H.R. 3614 — FIRE Act

This section designates the Act as the “Fairness, Inclusion, Rehabilitation, and Expungement for Incarcerated Firefighters Act” or the “FIRE Act” and includes a table of contents.

This section extends Occupational Safety and Health Act of 1970 (OSHA) protections to incarcerated firefighters—defined by cross-reference to the Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938 (FLSA) as individuals incarcerated in correctional facilities (also defined by cross-reference to the FLSA) who perform firefighting or emergency response services—through the following amendments: (1) adding a definition of "correctional facility" to OSHA section 3; (2) revising OSHA section 18(c) state plan requirements to expressly cover incarcerated firefighters in public agencies or political subdivisions and to mandate annual reports (beginning not later than two years after enactment of the FIRE Act) from operators or contractors of such facilities on workplace safety and health conditions and potential noncompliance with state plan standards; and (3) adding new OSHA section 19(e) to require the Bureau of Prisons to apply its OSHA program to incarcerated firefighters equivalently to employees and to submit annual reports (beginning not later than two years after enactment) on safety and health conditions, injuries or deaths, and potential noncompliance at prisons it operates or contracts.

This section expands the definition of "employee" under the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA)—which establishes federal minimum wage, overtime pay, recordkeeping, and youth employment standards—to expressly include (1) incarcerated firefighters employed by public agencies operating the relevant correctional facility and (2) those employed by private entities operating such facilities under contract with a public agency. (Thus, incarcerated firefighters become entitled to FLSA minimum wage and overtime protections, subject to the following exceptions.) It further (3) modifies the computation of wages under FLSA subsection (m)(1) to exclude, for incarcerated firefighters, the cost of board, lodging, or other facilities and any amounts deducted for court-imposed fees (e.g., criminal justice administrative fees, court clerk fees); and (4) adds definitions of "incarcerated firefighter" (i.e., an incarcerated individual performing firefighting or emergency response services through the correctional facility), "correctional facility" (i.e., a jail, prison, or other detention facility), and "court-imposed fee" (with specified inclusions and exclusions).

This section amends the Edward Byrne Memorial Justice Assistance Grant program (Byrne JAG) to promote workplace safety and health protections for incarcerated firefighters by (1) requiring states or units of local government receiving formula grants under the program that operate or contract for correctional facilities to submit annual reports—not later than two years after the date of enactment of the FIRE Act and annually thereafter—to the Attorney General and Congress on workplace safety and health conditions at each facility, injuries or deaths of employees or incarcerated firefighters performing required work during incarceration, and potential noncompliance with applicable occupational safety and health standards; (2) requiring competitive grant applicants to certify that they have provided such protections, by legislative or executive action, at least as effective as state occupational safety and health programs under section 18 of the Occupational Safety and Health Act of 1970 (29 U.S.C. 667), or that an appropriate agency monitors and enforces them; (3) reserving $400,000 annually from total amounts available for the program, in consultation with the Assistant Secretary of Labor for Occupational Safety and Health, for states and units of local government to establish and implement such protections; and (4) defining "incarcerated firefighter" by reference to section 3(z) of the Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938 (29 U.S.C. 203(z)).

This section establishes a grant program administered by the Secretary of Labor to award grants to states submitting satisfactory applications, to assist those states in amending their occupational safety and health laws to cover incarcerated firefighters (as defined in 29 U.S.C. 667(i)) and in enforcing such laws through inspections, investigations, citations, penalties, and other mechanisms. The section authorizes $100 million for each of FY2026 through FY2031, to remain available until expended.

This section establishes a new grant program under the Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act (WIOA) to provide job training, job placement services, and mentoring to former incarcerated firefighters (as defined in section 3(z) of the Fair Labor Standards Act) during the 180-day period following their release from incarceration. Grants may be awarded to eligible entities—including 501(c)(3) organizations, local workforce development boards, state or local governments, and certain Native American entities eligible under WIOA section 166—for program costs related exclusively or partially to such individuals, evaluating methods to improve their employment opportunities, and identifying best practices for their reentry as full-time firefighters. The section further amends WIOA's authorization of appropriations to cover the new program; redesignates section 172 as section 173; and updates the table of contents accordingly.

This section establishes a federal expungement procedure for eligible incarcerated firefighters to petition the court of conviction for removal of records related to certain offenses. Petitions require fulfillment of sentence requirements (waivable for extenuating circumstances); courts must appoint counsel for indigents, consider evidence and factors including public safety, allow U.S. attorney recommendations (except for mandatory grants), grant mandatorily if filed at least seven years after fulfillment, grant discretionarily if filed at least one year after, and prohibit refiling for two years after denial. Upon granting expungement, courts must notify specified federal, state, and local officials within seven days; the order restores the firefighter's pre-arrest legal status (including non-use in U.S. Sentencing Guidelines calculations, no disclosure requirements or disqualifications, and expungement of official records and references) subject to Attorney General exceptions and nonpublic Department of Justice retention for law enforcement purposes.