Wildland Fire Management Policy and Fire Management Economic Efficiency in the

Abstract: Wildfires are a significant social problem affecting millions of people worldwide and causing major economic impacts at all levels. The severe fire events of 1910 in Idaho and Montana galvanized a fire policy excluding fire from the ecosystem by the U.S. Department of Agriculture Forest Service. This policy was consolidated with the passage of the 10 a.m. fire suppression policy in 1935, which lasted all through the late 60s. Fire management policy changes in 1978, 1995, and 2001 introduced the use of prescribed burning and cost-benefit analysis into the fire management policy, and the concept that fire plays an important ecological role in the ecosystem. However, the fire problem remained unabated in part because the large hazardous fuel loads created by the fire exclusion policies of the past and tremendous influx of population in the wildland-urban interface. The 1978 policy change required the FS to conduct a cost-benefit analysis to justify its budget requests to Congress. The resulting National Fire Management Analysis System (NFMAS) used the Cost-plus-Net-Value Change (C+NVC) model to evaluate fire management programs economic efficiency. The model is now being challenged in its utility to measure fire management programs economic efficiency. The unwritten social contract between the Forest Service and the public has created the expectation on the public’s part that it is the agency’s responsibility to protect them regardless of the circumstances and costs. This expectation is taxing the capabilities and abilities of government agencies to respond to fire situations. One potential solution to this conundrum is to ask households to pay for the fire protection services provided so they face the true costs of their decisions to build in the wildland urban interface. For a national wildland fire policy to succeed we must avoid focusing on just one dimension of the fire problem and understand the social and financial investments necessary to redress 100 years of fire exclusion policies. It is time for a change in the existing social contract and for the public to take responsibility for their decisions to live in high fire danger prone areas