The Corruption of Climate Science: California Forest Facts Expose Study’s Flaws

By Edward Ring
06/21/2023
For over 50 years, with increasing frequency, corrupted, careerist scientists have produced biased studies that, amplified by agenda-driven corporate and political special interests, constitute a “consensus” that is supposedly “beyond debate.” We are in a “climate crisis.” To cope with this climate emergency, all measures are justifiable. This is overblown, one-sided, and manipulative propaganda. It...

TAGS: CalFire, California forest fires, firefighters, forest management, Forests

Are Firefighters Hard to Recruit in California?

By Edward Ring
04/11/2022
This article originally appeared in the California Globe. In response to a recent California Policy Center analysis that provided an updated calculation of the average pay and benefits for full-time firefighters working for cities in California, one commenter claimed that it has become difficult to recruit firefighters. The accuracy of this claim carries significant implications. When employers...

TAGS: firefighters, San Diego

Questioning the Political Priorities of the Firefighters Union

By Edward Ring
03/31/2022
As another summer of wildfires approaches, it is in the interest of every Californian to understand that California’s firefighters’ union, the California Professional Firefighters, is one of the most politically powerful unions in the state. This union has the power to help solve the growing problem of wildfires in California, but to more effectively do so...

TAGS: CalFire, firefighters, union

Firefighting in Orange County – Part One, Firefighter Pay and Benefits

By Edward Ring
06/17/2020
In June 2019 the City of Placentia, in a 3-1 council vote, decided to leave the Orange County Fire Authority and build their own fire department. The reasons for this decision, and the means to accomplish it, will be explored in greater detail in a follow-up article. But the decision came down to this: a majority...

TAGS: firefighters, orange county, Orange County Fire Authority, pensions, placentia, Unions

Manhattan Beach firefighter pay averages over $300,000 per year

By Edward Ring
01/21/2020
There is now a $300,000 club for California’s firefighters. In the City of Manhattan Beach during 2018, the average pay and benefits for a full time firefighter were $300,242. While the Manhattan Beach firefighters, at least through 2018, belong to an exclusive club, twelve California cities pay their firefighters over $250,000 per year, and 69...

TAGS: CalFire, Charter schools, firefighters, Social Security, UTLA

Politicians who accept Government Union money betray the public

By Edward Ring
09/12/2019
Public sector unions should be illegal. They have very little in common with private sector unions, which, properly regulated, play a vital role in society. The differences between public sector and private sector unions are significant. For example: 1 – Private sector unions cannot be unreasonable in the demands they bring to negotiations with management,...

TAGS: California, Charter schools, conservative, Costa Mesa, firefighters, orange county, public sector unions, school choice

City of Richmond faces pension stress

By Edward Ring
08/15/2019
here Pick a city in California. Pick a county in California. Odds are, they could be the topic of this analysis instead of Richmond. But Richmond is the focus of a recent analysis published in Reason entitled “Richmond, California’s Finances Remain Shaky,” and that work provides solid data from which to take a deeper look at what’s truly driving...

TAGS: CalPERS, Edward Ring, firefighters, public safety

Napa fires highlight huge disparities between wealthy firefighters and ‘slave laborers’

By Steven Greenhut
10/24/2017
Sacramento As Napa’s deadly wildfires have subsided, newspapers and politicians are asking an interesting question in an indelicate way. How come the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection, or Cal Fire, relies so heavily on thousands of prison inmates to battle the blazes alongside well-paid professional firefighters? Many observers have even used the term...

TAGS: firefighters