Resolution No. 31- Support Federal Firefighters Fairness Act – H.R. 3718

Resolution No. 31
COMMITTEE ASSIGNMENT: Legislative
Re: Support Federal Firefighters Fairness Act – H.R. 3718 – Adopted

1	WHEREAS, in 1982, CPF secured California’s
2	first cancer presumption statute protecting state and
3	local government fire fighters and other public safety
4	officers, which specifies that any cancer so
5	developing or manifesting itself in a fire fighter shall
6	be presumed to arise out of and in the course of
7	employment; and
8	WHEREAS, at first glance, the dangers fire
9	fighters face today might appear to mirror what they
10	faced a hundred years ago. But our members know
11	that a closer look reveals quite the opposite. With the
12	advent of polyvinyl chloride, asbestos and
13	polychlorinated biphenyls, just to name a select few,
14	a fire fighter’s work environment has changed
15	dramatically since even the 1980s, when the public
16	safety cancer presumption was first adopted in
17	California; and
18	WHEREAS, since 1982, CPF has not only been
19	successful in expanding California’s presumptive
20	statutes to include other job-caused illnesses and
21	injuries, but each of the remaining 49 states have
22	also since passed some form of similar presumptive
23	legislation, but these state presumptive laws do not
24	apply to those fire fighters who are employed by the
25	federal government; and
26	WHEREAS, because federal fire fighters are not
27	protected by a federal presumptive statute, when a
28	federal fire fighter is diagnosed with a type of lung
29	disease or some form of cancer, they are faced with
30	the daunting task of proving when, where and what
31	type of exposure caused said disease before it can
32	be considered job-caused – a link that is often
33	impossible for a fire fighter to make given the
34	complex synergistic effects of multiple compound
35	exposures, as well as the rapidly growing
36	introduction of new chemicals and industrial
37	compounds into our environment; and
38	WHEREAS, there is a long-overdue need to
39	adequately protect the rights and benefits of all
40	federal fire fighters who, like their state and local
41	government counterparts, become ill as a result of
42	hazardous occupational exposures and the daily
43	stresses of the job, especially when such exposures
44	can result in catastrophic illnesses, such as cancer;
45	therefore be it
46	RESOLVED, That the delegates to the 2014 IAFF
47	Convention wholeheartedly support H.R. 3718,
48	sponsored by California Congresswoman Lois
49	Capps, which would enact the Federal Firefighters
50	Fairness Act and remedy this inequity by affording
51	presumptive parity to California’s federal fire
52	fighters and their colleagues nationwide; and be it
53	further
54	RESOLVED, That the IAFF transmit a copy of
55	this resolution to Congresswoman Capps.

Submitted by: California Professional Firefighters
Cost Estimate: None

Resolution No. 31- Support Federal Firefighters Fairness Act – H.R. 3718

Convention Videos

Duke Energy Convention Center

Cincinnati Convention & Visitors Bureau Welcome the IAFF