBLYMAN SEELEY: No.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: All right.
MR. McKAY: Can I speak?
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: Yes.
MR. McKAY: I want to say our relations with the foremen and
so on, they were rocky for a while, the relationship with the
foremen and camp director, who is in the audience here, and the
administrator, they are getting much better. We have an extremely
fine relationship with our group foremen. We have no complaints
about them at all as far as I know. They are fine people to work
with and I want to say something about John Clark, the center
director, and Phil Thomas, ranger one, and the rest of the center
staff. They are all excellent people to work with.
CHAIRMAN CULLEN: All right, sir. Thank you.
We have another witness that wants to contribute.
MR. TIMOTHY WHITE: My name is Timothy White and I'm a
corpsman. I'm presently on assignment, a special assignment to
the Department of Conservation, working in the information office.
And I haven't intended to testify so I have not prepared a statement.
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