STURGIS, S.D. (AP) - About five years ago, Travis Ugland was looking for work.
He stumbled upon a program called Firewise. He wasn’t sure what the job entailed, but he applied and was accepted.
The Meade County Firewise Program is a veteran-hire program funded primarily by federal grant dollars through the Bureau of Land Management. It is part of the “Veteran in the Woods” Initiative started in Meade County in December of 2012 with two goals in mind - lessen the risk of wildland fires around homes built among the trees and - more importantly - assist veterans in reintegrating into civilian life.
Ugland, an Army veteran, admits that when he came into the program he was no lumberjack and had little experience with a chain saw.
“It was different. There was a learning curve,” he said. “I grew up in Spearfish a small city kid and my only experience was trimming some branches off a few trees.”
Now, as fire mitigation coordinator for the Firewise program, he teaches program participants how to use the chain saw. But his relationship with the participants goes much deeper than what he teaches them in the classroom.
“When I first came into the program, I felt alone. I really missed the camaraderie I had with my brothers-in-arms,” he said. “Some of the issues I faced on a daily basis were not uncommon. Realizing that I wasn’t alone and these other guys were having the same troubles was an eye opener.”
Working day-in and day-out with the other veterans can sometimes feel like an ongoing group therapy session, Ugland said.
“During our trips in the truck to the jobsite, the guys talk about what they are struggling with and most of us had been through something similar. It’s like we’ve all been through the same muck, so we can help each other out,” he said.
Veterans accepted into the program work 40 hours a week and are paid $15 an hour.
Firewise participants work Monday through Thursday out in the field on projects. Fridays are spent in the office working on resume writing, job interviewing skills, or participating in pertinent job shadowing opportunities, the Black Hills Pioneer reported .
A focus of the program is to help veterans move on to the next step in their lives.
Sometimes veterans face financial concerns, other times it can be emotional or physical.
“It can vary wildly from one veteran to the next as to what their concerns are,” Ugland said.
“The Firewise Program gives them a safe landing zone to work their way through those issues. They get to plug into a network of veterans going through the same struggles,” he said.
The county’s veteran services officer gives participants insights into veteran benefits for which they might be eligible through the various state and federal agencies.
“We provide them the tools to be successful,” Ugland said. “Guys come into the program very able bodied and open minded.”
The next step for participants may be a job, but it also may be going back to school.
“Some of them weren’t even aware that they had state and federal benefits for schooling through the VA,” Ugland said.
Some have gone to school to become electricians, others for heating and air conditioning, and still others have earned their CDL license and found jobs as truck drivers.
Meade County has had the Firewise program since 2002, said Jerry Derr, Meade County human resources director and Meade County Commission assistant. The startup funding was $100,000 from the BLM.
Initially, the focus of the Firewise program was to promoting public awareness among homeowners to clear trees and debris around their property to lessen the threat of wildland fires.
From 2002 to the end of 2012, the county operated that program and had someone on the outside manage it. The dollars which came to the county were used to pay an outside coordinator. That person hired private contractors to do the clearing around the homes of landowners who lived among the trees.
Then, in October of 2012, the BLM and Derr met with several commissioners to discuss a change in the scope and funding of the program. Derr said that nationally at time there was a spotlight on the issue of veterans without jobs.
The idea to use the Firewise money to support a program called “Veterans in the Woods,” came from Bureau of Land Management official Mike Dannenberg.
“His idea was to hire and train veterans to do fire mitigation instead of having contractors do the work,” Derr said. “It took some commitment on the part of the commission. It was really a limited discussion because the commission at that time just jumped right on the idea.”
In December of 2012, the county hired its first veteran into the program. Since then, the program has had 44 veteran participants.
In 2015, the county received a national award for its Firewise program for Wildfire Mitigation Innovation from the National Association of State Foresters, International Association of Fire Chiefs, the National Fire Protection Association and the USDA Forest Service.
The program continues to be successful and staff work to get more interest from homeowners. This year, Ugland said they have done mass mailings to homeowners along the Interstate 90 corridor to promote interest in the Firewise program.
Once they get a call from an interested homeowner, they schedule a meeting to walk the property and do an assessment. Homeowners are given a list of areas that need to be addressed and then decide if they wish to participate.
Firewise staff mark trees around the property which they plan to fell so that homeowners understand the plan. Ugland said they usually give homeowners a day or two to contemplate the project.
The Firewise program can pay up to 80 percent of the cost to mitigate the fire threat with the homeowner only having to pay 20 percent of the cost.
The goal of Firewise is to physically reduce and clean up hazardous fuels - such as dense or overgrown vegetation and trees - which creates a survivable space around structures.
“We usually talk about thinning, reducing fuel levels, removing trees and shrubbery around the home,” Ugland said. “In the Black Hills, it’s about creating a break so if a fire were to burn through the area we could potentially protect the structure.”
Firewise job openings are posted in the VA facilities around the Black Hills, through the South Dakota Department of Labor and on the Meade County website.
Most veterans find the program through word-of-mouth, Derr said.
“We don’t have trouble finding vets to get onto the program. The problem we have is making sure we have enough money to fund the vets that keep coming in,” Derr said.
When the Veterans in the Woods program first began, the county received $62,500 to operate it. They weren’t sure if the funding would continue, but since then, they have received more than $611,000 to keep it going.
“The program performs and the BLM sees a benefit,” Derr said. “The Firewise program is one of the best things that is happening within Meade County.”
Derr said the fire mitigation is what gets the dollars into the program, but the veteran hire initiative is the heart of the program.
“If it’s $90 out of every $100 spent on doing that and $10 spent in the field, it’s a win-win,” he said.
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Information from: Black Hills Pioneer, http://www.bhpioneer.com
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