Assistant Director (Fire and Aviation Management Operations)

Assistant Director (Fire and Aviation Management Operations)

Department: Department of Agriculture

Location(s): Salt Lake City, Utah, Seattle, Washington, Phoenix, Arizona, Los Angeles, California, San Francisco, California, Denver, Colorado, Washington, District of Columbia, Miami, Florida, Atlanta, Georgia, Chicago, Illinois, Indianapolis, Indiana, New Orleans, Louisiana, Boston, Massachusetts, Minneapolis, Minnesota, Kansas City, Missouri, Albuquerque, New Mexico, New York, New York, Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, Portland, Oregon, Austin, Texas

Salary Range: $112824 - $168420 Per Year

Job Summary: This position is located within the Pacific Northwest Region, Region 6. Incumbent serves as an Assistant to the Director of Aviation and Fire Management with primary responsibility for planning, organizing and directing activities in wildland fire protection systems, including fire detection, readiness, preparation, coordination, incident organization, and management of activities within the Region. For additional information contact regional representative: Jason Heinz at Jason.heinz@usda.gov

Major Duties:

• Duties listed are at full performance grade GW-14 level.
• Perform administrative and human resources management functions for the unit such as providing advice, counsel or instruction on both administrative and work matters.
• Establish and communicate guidelines and performance requirements to employees including conducting formal performance reviews and identifying developmental and training needs of employees.
• Plan the work to be accomplished by the unit by assigning work to employees and establishing production or quality standards for the unit’s work.
• Serve as principal assistant to the director for region-wide activities in wildland fire protection systems (e.g. fire detection, readiness, preparation, coordination, incident organization).
• Direct the formulation of standards, methods, and guides for a highly complex fire operations program.

Qualifications: In order to qualify, you must meet the eligibility and qualifications requirements as defined below by the closing date of the announcement. For more information on the qualifications for this position, visit the Office of Personnel Management's General Wildland Fire Schedule Qualification Standards. Your application and resume must clearly show that you possess the experience requirements. Specialized Experience Requirement: For the GW-13: You must have one year of specialized experience equivalent to at least the GW-12 grade level. Examples of Specialized Experience: Prepared detailed plans, goals, objectives, requirements and criteria for complex or high value management processes and systems such as developing staffing standards for all aspects of wildland fire program functions. Coordinated and directed programs during critical fire situations establishing priorities for all firefighting resources. Developing, coordinating and implementing a full fire program budget. Effectively managing and utilizing available dollars taking into consideration changing priorities. For the GW-14: You must have one year of specialized experience equivalent to at least the GW-13 grade level. Examples of Specialized Experience: Prepared detailed plans, goals, objectives, requirements and criteria for complex or high value management processes and systems such as developing staffing standards for all aspects of wildland fire program functions. Coordinated and directed programs during critical fire situations establishing priorities for all firefighting resources. Developing, coordinating and implementing a full fire program budget. Effectively managing and utilizing available dollars taking into consideration changing priorities. Experience refers to paid and unpaid experience, including volunteer work done through National Service programs (e.g., Peace Corps, AmeriCorps) and other organizations (e.g., professional; philanthropic; religious; spiritual; community, student, social). Volunteer work helps build critical competencies, knowledge, and skills and can provide valuable training and experience that translates directly to paid employment. You will receive credit for all qualifying experience, including volunteer experience. FIREFIGHTER RETIREMENT COVERAGE: This is a secondary firefighter position under 5 USC 8336 (CSRS) and 8412(d) (FERS). Prior wildland firefighting experience is required. There is no age limit for entry into secondary positions. Firefighter retirement coverage of the incumbent depends upon his or her individual work history. To receive consideration for this position, you must provide updated required documents and meet all qualification requirements by the closing date of this announcement. TIME IN GRADE REQUIREMENT: If you are a current federal employee in the General Schedule (GS) pay plan and applying for a promotion opportunity, you must meet time-in-grade (TIG) requirements of 52 weeks of service at the next lower grade level in the normal line of progression for the position being filled. This requirement must be met by the closing date of this announcement.

How to Apply: Please view Tips for Applicants - a guide to the Forest Service application process. Please read the entire announcement and all instructions before you begin. You must complete this application process and submit all required documents electronically by 11:59p.m. Eastern Time (ET) on the closing date of this announcement. Applying online is highly encouraged. We are available to assist you during business hours (normally 8:00a.m. - 4:00p.m., Monday - Friday). If applying online poses a hardship, contact the Agency Contact listed below well before the closing date for an alternate method. All hardship application packages must be complete and submitted no later than noon ET on the closing date of the announcement to be entered into the system prior to its closing. Resumes must not exceed two pages. This agency provides reasonable accommodation to applicants with disabilities on a case-by-case basis; contact the Agency Contact to request this. To begin, click "Apply" and follow the instructions to complete the Assessment Questionnaire and attach your resume and all required documents. Please verify that documents you are uploading from USAJOBs transfer into the Agency's staffing system as there is a limitation to the number of documents that can be transferred. However, once in the Agency's staffing system, you will have the opportunity to upload additional documents. Uploaded documents must be less than 5MB and in one of the following document formats: GIF, JPG, JPEG, PNG, RTF, PDF, TXT or Word (DOC or DOCX). Do not upload Adobe Portfolio documents because they are not viewable. Encrypted documents will not be accepted. Failure to submit required, legible documents may result in loss of consideration. Please ensure your resume does not exceed two pages. Applicants who submit a resume that exceeds two pages will be removed from consideration. Our office cannot be responsible for incompatible software, your system failure, etc.

Application Deadline: 2026-01-22