Wildfire Rules Struggle as Spokane Burns Outside Risk Zones

Three wildfires that tore through Spokane, Washington, in early August destroyed more than 800 homes and buildings, forced the evacuation of an estimated 65,000 people, and burned roughly 10,000 acres. The Old Trails Fire, the most destructive of the blazes, crossed the Spokane River and ripped through established neighborhoods, leaving whole blocks reduced to ash. Yet a draft state wildfire map shows that the area where more than 900 buildings were destroyed or damaged sits outside the high-risk zones that would be subject to new fire-resistant building standards.

The disconnect between where fires actually burn and where states designate risk lies at the heart of a growing challenge across the American West: as wildfires become more frequent and destructive, states are struggling to pass regulations that could protect communities.

Washington’s Years-Long Regulatory Debate

Washington has been developing new wildfire safety regulations for several years, including building codes for homes constructed in risky areas and rules for managing plants and vegetation. In 2018, the state Legislature enacted rules requiring fire-resistant building standards in wildland-urban interface areas, contingent on the Department of Natural Resources completing a wildfire hazard map.

When building code officials gathered public feedback in 2023 on the state’s proposed wildfire hazard maps and regulations, the rules would have required newly constructed homes in at-risk areas to have fire-resistant roofs, siding, and other measures. Homeowners would also have been required to manage flammable vegetation to create defensible space, such as ensuring tree branches stay at least 10 feet from a house or structure.

But the proposals sparked significant pushback. Some conservation groups argued that the vegetation rules would undermine regional goals to increase urban tree canopy and provide shade during heat waves. Others said the wildfire maps were overly broad and didn’t accurately reflect real risk.

“Our greatest concern at Audubon is preserving bird habitat,” testified Eric Seibel on behalf of the Tahoma Audubon Society, now known as the Tahoma Bird Alliance. “I’m concerned that trees, which are our best defense against climate change, will be destroyed en masse if the provisions of the code pass.”

In 2024, Washington passed a bill ordering state regulators to produce new wildfire hazard maps with fewer enforced rules. New construction would still require fire-resistant roofs and siding, but no vegetation management would be required by homeowners.

“That got the fire service pretty concerned, because that’s our primary protection,” said Dave Kokot, a former fire protection engineer at the Spokane Fire Department and former president of the Washington State Association of Fire Marshals. It’s safer for firefighters to defend a burning structure when there’s less vegetation directly next to it.

The Map Controversy

The stakes of these regulatory decisions became tragically clear this month. A POLITICO analysis found that the Spokane area where more than 900 buildings were destroyed or damaged is outside high-risk zones in Washington’s draft wildfire map, meaning the devastated area would not be subject to the new fire-resistant building code.

“They’re not as useful as they could be,” Kokot said of the new wildfire maps.

Washington state officials say the new wildfire maps will be released in December and will now account for past wildfire history, which they say will more accurately show which areas are most at risk. The Department of Natural Resources has been holding public listening sessions in 16 locations around the state to gather input on the mapping project.

“It’s trying to make sure that people are smart, building in those areas,” said Angie Lane, assistant division manager with Washington’s Department of Natural Resources. “When you’re starting fresh, it’s easier to go ahead and prepare for all of that while you’re building.”

The Oregon Precedent

Washington’s struggles mirror those of its southern neighbor. Oregon faced intense backlash after releasing its wildfire hazard map in 2022, which was designed to guide new building codes and create vegetation reduction requirements for properties in high fire-risk areas.

Misinformation about the extent of vegetation restrictions spread online, and the map coincided with insurance premium increases and cancellations that residents attributed to the state’s designation. The map was also criticized for being too broad, factoring in landscape characteristics without examining on-the-ground details of private property.

“Property owners said ‘Explain this to me.’ And I couldn’t. Nobody could,” said Oregon Sen. Jeff Golden, D-Ashland, who sponsored the 2022 map legislation. “Everything you were seeing looked low risk.”

In May 2025, Oregon lawmakers unanimously repealed the wildfire mapping program. Golden, who originally sponsored the legislation, voted for its repeal, saying the map’s landscape-level approach couldn’t account for local property variations.

A Patchwork of Western Regulations

While flood risk is managed by the federal government, wildfire regulations are left to state and local governments. The result is a patchwork of rules across the West, as OPB reported when Washington began creating its own map as Oregon’s program died.

California pioneered building codes for housing in wildfire-prone areas, requiring fire-resistant construction standards for almost 20 years. Colorado’s effort to develop wildfire building codes was defeated more than a decade ago but changed after the destructive Marshall Fire in 2021; the state now has new rules on building codes and vegetation. Utah recently passed its own wildfire rules.

“It’s up to the political will of a community to adopt a building code to address wildfire,” said Ryan Maye Handy, who works on community wildfire planning at Headwaters Economics, a land use think tank. “What we’re increasingly seeing is many different interpretations of how to reduce that risk. It is literally all over the map.”

Handy noted that insurers already maintain their own sophisticated wildfire risk maps, and state maps are in some senses just catching up. “One of the best ways to get everyone on the same playing field is a wildfire building code,” she said. “We know now, more so than we knew 10 years ago, that regulating what we call the ‘built environment’ to reduce wildfire risk is extremely effective.”

The Spokane Disaster

The Spokane fires began on August 1 under extreme conditions: gusty winds, low humidity, and high temperatures. Eastern Washington was in drought after a winter with low precipitation. The Old Trails Fire, which was determined to have been intentionally set, was the most destructive of the three blazes. Aaron Farinacci, 37, was arrested and charged with first-degree arson, as NPR reported.

The fires forced the evacuation of nursing homes, a dementia care center, and the entire Veterans Affairs hospital campus. Remarkably, there were no reported deaths or injuries, which officials attribute to improved evacuation planning and coordination.

“People were able to get out within a reasonable amount of time, and we have not to this day learned of any deaths or injuries related to the evacuations or the fires,” said Sarah Nuss, Spokane’s director of emergency management, as KNKX reported.

Gov. Bob Ferguson described Spokane as a “war zone,” saying neighborhoods had been “wiped out.” The fires cost more than $30 million to suppress.

What’s Next

For Kokot, who spent his career thinking about wildfire safety and prepared his own home with fire-resistant materials and cleared vegetation, the Spokane fires underscore the urgency of regulatory action.

“This was a huge part of our city and a lot of people in the city thought: We’re never going to have a fire here, it’s never going to come to us and we don’t have to worry about this,” he said.

“We can’t be complacent about the fires,” Kokot added. “We have to predict that there’s a possibility it could happen. We have to plan for it.”

As Washington prepares to release its revised wildfire maps in December, the question remains whether the state can learn from the Spokane disaster and from Oregon’s failed experiment. The challenge is balancing the need for protective regulations with the political realities of telling homeowners what they can and cannot do with their property.

For now, the fires that devastated Spokane serve as a stark reminder that the places most at risk may not always be the ones marked on a map.