Lauren Stachowiak and Matthew B. Anderson: Living with fire in the 21st century

Wildfire activity in the Inland Northwest has increased in recent years, but strong evidence suggests that much of the Western United States is in a fire deficit.

If high-severity fires are on the rise, but research shows that not enough area is burning each year throughout the West, then where is the disconnect? And, more important, what are some things that have led to our current wildfire situation in the Spokane region?

Climate change can be considered a threat amplifier to issues already prevalent in forests and within the wildland-urban interface, such as elevated fuel loads and increased sources of anthropogenic ignition (for example, aboveground electrical lines).

On Aug. 18, 2023, the Gray and Oregon Road fires ignited in red -flag warning conditions during a strong east wind event, and just three months into the longest continuous streak of hottest months recorded, which began in May 2023. The fires burned approximately 20,000 acres and hundreds of structures in communities in Medical Lake and Elk-Chattaroy, and two people died.

Students often ask us, “What’s next for fire and climate change?” or “What can we do to make ourselves as wildfire resilient as possible?” Geographers and city planners have been researching and communicating answers to these questions for years now.

In short, we can expect our summers to be hotter and drier here in Spokane, and we can expect our winters to also be warmer, leading to earlier peak flow through our rivers and less available moisture in the warmest months of the year. Essentially, the current conditions that we have experienced over the past few years will continue and, in many cases, worsen fuel conditions already primed for wildfire.

But what can we do about this? The answer is more complicated and often obfuscated on purpose by those with invested interests, often coupled with a lack of sufficient appreciation for Spokane’s current wildfire resiliency problem.

Ultimately, the routes forward are multipronged and must be custom designed for each community.

For Spokane, laws and ordinances that require certain wildfire-resilient building and urban design practices and limitations on development in specific high-risk areas are good places to begin. Integration of regional implementation of prescribed burning, collaboration with the Spokane Tribe and other tribal organizations for cultural fires and expansion of food sovereignty programs are also vital to improving overall wildfire resiliency and acceptance of “good” fire in our lives.

Removing barriers to tribal use of fire for cultural burning and intentional uses of fire relevant to individual tribes and Indigenous communities is necessary to bringing fire back to the landscape. Furthermore, an enrichment of microeconomic industries for wood (i.e. fuel) use and effective educational programs are concrete examples of immediate steps we can take.

At the individual level, fire-hardening homes is a vital part of improving communitywide resiliency – when one home catches fire, especially on windy days, blowing embers make it easier to catch the next house on fire.

Once wildfires begin burning through communities, home ignition is based heavily on the types of materials used in construction, design of the structure and vegetation clearance. Existing wildfire resiliency principles specify that houses should be built with as little use of wood as possible in favor of, for example, tempered glass and metal roofing. Per WUI standards, houses should also be separated by no less than 100 yards to create a buffer zone of defensible space (consisting of low-combustible vegetation) in high-risk areas. If this is not feasible, then a similar buffer zone should surround the entire development.

At the city scale, limitations on approvals for housing developments in high-risk areas and appropriate evacuation routes are crucial to mitigating risk for our communities.

Little of Spokane’s existing urban landscape meets these standards. Much can be accomplished, however, by retrofitting our existing communities along these lines, as evidenced by the town of Stevenson Ranch, California, which has been spared during wildfire events as surrounding areas burned.

Development locations along Highway 195 have been rapid in recent years and most appear designed without observing much of the above standards, nor were evacuation plans kept in mind. In short, limited access points to developments consisting of hundreds of households represent severe choke points if everyone is ordered to evacuate, a situation that could result in catastrophe during a wildfire event.

Unfortunately, none of this is unique to Spokane, but if we are to improve overall community wildfire resiliency planning moving forward, a far greater sensitivity to this issue is sorely needed.

Lauren Stachowiak is a professor of geosciences at Eastern Washington University. Matthew B. Anderson is a professor of urban and regional planning at EWU. Both live in Spokane.