Sponsors (73)
The bill strengthens retirement pay, reduces routinely scheduled hours, and clarifies federal firefighter workweeks—improving worker income security, retention, and safety—but raises federal personnel costs and creates administrative and operational trade-offs that agencies and taxpayers must absorb or offset.
Federal and career firefighters will receive higher retirement annuities because average-pay calculations will include regularly scheduled hours and a half-time credit for overtime, improving their long-term income security.
Making pay and scheduling for Federal firefighting roles more comparable to municipal/public-sector counterparts and establishing a regular workweek should help recruitment and retention of skilled federal firefighters.
Capping routinely scheduled workweeks (no more than 60 hours) will reduce burnout and fatigue, likely improving job performance and public safety outcomes for the communities served by federal fire stations.
Federal taxpayers and agencies will face higher long-term personnel costs from increased pension payouts and the need to hire additional staff or pay more overtime to cover duties under the defined/capped workweek.
If Congress does not fully fund these increased liabilities, agencies may need to reallocate budgets, reduce other services, or change hiring and benefits policies for other federal employees.
Capping routinely scheduled hours could reduce operational flexibility for fire operations with variable demand and complicate emergency coverage in some locations.
Based on analysis of 5 sections of legislative text.
Introduced January 28, 2025 by Gerald E. Connolly · Last progress January 28, 2025
Changes how retirement annuities are calculated for covered federal firefighters by including a half-time credit for regularly scheduled overtime when computing average pay, and directs OPM to limit how many regularly recurring hours may count as part of a firefighter’s workweek (no more than an average of 60 hours). The rule applies only to separations from service that occur after the 60-day period following enactment and requires OPM to issue implementing regulations within one year. The stated aims are to improve pay parity, recruitment, and retention for federal firefighters; no new appropriations are specified.