…While decisions on where to develop are made at the local level by private citizens and municipal planners, the costs of fighting fires are mostly picked up by taxpayers at the state and federal level. With that safety net in place, builders and dwellers alike are more comfortable taking the gamble on property susceptible to wildfires.
“When things go wrong, the cost of that is borne by someone else,” said Ray Rasker, executive director of Headwaters Economics, a Bozeman, Mont., nonprofit research group that focuses on natural resources management. “That’s the disconnect.”
As Wildfire Risk Grows in the West, So Does Home Building
As wildfire seasons in the Western U.S. have grown longer and deadlier over the last three decades, the pace of development has accelerated in areas most at risk.