From prison to purpose through wildland firefighting | Royal Ramey
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You're listening to TED Talks Daily, where we bring you new ideas to spark your curiosity every day. I'm your host, Elise Hu. Today's talk is from our brand new batch of 2024 TED Fellows Films. TED's fellowship supports a network of global innovators, and we are so excited to share their work with you.

Today, we'd like you to meet wildland firefighter Royal Ramey. When wildfires rage in California, incarcerated people are often on the front lines of fighting the fires. Royal Ramey was one of them. He shares the story of how doing public service in prison gave him meaning and what he's doing now to help others who want to follow his path. After we hear from Royal, stick around for his conversation with TED Fellows Program Director Lily James Olds. It's all coming up after a break.

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Beat the holiday rush and get your paper tablet at remarkable.com today. And now our TED Talk of the day. What I'm doing and my co-founder Brenna Smith and I is doing is like changing the narrative of like people that you think that might not have the ability or the competency to

to go out here and fight wildland fires or even have the privilege to do it, can do it at a high level and can be able to be a contributor to society just given a chance. You really don't have control when you're in prison. They tell you what to do, when to eat, when to sleep, when you can come out to exercise, to be on the phone with your family, you don't select your cell, you don't select your bed. You're getting told 24/7 what to do. You have no control of your destiny in there.

It's really the meaning and it shows like how much that you want to take that control back. Being a firefighter in prison definitely gave me the opportunity to take that control back. And it showed me that I can be a hero, right? Because everybody from the outside world kind of look at you as a zero. And it really showed that when I put my mind to something, I can actually do it.

My name is Royel Ramey and I am the co-founder and the CEO of the Forestry and Fire Recruitment Program. The Forestry and Fire Recruitment Program is the intersection between workforce development, criminal justice, and the climate crisis. We're about more than just training people who've been in prison to be firefighters. We're about training them to be better people, to see the power they have to make real choices in their lives.

After World War II, California relied heavily on incarcerated people to fight wildland fires. Folks didn't want to do that work and it was pretty hard, so they wanted to exploit, you know, folks that was incarcerated for a lower wage. It saved the state, you know, millions of dollars each year. These facilities are called California Conservation Camps, aka fire camps.

These long-standing facilities are where I found myself at the peak of my youth, and it literally changed my life. In 2012, I was serving time in prison, feeling mentally devastated. At the time, I remember looking at this Sports Illustrated cover of John Wall, realizing he was my same age with a bright future ahead of him. Why was he so different than me? How did I get here? I was angry at life, and I felt a bit lost. During my sentence, I had the opportunity to go to fire camp, and I'm going to be honest with you, I didn't know

what I was getting myself into. All I know was it was an opportunity for me to be more in a dormitory setting, better food, access to weights, and being closer to my family. When I actually got on the crew,

And they gave me this pack and gave me this tool. I'm like, what the heck am I doing? Right? He smoked. Then he, you know, hiking up a steep hill with a 45-pound pack on your back, you know. It was just crazy to know that I was going towards a fire where everybody else was running away from it. It is dangerous. You never know if this might be your last time.

But I grew to love it. You know, I grew to love the camaraderie. I grew to love the team cohesion. I grew to love, you know, the challenge. That was when the shift changed for me mentally. It gives you, you know, the mental capacity of just knowing that if challenges come your way, you can easily, you know, overcome them by making a choice. It just really gave me, you know, the power to evaluate myself.

and what I really wanted out of life and how I wanted to feel like I was doing something that actually was meaningful. When we went to fires, you would see signs of saying, "Thank you, firefighters." And I always felt that, you know, they were talking to me, even though I was in orange, you know?

Once I got released from prison, I always wanted to be a wildland firefighter. I always saw myself in that blue uniform. You know, I always wanted to work for CAL FIRE. I was like, you know what? You know, I really want to make it happen. But it soon became clear. Prison and public service don't mix.

What is the true roadmap? What is the true process of becoming a firefighter with this record and how to navigate that? How to build up a nice resume that explains that you was in fire camp? How to explain your crime so folks don't judge you? Because most folks in the fire service, they're going to know if you've been incarcerated just based off of that resume, based off the color of your skin. I don't want to be judged. I want to be judged by the work done.

that I put in and not buy, you know, my past. So it took 11 months to figure it out, but

You know, it was worth the journey. And, you know, once we figured it out, my co-founder, Brendan Smith, and I, we established a four-year fire recovery program. I wanted to be the Harriet Tubman, you know, the Underground Railroad, you know, to bring in people that was incarcerated in fire camps and give them an opportunity to be successful in their lives. And knowing that it's generational changing, right? Like being able to have a family-winning career for folks that was told that they couldn't

do this based on their record or their past. That was my life's mission from then on. We helped train and place over 200 people in the fire service through our career training program, but we impacted over 3,000 people that's been formerly and that's currently incarcerated in California conservation camps. Do you ever feel like John Wall when you're out there? That's deep. I definitely feel like

John Wall when I'm out there. Knowing that you have the ability to inspire people, especially with my upbringing and the challenges I had in life. The power of opportunity is real. It's kind of like a phoenix coming out of the ashes. Like, we can make this happen. We can make this work. Just give us a shot, you know? All we need is that opportunity to be successful. People want purpose, want success.

encouragement, want to be influenced, want to serve. If we just get that opportunity, you'll see wonders. People can, you'll see the power in choice. That was Royal Ramey, a 2024 TED Fellow. Stick around after the break to hear Royal go deeper into his work and fellowship experience. And now a special conversation between TED Fellow Royal Ramey and TED Fellows Program Director Lily James Olds.

Hi, Royal. Welcome to the show. Hey, how you doing? I'd like to start by understanding how this program works in practice. So what does the training include for the participants? So I'm going to take a step back, right? So the first thing we do is the recruitment process, making that connection and building the bridge when people are losing hope. And then we have our intake process where we're asking the right questions, asking

Knowing that success in this job takes more than just altitude. It takes stability, safety. We have our career training program, where it's the meat of our program. Half of it is in the classroom training. The other half is in the field.

While we are out there, we obviously focus on heart skills, you know, base training. But we're also mindful of the healing that happens when people, you know, find their purpose and when they are pushed to their limits and beyond and what they think that they can achieve and when they are like responsible for lives next to them.

And then we tap into the job placement piece, right? As people are finishing the program, we work with them to find jobs in any number of other partner organizations and beyond. Some of our graduates want to continue with their education, and we support them with that, connecting them with resources to make that possible.

And then we go to the grand finale, which is graduation. We celebrate the hard work of our people with families and supporters, obviously. For many of, it's the first time they graduated or even celebrated anything. So while it seems like a small gesture, right, is for us one of the biggest moments that we look forward to. And then last but not least, we have our retention services where we,

we stay with these folks and, you know, continue to offer our support as they navigate their new careers or the space in between. So that's amazing. So it sounds like those are really all the ways I know you mentioned, you know, how to help people have family winning careers. And it sounds like those are all some of the benefits that go so much deeper. What remind me, what is the length of the program again?

So we have an eight-week training, and then we also have a 12-week training. The difference really is, is it's the timing where we have an opportunity to go out in the summer to go and fight wildland fires with our staff to be able to gain that paid-on-a-job experience.

Wow. And I know that some people critique prison camps as exploitative since those who are incarcerated are paid very little and it's dangerous work. I'm curious to hear your take on it. How do you see it and how do you ensure the safety, which you mentioned earlier, of these firefighters and those who are training? That's a great question. It's not really a matter of opinion and it is what it is and it always has been. Um,

that, right? Like prison labor was used as punishment in the 17th, 18th century, right? The South relied on slave labor. And when they lost access to it, they started reaching into prisons and replacing slaves with incarcerated people. And, you know, evidently like corporate America start using prison labor to cut costs. But

When you have organizations like CAL FIRE see an opportunity to fill the workforce shortage by entrusting people like me with the training and the tools necessary to do the job, when they support our participants and welcome them into the industry, giving them those family winning careers, it's hard to demand that we end all programs like this in prisons. And I have to acknowledge that

I wouldn't be where I am today without fire, you know, fire camp, despite this roots. I think the takeaway for me is giving people the opportunity for this kind of training and experience without prison being the equation. Right. So why are we OK paying hundreds and thousands of dollars in loss to the criminal justice system? Years of incarceration.

And the destruction of a family to offer training for a meaningful career when we could spend under $50,000 on the same person before they step foot into prison, right? And change their lives. And then to your point, when it comes to safety for firefighters, it's a dangerous job, right? And nobody can really ensure safety otherwise. But, yeah.

What we can, though, do is provide the state-of-the-art training on how to stay safe in this job, providing the best equipment, obviously, and then ensuring that we certify folks in keeping themselves and their teammates safe. What sets us apart as an organization is also recognizing that beyond the physical safety, we need to protect the mental and emotional well-being of our firefighters.

This is hard, physical taxing work that sometimes takes our folks hundreds of miles away from their families. So we're building into our program modules around protecting those parts of ourselves and to avoid burnout, right? You know, to manage stress.

when to ask for help when it's needed. That's such a thoughtful response. And thank you for laying that out so clearly. I think also, as you were saying, the difference here is that you and your co-founder created this organization. And from the conversations we've had, you have such a holistic approach to every aspect of this.

the human of that training and that kind of support, which I think is part of what makes it really meaningful in the scale of such a massive systemic problem.

I think just to go one step further with that, I would ask, how do you think your model and what you both have created could be used in other industries to start to solve some of these bigger, massive issues? Do you see that that template could be used in other businesses or industries? For sure. Yeah.

But the conditions need to be right, right? So first, we're only successful because we have partners like Cal Fire, the Nature Conservancy, and many other partners who understand the value of our graduates, regardless of their past. So you need partners in public and private sectors who are willing to

offer the same employment opportunities to our graduates as they would to a kid whose dad was a firefighter, right? Second, the incentive to hire people must go beyond goodwill.

And it's because of goodwill, it's impermanent and puts our folks in a unsecure position, right? And for instance, think of all the companies who hire black folks and brown folks in this DEI coordinators around the murder of George Floyd. You know, many of people have since been let go because of the goodwill around BLM is gone.

employers must be incentivized to hire people because they believe it is a good investment and they were getting their return on it. And again, employers should be offering family winning careers, building pathways for people to earn. And I want to stress, earn upward mobility is key. Just to love to see people recognizing the untapped

pull a talent inside of prisons and marginalized neighborhoods. And I'm proud to be a model of that and what that looks like. And listen, like I know business is business, right? And people need to make money, but investing in your people almost always make you more, more money. You know, obviously we have a model that works, but we definitely need employers to provide opportunities to

And to be willing to hire people that might be a skills first hiring. And it's like, how can we provide training? How can we put folks in positions where it's not just a job that they can get when they come home? But how can we make this a family winning career?

Thanks for that. Yeah, I was having the same thought that it's not just the right human thing to do, but honestly, it's probably better for the bottom line anyways, because of what it takes to invest in people, right? To create those kinds of abilities for people to move up. So thank you for that. Yeah.

So last question for you, Royal. If someone listening is interested in diving deeper on this topic and some of the things that you've touched on, what resources would you recommend to them in terms of a book, a podcast or something else? The first thing that comes to mind is what if we get it right by Dr. Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson?

which is a great book. We have FFRP as a documentary that's in the film festival circuit right now with Blue Chalk Media called Fire Break, which coming soon to a theater near you. Also, I think about Evicted by Matthew Desmond, which is a great book. Yeah, those are great recs, all of those. Absolutely. Well, thank you so much for your time and for this conversation, Roel. I really appreciate it.

And I appreciate you for giving me an opportunity. Thank you. This episode is brought to you by Progressive Insurance. Fiscally responsible, financial geniuses, monetary magicians. These are the things people say about drivers who switch their car insurance to Progressive and save hundreds. Visit Progressive.com to see if you can save. Progressive Casualty Insurance Company and affiliates. Potential savings will vary. Not available in all states or situations.

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