Today, Georgia’s program has about 200 participants each year. Those who qualify receive training to become certified as firefighters and EMTs and live in the prison firehouse rather than in cells. But while some states, including California, pay a small wage to inmate fire crews, Georgia’s aren’t paid a salary.

Officials in rural communities told me they relied on the prisons’ services because their own emerency crews were understaffed. Without enough personnel, not only were the communities vulnerable, but any paid or volunteer firefighters were also vulnerable because they would be responding without the support needed to safely handle emergencies.

However, while the program may provide much-needed stability to many communities, it has also faced backlash in some areas. When Camden County, Georgia, considered supplementing the local fire department with incarcerated firefighters in 2011, members of the department raised fears about the safety of the community.

Officials I spoke with suggested there had been some resentment from more urban areas that see the program as a way to avoid paying for career firefighters and from local volunteers who feel like they’re being replaced by the incarcerated firefighters.

The Georgia program also raises questions about the vulnerability of incarcerated firefighters.

Incarcerated people who participate in the program must sign a waiver that releases the Georgia Department of Corrections from liability should they be injured while working as a firefighter. They also are not eligible to receive workers’ compensation benefits.

Those rules increase the risks for incarcerated firefighters. Several have been injured while responding to fires and other local emergencies in Georgia and other states.

At least one incarcerated firefighter has died in Georgia. William A. Satterfield died in 1984 responding to a fire call with the prison fire team. In May 2013, the Georgia Board of Public Safety voted to acknowledge the death and service of Satterfield in a Public Safety Memorial. Two firefighters from Georgia’s Dooly State Prison were injured in 2016 in a vehicle crash while responding to a fire call.

An incarcerated firefighter in Mississippi, Michael Davenport, died while fighting a structure fire in 2006. According to court documents from a subsequent lawsuit, Davenport did not receive full firefighter training, but there were no laws requiring such training at the time.

It is unknown how often these injuries occur or how working as a firefighter affects the health of incarcerated people after they are released.

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