Arizona forester: inmate crews, mitigation and scaling state capacity to meet growing wildfire risk

Tom Torres, director of the Arizona Department of Forestry and Fire Management and Arizona’s state forester, told Wyoming legislators that Arizona has expanded firefighting personnel and mitigation capacity in recent years and relies heavily on multiple staffing models including inmate crews.

Torres said Arizona now employs about 260 people (up from 88 in 2020) and averages roughly 2,000 fires per year, burning about 450,000 acres annually across jurisdictions. In 2024 he said his department recorded roughly 2,160 fires, 280,000 acres burned and about $21,000,000 in state spending.

Why it matters: Torres’ presentation highlighted how states with complex land ownership and large national forest footprints (Arizona’s six national forests) combine state staff, local fire districts and federal partners to respond. His mitigation focus — and the scale of Arizona’s inmate crew program — offered an operational model with both capacity and workforce considerations relevant to Wyoming.

Workforce and inmate crews Torres said Arizona runs about 12 inmate hand crews of 20 people for wildfire response (about 240 participants) and an additional eight 20‑person inmate crews devoted to mitigation work. He said the program has operated more than 30 years in Arizona and is governed by a contract between his department and the state Department of Corrections. He said compensation for trainee inmates is low (around $1.50 per hour) and the state also operates a “post” crew — a civilian crew of former inmates — as a workforce continuity and reentry pathway; several former inmate crew members later worked for the department.

Aviation, funding and mitigation goals Torres said Arizona has few state‑owned large aviation assets but uses exclusive lease contracts for single‑engine air tankers and air attack aircraft; very large air tankers and many helicopters come through US Forest Service and Bureau of Land Management agreements. He cited a multi‑year state investment that raised mitigation outputs from roughly 5,000 treated acres in 2022 to over 30,000 treated acres in 2024, with a 2026 target of 40,000 acres per year and a 5‑year sustainable goal to maintain that level.

Torres described Good Neighbor Authority as an important tool for treating federal forest lands near at‑risk communities and stressed strengthening private‑sector capacity (contractors) as a priority to scale mitigation work.

Quote “We used inmate crews for well over 30 years,” Torres said. “We try to emphasize the fact that they're learning a skill and a skill set that can help them get a job when their terms are over.”

Ending Torres told the committee Arizona continues to expand staff and mitigation work and is using a mixed model — state staff, leases, federal partners, inmate crews and contractors — to protect communities in diverse ecosystems from Sonoran Desert to ponderosa pine country.