…"As the weather becomes more extreme across the nation, so does the threat of fire," said Joe Dougherty, spokesman for the Utah Division of Emergency Management. "Utahns are encouraged to know their risks, take action and be an example to others."
The warning comes as a report by the nonpartisan research group Headwaters Economics shows that 84 percent of private lands near fire-prone wildland-urban interface areas remain undeveloped in the West.The group says firefighting costs greatly increase in such developed areas because of the desire to protect houses.…
Ray Rasker, director of Headwaters Economics, said the rise in wildland firefighting costs because of urban encroachment is a problem widely recognized, but it gets little discussion.
“Where the conversation gets stuck nationally on this is that people say, `Yes, it is a problem, but what do you do about it?’” he said.…