A California licensing law that bans many ex-offenders from working as full-time firefighters, even if they were trained to fight fires while imprisoned, was upheld last week by a federal judge. But once released from prison, the state makes it almost impossible for former prisoners to earn a living fighting fires full-time. The state doesn’t require any relationship between a felony and EMT certification, much less a rational one; even completely irrelevant felonies trigger disqualification. But since judges can still deny those petitions, and the disqualifying crimes for EMT certification remain unchanged, the impact of AB 2147 will be limited. (Career firefighters, on the other hand, earn an average salary of more than $90,000, not including overtime.)

Source: Forbes February 16, 2021 15:22 UTC