Fire Safe Communities: What will it take?

By Ryan Richards 

Earlier last week, parts of Los Angeles County in Southern California, were devastated by wildfires. The level of suffering, loss, and damage caused by these fires in the affected wildland urban interface (WUI) communities is the worst in recent memory. In his book, Young Men and Fire, Norman Maclean writes that “when California suffers, it takes politicians to cure it.” Indeed, these recent fires have grabbed national attention as the costliest disaster in America’s history and might just be the spark that finally brings real change.

Southern California has always had wildfires. Data shows over the past 100 years there have been dry January’s in Southern California before (e.g., Du 2020; Jiang 2022). There have also been Santa Ana winds in January before, although less than now (e.g., Miller 2006; Morales 2016). The last year may have been warmer than before but in terms of destructive fires this warming trend has no statistically significant impact on frequency and severity in lower areas such as the Palisades, especially when compared to population and proximity to development (e.g., Keeley 2017).

So, what are the solutions to stop this from happening again? This is usually the first question anyone asks themselves when a devastating event like this occurs. Unfortunately, we know this is true because it’s already been asked before. For over 100 years in the American west, we’ve had devastating wildfires from before The Great Fire of 1910 to the recent LA fires. After each of these fires, whether it is agencies, private industry, the public, or the government, someone or something has sat down and tried to answer this question. More recently the something has commonly become boards or commissions. These boards or commissions consist of members from a wide range of groups with experience and knowledge in fire. One of the main answers they’ve provided is fuels reduction and mitigation. Throughout the multitudes of ecosystems and vegetation types in the west mitigating fuel loads around your community and home can be one of the greatest factors in reducing the potential of a devastating wildfire (e.g., Daum 2024; Ott 2023). In 2021 the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (IIJA) established The Wildland Fire Mitigation and Management Commission to “find new systems and policy solutions to address the crisis that wildfire has become.” Within the commission’s final report, they stated, “Pre-fire mitigation, or actions taken to reduce the potential adverse impacts from fire, is the way in which we break the cycle of increasing cost and increasing risk” and “that forest and rangeland management and fuel reduction treatments play a significant role in mitigating and managing the risk of wildfire.”

So, if we have at least one of the answers to our question, why has it not been fully implemented? Especially, in the large WUI communities of greater Los Angeles surrounded by chaparral brush. The answer is multifold. In some areas it has been an issue of funding, there is not enough money to pay for the fuel mitigation work. However, funding has not been a factor in the areas affected by the Palisades Fire, it was a wealthy community. In such areas, lack of implementation can be due to other factors such as people not wanting the fuels treatments for aesthetic reasons, advocacy groups getting involved for environmental reasons, and governmental leaders who may be uncommitted to implementing the tough stances that are needed. Many of these issues with implementation have led to discussions of mandates to require mitigation around homes and communities, insurance increases for homeowners that don’t comply, or new zoning laws and building codes. Yet, each of these solutions also has a counter argument such as private property rights and insurance issues. In the end success isn’t really obtained until people fathom the increasingly devastating risk of wildfire and are willing to sacrifice legacy approaches and embrace innovative practices. Perhaps these southern California fires will be the forcing function in our collective reimagining of wildfire.

One recent example of where a destructive wildfire has brought about innovative practices to address the risk of wildfire in a community is Flagstaff, Arizona. Located in a Ponderosa Pine fire-adapted ecosystem the city and region are no strangers to frequent wildfires. However, as with most of the west these forests have been degraded by unsustainable historical land uses and fire exclusion, while urban sprawl has encroached upon them. This has resulted in overgrown forests and an increased risk of unnaturally severe wildfire adjacent to the WUI.

In June 2010 the inevitable struck with the Schultz Fire burning over 15,000 acres and threatening multiple homes and structures. Proceeding post fire precipitation events brought major erosion and flooding to the area resulting in one fatality. In the aftermath of this event, it was reaffirmed to the community that the greatest risk to them was wildfire. A reinvestment was made into the already existing wildfire risk reduction programs which were based on the 5 “E’s” of Community Risk Reduction: Education, Engineering, Enforcement, Economic Incentives, and Emergency Response. However, concerns and frustration soon followed as the realization that despite their work the areas that needed the most risk reduction in the forum of fuels mitigation was being excluded. The surrounding forest and of the greatest concern the community’s watershed were all located on federally managed lands. Due to the agencies managing the land having no funding or available resources to work on these areas of concern progress had slowed or stalled.

 With the recent Schultz Fire in their collective memory the city decided to work towards creating a municipality funded bond which would help pay for the work that needed to be done on the federal lands. Within a few years the bond had been created and put before the voters. In 2012 the citizens of Flagstaff voted that reducing the risk of wildfire was of the outmost importance to the community and supported the creation of the Flagstaff Watershed protection project with a $10 million dollar bond. In doing this, citizens had decided to place wildfire risk reduction and fuels mitigation as a priority, possibly sacrificing the views, trails, and experiences they had come to know and love. Over the next few years work progressed rapidly and treatments were completed. During that time wildfires still effected the region as they always have and will in a fire-adapted ecosystem. The reality that Wind-driven fires pushed into homes at hurricane-like speeds can transition from sparks to infernos at an overwhelming pace also still occurred with the Tunnel fire in 2022. However, a meaningful difference was made by the citizen’s sacrifice. Their decision to support a new innovative approach to wildfire reduction through community funding and support kept the ensuing fires from being more destructive, strengthened our response, and allowed for a more resilient recovery. 

Fuels reduction and mitigation around homes in the WUI will be important work, but it is one solution that needs to be complemented within a range of other system-wide initiatives. The Wildland Fire Mitigation and Management Commission’s report consists of over 300 pages and includes themes such as workforce development, collaboration, technology innovation, modernization, and beneficial fire. All these approaches may run into roadblocks along the way but we must continue to bring awareness and attempt implementation so there can be a sustainable future of living with fire.

About the author 

Ryan has worked in the Fire Service for both federal and local agencies over the past 15+ years. He has led agency wildland divisions and crews as a Captain and coordinated with state and national agencies to acquire grants for wildland fire safety work and fuels reduction. He has mentored new firefighters, and developed training and education programs, including as a current part time instructor at a community college in the Flagstaff, Arizona. His true passion lies in helping others and he is very happy to now be a member of the FireUp team helping coach the next generation of fire and forestry professionals.

Citations

Daum, K. L., Hansen W.D., Gellman J., Plantinga A. J., Jone C., Trugman A.T., 2024: Do Vegetation Fuel Reduction Treatments Alter Forest Fire Severity and Carbon Stability in California Forests? Earths Future., 12(3). [Available online at https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1029/2023EF003763]

Du, X., Hendy I., Hinnov L., Brown E., Schimmelmann A., Park D., 2020: Interannual Southern California Precipitation Variability During the Common Era and the ENSO Teleconnection Geophys. Res. Lett., 47(1), e2019GL085891. [Available online at https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1029/2019GL085891]

Jiang, X., Waliser D. E., Gibson P. B., Chen G., Guan W., 2022: Why Seasonal Prediction of California Winter Precipitation Is Challenging. Amer. Meteor. Soc., 103(12), E2688-E2700. [Available online at https://journals.ametsoc.org/view/journals/bams/103/12/BAMS-D-21-0252.1.xml]

Keeley, J. E., Syphard A., 2017: Different historical fire–climate patterns in California. Int. J. Wildland Fire., 26(4), 253. [Available online at https://www.researchgate.net/publication/315875417_Different_historical_fire-climate_patterns_in_California]

Miller, N. M., Schlegel N. J., 2006: Climate change projected fire weather sensitivity: California Santa Ana wind occurrence. Geophys. Res. Lett., 33(15). [Available online at https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1029/2006GL025808]

Morales, G-M., Gershunov A., Theiss J., Li H., Cayan D., 2016: Santa Ana Winds of Southern California: Their climatology, extremes, and behavior spanning six and a half decades. Geophys. Res. Lett., 43(6), 2827-2834. [Available online at https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/2016GL067887]

Ott, E. T., Kilkenny F. F., Jain T. B., 2023: Fuels treatment effectiveness at the landscape scale: a systematic review of simulation studies comparing treatment scenarios in North America. Fire Ecology., 19(10). [Available online at https://fireecology.springeropen.com/articles/10.1186/s42408-022-00163-2]