Friday, January 27, 2017

Federal hiring freeze hits Forest Service jobs

Earlier this month the Shasta-Trinity National Forest was plowing ahead to fill dozens of jobs at the federal agency, holding a job fair and posting openings online. The application period closed just this week for 68 openings — not including temporary firefighting jobs — that were advertised online. The list included such jobs as forestry technicians, archaeology technicians and range technicians. But President Donald Trump issued an order this week that freezes hiring at all federal agencies, bringing new employment activities at the Shasta-Trinity to a halt, including seasonal firefighter jobs. The Shasta-Trinity job applications will continue to be processed during the hiring freeze, said Josef Orosz, a spokesman for the National Forest. He characterized the hiring process as being paused and expected the freeze to be lifted. “The applications are still in the system. We don’t go out and zero out everything,” Orosz said. “This is nothing new. Every president that comes in does this.” And every president has also lifted hiring freezes, he said. While the U.S. Forest Service has included firefighting jobs among those included in the hiring freeze, other federal agencies have not. Jim Milestone, superintendent at Whiskeytown National Recreation Area, said public safety positions, such as firefighters, law enforcement, sewer plant operators and lifeguards are excluded from the hiring freeze...more

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