Wildfires: Should taxpayers pay for those who build mansions

[stefan]

Wildfires: Should taxpayers pay for those who build mansions in 'the stupid zone'?
By Patty Henetz
The Salt Lake Tribune


All of those dream homes that are sprouting up at the edge of national forests in Utah and elsewhere in the West are creating a nightmare for the U.S. Forest Service.

Increasingly, the federal agency is raiding its bank account to douse wildfires at the expense of some of the public's favorite outdoor programs.

A new analysis of the Forest Service budget shows the agency, already staggering under stagnant funding, might soon spend virtually all of its average annual $4.5 billion federal appropriation fighting fires that threaten homes on the rim of national forests.

Headwaters Economics, the nonprofit consulting firm in Bozeman, Mont., which issued the report, found that the nation's taxpayers are bound to spend even more as increasingly affluent Westerners continue to seek solace in wild country subdivisions.

That means the Forest Service amenities the public most cares about - clean campgrounds, sturdy trails, fish-cleaning stations and ranger talks - could go begging, said Ray Rasker, Headwaters executive director and co-author of the report.

"Fire is becoming the big gorilla that is eating all the bananas," Rasker said.

And it could get worse. About 14 percent of the land at the edges of the national forests now have homes on them. If 50 percent of the lands on the urban-forest line go to housing, annual firefighting costs could range from $2.3 billion to $4.3 billion, Rasker's report says.

"It's like the perfect storm," Rasker said. "We've got fuel buildup from the Smoky Bear years. We've got a warming climate and more drought. We've got a lot of insect infestations, so a lot of these forests are dead. And we've got a more prosperous West where people want to live out of town in the woods."

The Forest Service has reported that the cost of firefighting has exceeded $1 billion four times since 2000. Last year, the bill was $1.5 billion. Already this year, with months of fire season still to go, nearly 65,000 fires have burned almost 7 million acres and cost $1 billion.

Before a new management consciousness took hold in the early 1990s, the agency pushed timber sales - even though it wouldn't make any money - so the agency could build roads, often over-engineering them to reap the maximum budget return. Congress would approve budgets that essentially reimbursed for the road-building costs.

Now fires are the new cash cow, said Peter Morton, a resource economist for the Wilderness Society in Denver. But with a big difference: In the old days, district rangers could keep the money reimbursed for the previous year's costs and parcel out funds for local activities.

But when it comes to fire, "none of that money is available for recreation," Morton said. "It's not going for anything but fire. It might be funding people in the agency, but they're not funding any other program out of firefighting money."

On the contrary, the Forest Service dips into its recreation-program coffers to cover emergency firefighting costs, a practice the agency calls "fire borrowing."

"The old saying is, you throw money at the fire until the weather changes," Morton said.

Pleasant Grove District Ranger John Logan said the current fight-every-fire policy is a reworked version of the agency's early philosophy of saving the forests from fire. But that was before scientists pointed out that the forests need to burn to kill off invasive pests, clear combustible debris and make room for new trees.

"It does work, and we've seen it work," Logan said. "I've managed a fire for 140 days; let it do its natural thing. I got severely chastised at times. Other people said, 'That's the greatest thing that ever happened out there.' "

But the science-based "let burn" policy died in the ashes of the Yellowstone National Park fire of 1988, Logan said. Now, standing dead trees killed by beetles infect adjacent healthy trees, leaving swaths of destruction in the forest.

Logan grew up near Cedar Breaks, where he used to hike to an old beaver pond and spend all day enjoying the outdoors. "I can almost cry, seeing what happened up there with the beetles," he said. "Now, there's an oil road and houses in the middle. Man, what happened? But it's private land, and not the Forest Service's issue to tell them how to manage it."

Wasatch County Fire District Chief Ernie Giles hates to see money burn, especially when the Forest Service is sparking the flint. "It's a crying shame, the money wasted in that department," he said.

Giles was a Wasatch County commissioner on Aug. 24, 1990, when Utah's most devastating wildfire on the edge of the public forest began just west of the Heber Valley above Midway and lasted for six days, burning nearly 3,000 acres until it was officially contained.

The Wasatch Mountain Fire killed two county employees who had volunteered to work the fireline, destroyed 18 homes and cost the state approximately $1.42 million in fire suppression. Overall loses were estimated to be about $2 million.

That was when most of the homes in the pines were summer cabins with no water or power. These days, homes are 7,000 to 12,000-square-foot mansions whose owners fully expect fire bosses to consider that in their emergency calculations.

While a commissioner, Giles pushed new county ordinances requiring homeowners to clear the land 35 feet around their houses and thin another 150 feet, install sprinkler systems inside and outside the home, grade roads 20 feet wide to accommodate firetrucks and use materials and techniques to make the homes more fire-resistant.

Residents and developers complain about the added costs, but they don't get their building permits unless they comply, Giles said.

But fire-resistant homes aren't enough to fend off forest disasters.

Four years ago, the Forest Service went ahead with a controlled burn in the Cascade Springs area of Utah County to clear out combustible forest-floor clutter, despite windy conditions. The burn was supposed to be 600 acres, but by the time it blew into Wasatch County it had consumed more than 8,000 acres, threatened homes in Midway and reburned sections destroyed in 1990.

Giles still steams over how the Forest Service mishandled the 2003 calamity. "Looking back, this is my opinion, they didn't want to put it out," he said. It "makes a bigger budget for the next year."

Forest Service "nuts and bolts people" sympathize, Giles said. "But the people who call the shots - they know they've got a big old milk cow there. They're going to use her until they can't use her anymore."

Western governors are trying to get the feds to separate wildfire money from Forest Service program money. Utah Gov. Jon Huntsman Jr. and Arizona Gov. Janet Napolitano teamed up to write an opinion piece published last week in the Montana newspaper, the Missoulian, calling on national leaders to recognize that it makes more sense to "thin forests and protect communities in advance of a wildfire than it is to control wildfires and repair the damage after the fact."

But that doesn't solve what Rasker sees as the central issue: houses in the woods.

"These are houses within 500 meters of a forest that's going to burn," Rasker said. "If we're bashing anybody, we're bashing the county commissioners who allow these homes to be built in harm's way, and the homeowners who don't pay for the costs of firefighting. There's a lack of accountability."

Morton, of The Wilderness Society, questions whether it's the role of the federal taxpayer to protect people in what he calls the "fire plains" or what others call the "stupid zone."

"It's sort of like the flood plain," he said. "We no longer feel compelled to rescue people who live in the Mississippi River flood plain."

Forest defenders need to be part of the equation, too, Rasker said, noting that wildfire fighting is one of the nation's most dangerous occupations.

Morton and Rasker believe if the responsibility was laid on the counties and homeowners, and if insurance agencies looked specifically at the realities of homes in fire zones instead of spreading the risk across the entire homeowner pool, building next to the forest would become far less attractive.

That argument doesn't impress Lynn Hales.

A member of the Emigration Canyon Township Planning Commission, Hales plans to build his retirement home in Emigration Oaks, a relatively new subdivision platted amid the beauty of Salt Lake Canyon's Emigration Canyon and abutting the Wasatch-Cache National Forest.

While he doesn't live there now, Hales has been a 23-year canyon resident. He acknowledges there is no emergency evacuation plan for the canyon, which has no way out but for one twisty road that winds through it. He also said a new water system and fire hydrants would do nothing to stop a major wildfire.

"That's where the county and national [firefighting] folks come in," he said. "The land that's being built on in Emigration Canyon has been privately owned for more than 100 years. Property taxes have been paid for 100 years."

[JP]

Stupid zones What about homes being built in tornado hit areas? Homes in flood areas? Hurricane areas? Earthquake places? So any place could be considered a "Stupid Zone" if it is hit by natural disasters? One thing about the fires, the cause may not be natural. Some people may not be able to leave these areas, while others may want to live there. So, should the government tell us where to live and where not to?

[packfish]

A new analysis of the Forest Service budget shows the agency, already staggering under stagnant funding, might soon spend virtually all of its average annual $4.5 billion federal appropriation fighting fires that threaten homes on the rim of national forests.


The person who came up with the above analysis obviously is F of S.
No matter what they have to spend 1/2 the budget on idiotic lawsuits.

[LOAH]

That's a really tough one, isn't it? It seems only logical that one is taking a huge risk by building a luxurious home on a hillside. The big problem in Utah County is landslides. People insist upon building their dream homes right on top of a major fault line so they can have a nice view (or look down upon the peasants ). I figure that if they can afford to do that, they can afford insurance and no taxpayer funding should be available. The wildfires can slip into the same category.

I don't think that the question can be solved with a cookie-cutter answer though. Most of the people that live on the hill are just consumers of a good: their homes. The companies that develop these areas should probably be held liable for a percentage of the damage. These are the people that had access to the geologic facts about the area.

JP brings up a great point about "Stupid Zones", as well. Some places just don't work well for long term residency, but these places have been created, nonetheless. We can't hold the residents liable who've been born and raised there can we? Or the people that can't just move somewhere else? I think not. I think their local governments should be responsible for damages related to natural disasters except for extreme cases of emergency.

Look at New Orleans. It's right next to the Ocean, but it's mainly below sea level. Doesn't that make any light bulbs flicker? When the levies broke, much of the town was inundated and people seemed surprised?

I realize that the local government couldn't possibly cover a disaster of that magnitude. I also realize that New Orleans is a very important port and logistical hub for the rest of the nation, being established right at the delta of the Mississippi River.

I guess what I'm trying to say is that holding taxpayers responsible for damages brought on by the pure ignorance of a few is disagreeable, but in preexisting, established societies, there isn't much else we can do.

It all really comes down to the original developers for deciding to build there. Tough question.

[stefan]

damn, i wrote this whole response, got distracted, and closed the multitabbed browser window.

oh well, my point was, while i agree with you that it's not an easy answer, i think fires are commonplace enough that zoning law blocking development in the more "stupid" areas would be a reasonable direction to move. "stupid" being defined as assessed to be relatively more prone to fires than other areas based on drought, insect infestation, history, etc.

i think one thing that our short history of the united states has taught us is that we are not responsible with development and mistakes aren't uncommon. there is nothing wrong with being smarter about development. money currently drives the system. intelligence should come in there somehwere.

let's look at the santa clara river in southern utah ... hmm, obviously they didn't expect a 100 year flood. but come ON! we should be MUCH wiser about developing such areas.

[sparker1]

I've never felt the government should pay for property losses. That is the role of insurance. Flood insurance has been handled by the government for a long time and frequently pays for homes lost in well known flood zones. I live in a hurricane area and never expected government to protect against or pay for hurricane damage. That's why I buy insurance, and it's damn costly these days. Until Katrina, the feds never did much for areas damaged by storm, just provide immediate disaster relief efforts. After Katrina, everyone expects the government to restore their pre-storm condition. I think that is wrong. Fire fighting efforts should be determined by threat against human life, not risk of individual property losses.

[JP]

That is the role of insurance.

That's what I would think