S. 142 — Wildland Firefighters Congressional Gold Medal Act

This section states congressional findings on the increasing intensity and severity of wildland fires affecting over 1 billion acres nationwide (including 117 million acres of high- or very high-risk federal land); the workforce of more than 18,700 federal wildland firefighters (plus state, local, contract, and volunteer personnel) employed by the Forest Service, Bureau of Land Management, National Park Service, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, and Bureau of Indian Affairs; their roles in suppression, forest management (e.g., prescribed burns, timber harvests), all-hazards response, and international assistance (e.g., 362 firefighters to Australia in 2020 and over 2,000 to Canada in 2023); working conditions (e.g., 16-hour days, over 2,500 operational hours in six months); recruitment and retention challenges; 98 line-of-duty deaths from January 1, 2019, to January 1, 2025; and recognition periods including the Week of Remembrance (June 30-July 6) and National Wildland Firefighter Day (July 2).

This section authorizes the Speaker of the House of Representatives and the President pro tempore of the Senate to arrange for the presentation, on behalf of Congress, of a single Congressional Gold Medal to wildland firefighters collectively in recognition of their strength, resiliency, sacrifice, and service protecting U.S. forests, grasslands, and communities. The Secretary of the Treasury must strike the medal with suitable emblems, devices, and inscriptions, in consultation with the National Interagency Fire Center (NIFC), after which the medal is given to the NIFC for appropriate display and research, with a sense of Congress that it be shown at locations associated with wildland firefighters.

This section authorizes the Secretary to strike and sell bronze duplicates of the gold medal struck under section 3 at a price sufficient to cover production costs, including labor, materials, dies, use of machinery, and overhead expenses.

This section designates medals struck under this Act (1) as national medals for purposes of chapter 51 of title 31, United States Code, and (2) as numismatic items for purposes of sections 5134 and 5136 of title 31, United States Code.

This section (1) authorizes the charge against the United States Mint Public Enterprise Fund of amounts necessary to pay costs of medals struck under this Act; and (2) directs deposit into that fund of proceeds from sales of duplicate bronze medals authorized under section 4.