The Volunteering Days is Gone

All-Hazard Incarcerated Firefighters and Rural Disinvestment☆

Bibliographic Data

ID2291506
AuthorsJ Carlee Purdum (0000-0002-9801-9513, Department of Landscape Architecture and Urban Planning, Hazard Reduction and Recovery Center Texas A&M University, corresponding author)
Year2023
Volume88
Issue2
Pages312-336
Publication date2023-06-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueRural Sociology (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0036-0112 • E-ISSN: 1549-0831
PublisherWiley (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1111/ruso.12477
OpenAlexW4317914534
LanguageEN
Citations received2
References cited35

After decades of economic restructuring, many rural communities are struggling to provide adequate fire and emergency services across their communities. Subsequent population loss, the destabilization of local tax-bases, and an increased demand from work and family have left local fire departments at a loss for personnel and support. In this context, rural Georgia communities look to nearby prisons to provide incarcerated persons to work as local firefighters and emergency medical technicians (EMTs) to stabilize rural emergency services. In this paper, I examine the narrative accounts that officials who employ, manage, or work alongside incarcerated workers who are trained to respond locally as firefighters and EMTs and ask why incarcerated workers are looked to for this type of work in spite of the challenges associated with the program. Officials describe turning to the state prison system as the only viable option to make their communities and fire departments safe. These findings further illuminate the relationship between racial capitalism, carceral infrastructure, and emergency services as rural communities turn to the false promise of prisons and all-hazard incarcerated firefighters to keep their communities safe

Business · Context (archaeology · Criminology · Economic growth · Economics · Environmental health · Geography · Hazard · Political science · Population · Prison · Restructuring · Sociology · Work (physics · Engineering · Finance · Gun Ownership and Violence Research · Homelessness and Social Issues · Medicine · Policing Practices and Perceptions

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