California Professional Firefighters

Local Leadership Presses First Responder Issues in Sacramento

Some 150 CPF local affiliate leaders brought the message from the front lines directly in the halls of the State Capitol at CPF’s Daniel A. Terry Legislative Conference.

The two-day conference brought lawmakers face-to-face with firefighters from their home districts, offering an opportunity for them to directly hear about the impact their actions will have on front line first responders.

Well over half of the Legislature, Republicans and Democrats, got to hear the firefighter message directly, either from office visits from their hometown firefighters or at a special legislative reception.

“It’s really important for us to get that face-to-face contact, so that they know that the people back in the district are paying attention and care about these issues,” said Erik Baskin, president of San Luis Obispo Firefighters.

Highlights of the conference included:

  • Speeches from three of the four top legislative leaders – Assembly Speaker Karen Bass, Senate President Darrell Steinberg, and Assembly GOP Leader Mike Villines;
  • Special presentations on lobbying and the CPF Legislative Agenda;
  • A special presentation on the state’s economy, featuring top line experts on national, state and local government principles;
  • A “firehouse breakfast” with most of the state’s constitutional officers.

“As hard as our legislative team works to promote firefighter-friendly policies, nothing beats hearing about it directly from the district,” said CPF President Lou Paulson.

The conference is held every two years, usually in the spring as committee hearings begin to ramp up for the new session. Many locals joined forces to lobby specific legislators on CPF priority legislation. 

In 2004, the conference was re-named the Daniel A. Terry Legislative Conference to honor CPF President-Emeritus Dan Terry, whose three decades of leadership produced groundbreaking legislative accomplishments ranging from firefighter presumptions to binding arbitration to the California Firefighters Memorial.

CLICK HERE TO VIEW MORE PHOTOS.