From the President's Desk.

Abstract

To join the IAWF, visit www.iawfonline.org As another year draws to a close, we again have suffered more civilian and firefighter fatalities, more lost homes and structures, and continued skyrocking costs. Why are we not making headway in dealing with this growing crisis? Homeowners, government officials and other organizations trying to resolve the issue of wildland-urban interface fire must stop, re-group and recognize that it is definitely time to take a new look and find fresh approaches to dealing with this problem. There are a multitude of fragmented WUI programs that are not well-coordinated. Many critics are simply calling this situation embarrassing, and are asking the simple question, “Why can’t we get all the players to the table to talk and work together on this issue?” Clearly, people and their property need protection from wildfire, which is the one fact upon which everyone can agree. But should this be the responsibility of the federal government through the Forest Service and the Department of Interior? Who should pay for this protection? Should homeowners living in the WUI do more to protect themselves from wildfire? They must learn to make better decisions about where and how to develop property, build homes and communities and to retrofit existing homes to be more firesafe. There is also an enormous problem in current fire-protection infrastructure, such as roads and water-delivery systems. In most cases existing systems are inadequate for property and resource protection during fast-moving wildfires. The cost of improving the existing infrastructure, however, would be staggering — some estimate hundreds of billions of dollars. During major fire operations in the interface, most structure losses occur in the first few hours of an incident. This often is due to a lack of effective vegetation-management practices. These losses will continue until appropriate access, landscaping and construction standards are implemented and enforced. Not everyone is smart enough not to build in harm’s way, which reinforces the need zoning as well as building, fire and interface codes and better public education. We will never get a true handle on firefighting danger — much less firefighting costs — if we consent to residential development sprawling throughout the wildland-urban interface. Three Time to re-think our approach