It was a familiar scene: the governor of California warning about the dangers of wildfires as several blazed across the state.
Gov. Gavin Newsom last week took part in what essentially has become an annual news conference with other officials to caution about the risks now and in the future, and discuss what the state and local jurisdictions are doing to address the growing threat of wildfires.
As it has for a long time, the traditional start of the wildfire season triggered discussion of immediate and long-term strategies. Both have evolved, with the latter shifting more toward land-use and vegetation-thinning policies, fire-resistant building materials and defenses other than fire suppression.
That’s not to say putting out fires or containing them when possible isn’t a top priority.
Some local governments have moved to stop new development in high-risk fire zones, or have been forced to take that posture by lawsuits. Both have been the case in San Diego County’s urban fringe, where lawsuits and decisions by the Board of Supervisors have blocked previously approved developments for thousands of new homes.
But for existing communities that are literally on the fire line, the concept of “managed retreat” has entered into the debate. The costly policy of methodically moving people, homes and facilities away from hazardous areas has mostly been discussed — with great controversy — regarding coastal areas where erosion is exacerbated by sea-level rise.
Politics and community opposition aside, there appears to be growing acknowledgment that, while managed retreat may be a worthy approach in some high-fire zones, it may not work as a broad policy. Part of that may be the impracticality of applying managed growth to the sheer mass of fire-threatened areas.
Newsom didn’t talk about managed growth at the event last week, but focused on the potential for another difficult fire season. As of Friday, 219,247 acres had burned in California wildfires, according to the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection. That’s more than five times the average of the previous five years – 38,593 acres – through July 10. However, there have been fewer fires during that period: 3,543 this year, compared with a five-year average of 3,659.
In his fire-warning a handful of years ago, Newsom suggested the amount of territory facing increased fire risk is growing well beyond backcountry regions — which gives some experts pause about the viability of managed retreat on a large scale.
“Every Californian has skin in the game when it comes to reducing wildfire risk,” Newsom said in 2019. “This isn’t ‘just’ a rural or suburban problem. Dense urban areas pose some of the highest risks for destruction and loss of life from wildfires, and climate change is putting urban communities at even greater risk.”
The Public Policy Institute of California, a nonpartisan, nonprofit think tank, last week asked two researchers studying managed retreat to weigh in on whether it makes sense in fire-prone lands.
“We’re developing a working definition of managed retreat in the context of fire,” said Kathryn McConnell at the University of British Columbia.
“First, it could mean individual residents or entire communities preemptively relocating away from fire-prone places. Second, it could mean limiting reconstruction in places where a wildfire destroyed buildings. Third, it could mean infrastructural retreat. One form of fire-specific retreat, for example, is to change the configuration of powerlines rather than remove housing.
“…In many situations, we think that retreat is very likely not an appropriate adaptation to wildfire.”
Liz Koslov of UCLA talked about the difference in applications along the coast and inland.
“Even if the (flood-prone) land isn’t actively repurposed, there’s a sense that you’ve reduced risk by reducing exposure: you’ve enabled people to move out of a floodplain and increased open space that can absorb and buffer stormwater,” Koslov said.
“The same cannot be said for wildfire — the potential impact of creating more unmanaged open space is huge. For instance, research has found that the depopulation of rural, agricultural regions and subsequent land abandonment in Mediterranean regions of Europe during the mid-twentieth century resulted in more severe wildfires due to fuel buildup.”
McConnell noted a difference in scale. She said one recent fire-risk assessment estimated about 44 million houses are situated in the “wildland-urban interface” across the United States. That compares with an estimated 9 million to 15 million homes in high flood-risk zones.
“That’s an enormous spatial scale,” McConnell said. “Retreat is just one tool in a larger toolkit of possible adaptations.”
Koslov expressed optimism about increasing investments in fuel reductions on wildlands, citing a report by the U.S. Department of Agriculture calling for more of that in areas where people live. Newsom’s istration has ramped up removing smaller and dead vegetation and conducting prescribed burns aimed at keeping fires from igniting bigger, more fire-resistant trees.
“That could be incredibly useful in addressing burning not just on Forest Service and Bureau of Land Management land but also where fire comes into with built neighborhoods,” Koslov said.
In the end, it may not be government policy that ultimately determines what happens in fire or flood zones.
Insurance companies have cited increase risks and costs of payouts and litigation. Some companies have said they are faced with insolvency, if they haven’t already collapsed. s have skyrocketed in some regions, if coverage is even available anymore.
Some insurers have stopped writing new policies in California, Florida and other states. Some critics say they’re trying to protect profits by reducing exposure and attempting to leverage relaxed regulations.
Anne Perrault, senior finance policy counsel at Public Citizen, told The Hill when an area is uninsurable, “it becomes uninhabitable.”
That can force a retreat that could hardly be considered managed.
