Fire Friday #196: The New Mexico Prescribed Fire Council

Happy Friday Greater Santa Fe community, 

Although we aren’t seeing much smoke in the air this fall due to abnormally wet weather, and the risk of high-severity wildfire has been temporarily superseded by the risk of severe flooding, the work of laying the groundwork for prescribed fire in New Mexico never ends. Prescribed fire continues to be the most effective method for reducing hazardous fuels and improving forest and range health and resilience at a landscape-scale. 

In today’s Wildfire Wednesday, we delve into the prescribed fire environment in New Mexico through an interview with the New Mexico Prescribed Fire Council Vice-Chair Sarah DeMay.

This Fire Friday features:

Be well,

Maya

New Mexico Prescribed Fire Council members discuss forest treatments during a field meeting in fall 2026.

What are Prescribed Fire Councils and Prescribed Burn Associations?

Learn about Prescribed Fire Councils.

Learn about Prescribed Fire Councils.

Prescribed Fire Councils, which generally exist at the state or regional level, tackle barriers to the expanded use of prescribed fire on both public and private lands. They may do this through public outreach, partner education, trainings, resource sharing, policy advocacy, and/or modeling collaborative burning. 


Learn about Prescribed Burn Associations.

Prescribed Burn Associations (PBAs) are groups of landowners who pool their knowledge and resources – and may work with local partners – to help conduct prescribed burns on each other’s lands. 

Formal and informal PBAs exist across the country. They often provide their members with peer-to-peer mentorship and training to gain the skills to conduct their own burns. 

New Mexico does not have any formal PBAs, but (as described below) the New Mexico Prescribed Fire Council is working on creating the enabling conditions for PBAs where they may be useful. 

WThe New Mexico Prescribed Fire Council's Mission and Projects: An Interview with Sarah DeMay

The following interview with New Mexico Prescribed Fire Council Vice-Chair Sarah DeMay (photo at right) has been edited for brevity. Sarah wears many hats including those of an experienced wildland firefighter, a prescribed fire practitioner, a landowner in a burned area, and a dedicated advocate for healthy forests and watersheds across the state.

What is the mission and audience of the New Mexico Prescribed Fire Council?

The New Mexico Prescribed Fire Council has been around for about 15 years. The mission is to support safe and effective prescribed fire on all lands in New Mexico – mostly through outreach, education and training. 

A lot of what we do is based on the power of collaboration. The Council is an acknowledgement of the fact that if we’re going to move the needle and burn more quality acres and change the culture and social factors around prescribed fire in New Mexico, we all have to be at the table.  

The Council is coordinated by a highly collaborative group of prescribed fire practitioners and professionals with representation from the US Forest Service, the Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS), the NM Forestry Division, Soil and Water Conservation Districts, the National Forest Foundation, the University of New Mexico, the Quivira Coalition, the Forest Stewards Guild, The Nature Conservancy, and the New Mexico Forest and Watershed Restoration Institute.  

The Council is not just for practitioners of prescribed fire: It’s open to anyone who works to support prescribed fire on all lands. 

We have monthly meetings, and we have collective momentum. We really think we can do something good with this entity.

What projects or initiatives has the New Mexico Prescribed Fire Council worked on? 

The Council was one of the main drivers for the Prescribed Fire Act passed in 2021, which gives people the right to burn in New Mexico and is also intended to provide training, facilitate burn permitting, and overall make it more feasible for people to burn on private lands (which is a big piece of the puzzle!). Editor’s note: Almost one-third of forests and woodlands in New Mexico — over 7 million acres — are privately owned!

The Prescribed Fire Act passed in the legislative session just before the Hermit’s Peak/Calf Canyon Fire, which of course was a big challenge because that fire started from escaped burns. The legislative session after the fire, we went back and reaffirmed support for the Act. That’s been a big deal. 

Learn more about Certified Prescribed Burn Manager Programs across the U.S. (including New Mexico) from this 2026 report.

We’re still trying to support the State in the rollout of the Prescribed Fire Act, specifically to work towards getting people certified as Prescribed Burn Managers. The Certified Burn Manager Program is really still in development, but the main reason I still work on it is because I truly believe that this program has the potential to create real, positive change for New Mexicans who are willing to take a proactive role in the protection and health of both their own lands and the landscape as a whole.   

Initially, the flagship benefit of the Certified Burn Manager Program was to reduce liability for landowners in the event of an escape if they’re certified. But the way that I’ve found it most useful is helping people actually work with local fire chiefs to get a burn permit and build that trust locally.  

Watch this 2023 webinar for more information about the Certified Burn Manager Program, steps to become certified, and benefits of the program.

The Certified Burn Manager Program can also help make burning more affordable for landowners because you can manage your own burn without having to pay someone to do it. So, we [at New Mexico Prescribed Fire Council] are also working to help facilitate burn manager trainings by finding opportunities on private lands to bring people in to learn how to burn and go through the training with the state. 

Anything else the Council hopes to work on in the next few years? 

The Council has always had great ideas and good intentions, but we’ve had limited time to get ideas across the finish line because it’s all been people just trying to find extra time to engage. But, our past chair Gwen Kolb and current vice-chair Eytan Krasilovsky secured us a Forest Service grant that is helping us actually move the needle on some projects.  

One of the Council’s main tasks under the grant is to help federal partners like the Forest Service with outreach for adjacent landowners and in-holders about potential prescribed fire projects, especially if we can develop Wyden authority agreements for cross-boundary prescribed fire. (A Wyden authority agreement is an agreement between the Forest Service and a private landowner that allows the Forest Service to actually manage a burn across the boundary onto private land.) 

When we talk to Forest Management Officers, the number one thing they say they need help with is outreach with communities and adjacent landowners. Forests need to be able to burn adjacent to private lands and across boundaries because that's the most important thing we can do to protect communities.  

When the Forest Service has to stop burns at fencelines, that requires a whole lot of extra work and is less effective, whereas when the Forest Service can use existing landscape features and not have to do all this invasive extra work, that’s better for everyone. Then the landowner also gets a really beneficial fuel treatment on their land, and when the fire moves through there, the fire will have a lower severity on both the Forest Service and the private land. 

Another priority for the Council right now is to support development of Prescribed Burn Associations (PBAs) through education, training, outreach, and microgrants. PBAs can help landowners and communities burn more safely and affordably, especially within the Wildland Urban Interface. 

It always comes back to making connections. This is very collaborative work! 

Questions for Sarah? Reach out to coordinator(at)nmrxfirecouncil.org.

Additional Resources and Upcoming Events

RELEASE: Wildfire Resiliency Training Center Fall 2026-2027 Schedule

If you are looking to launch or advance your wildland firefighting career, the Wildfire Resiliency Training Center (WRTC) at Luna Community College has finalized their class schedule for Fall 2026 - Winter 2027. Classes include S-130, S-112, S-211 and more. To register, call (505) 454-5323 or email wrtc@luna.edu.

Learn more and Enroll Here

Projected real median annual expenditures, USDA Forest Service + the Department of the Interior, projected historical (2013–2019), projected Mid-Century (2041–2059), and projected Late Century (2081–2099), and 80% upper and lower bounds, in billions of constant FY 2022 dollars, and percentage increases by Mid-Century and Late-Century relative to the historical median annual expenditures. The Historical average shown are model-based predictions.

Suppression spending by the two main US land management agencies, the US Department of Agriculture's Forest Service and the Department of the Interior (DOI), has been rising in inflation-adjusted terms over the past three decades. Much of this rise can be traced to increasingly fire-prone weather and climate conditions becoming more common and widespread over time. Researchers sought to understand how changes in the rates of such conditions, as projected by multiple global climate models, would translate into wildfire suppression spending implications for both agencies. New research develops statistical models that link driving factors of wildfire and spending and then apply projections of future changes in those factors to anticipate changes in wildfire on federal lands and associated suppression spending. Researchers found that projected wildfire and spending trends to 2100 vary widely across scenarios but are universally upward. When summarized across all ten climate scenarios, suppression spending rises by a median rate of about 0.87% per year for the USFS and 0.65% per year for the DOI. By the end of the century, the cost of suppressing wildfires is likely to increase significantly. Read more: Wildfire, Suppression, and Federal Spending, 2020–2100 - Prestemon - 2026 - Earth's Future - Wiley Online Library

PANEL: New Mexico Wildfire - Solutions and Answers

Join the Los Alamos City Fire Department and Jacobs Family Insurance for a wildfire expert panel discussion with speakers from the Insurance Institute of Business and Home Safety (IBHS), New Mexico Home Builders Association, and NM State Forestry Division. Panelists presentations will focus on solutions and answers to New Mexico’s wildfire situation including IBHS’s Wildfire Prepared Home certification program, proactive legal and building permitting in county and city departments, and State Forestry prevention and mitigation efforts on private land.

RSVP to attend or stream on YouTube and Facebook.

 

EVENT: Wild Rivers Fire Ecology Day
Saturday, November 7 · 10 AM–5 PM

Join the Paseo Project in Questa, NM on November 7th for a free day of art, science, stories and community exploring fire, change and renewal in Northern New Mexico. Enjoy exhibitions, hands-on family activities, mariachi, conversations with researchers, a community lunch and local fire stories—all part of Disturbance (a new interdisciplinary project by The Paseo Project, Del Fuego, and the Forest Stewards Guild.)

Dress warmly and bring a chair! Location may change due to weather; visit paseoproject.org/disturbance2026 for updates.

EVENT: Screening of the film burn, scar
6 PM Thursday, November 19 at Sky Midtown Cinemas, Santa Fe

Join Films with Backbone, the Forest Stewards Guild, and the Greater Santa Fe Fireshed Coalition 11/19 at Sky Midtown Cinemas to watch the award winning film Burn, Scar about the Hermit's Peak - Calf Canyon Fire. Conversation to follow.

Buy tickets here.

Highlights from a Field Tour of Wildfire Mitigation Treatments at the Glorieta Adventure Camps

Happy Friday, greater Santa Fe community!

On September 15, 2026, 27 participants came together for a field tour of forest management and wildfire mitigation projects at Glorieta Adventure Camps and Hagan Creek in northern New Mexico. Glorieta Adventure Camps encompasses approximately 2,400 acres of forested land and developed areas near the Santa Fe National Forest, where private property and public lands meet. This landscape highlights the importance of coordinating forest management across ownership boundaries, as wildfire risk extends beyond individual properties and can affect neighboring communities, infrastructure, and watersheds.

The day was an opportunity to get out in the field, learn from local practitioners, and share ideas about how we can work together to build healthier forests and more fire-resilient communities. Participants explored a variety of fuels treatments, discussed the challenges of implementing prescribed fire, and learned about ongoing research into soil health and forest conditions. A common theme throughout the tour was the importance of collaboration across property boundaries and finding practical ways to balance community protection with long-term forest health.

Building Wildfire Resilience at Glorieta Camps: Lessons from the Field

Glorieta Adventure Camps Background

Glorieta Adventure Camps is a privately managed property encompassing approximately 2,400 acres of forested land, campsites, and developed areas in northern New Mexico. The camp and conference venue hosts summer camps, church and school groups, retreats, and other gatherings, with approximately 100 full-time residents living on the property.

Located along the Santa Fe National Forest, Glorieta’s landscape highlights the importance of coordinating forest management across public and private ownership boundaries. Wildfire does not stop at property lines, and the condition of surrounding forests can influence risks to nearby communities, infrastructure, and watersheds.

Glorieta Camps tour stops at a fuel break and a Cross-boundary fuels reduction project1

Glorieta has invested in forest management through thinning, mastication, and pile burning, supported by partnerships and grant funding. These efforts provide an opportunity to explore how site-specific treatments, collaboration, and long-term planning can contribute to wildfire resilience across the broader landscape.

The field tour visited two locations to examine these approaches: a fuel break at Glorieta Adventure Camps and a mechanical mastication treatment at Hagan Creek on adjacent U.S. Forest Service land.

Field Tour Stop #1: Fuel Break at Glorieta Adventure Camps

Balancing Community Protection and Forest Health

At the first stop, participants learned about Glorieta’s ongoing forest management efforts and the role of fuel breaks in protecting developed areas. Since 2016, approximately 1,300 acres of forest management work has been implemented on the property, including thinning, mastication, and pile burning.

Participants at Stop #1 of the field tour discussing the importance of fuel breaks and how the Camps had effectively completed its implementation

Phil Howes, Forestry and Landscape Manager at Glorieta Adventure Camps and a former New Mexico Department of Game and Fish officer, discussed the property’s management approach and the importance of reducing hazardous fuels around developed areas.

One example is the fuel break along the northwestern side of the property. The fuel break was constructed to help slow a potential fire on Forest Service land as it approaches the interstate and the approximately 400 developed acres of the campus.

Fuel breaks are not designed to stop every wildfire on their own. Research summarized by the Joint Fire Science Program emphasizes that their benefits often include reducing fuel continuity, improving firefighter access, and creating opportunities for suppression efforts. Their effectiveness depends on conditions such as weather, surrounding vegetation, maintenance, and how firefighters use the area during an incident.

At Glorieta, the fuel break is one component of a broader approach to wildfire resilience. Its role complements forest thinning, mastication, prescribed fire, and vegetation management around buildings and other developed areas.

Excerpt from the Joint Fire Science Program’s Fuel Breaks and Fuel Break Systems fact sheet, explaining how strategically placed and maintained fuel breaks can reduce fuel continuity, improve firefighter access, and support wildfire suppression efforts. Fuel breaks are most effective as part of a broader forest management and wildfire response strategy, rather than as stand-alone barriers to fire.

The Opportunities and Challenges of Prescribed Fire

Rian Ream, Fire Management Officer with the Santa Fe National Forest, discussed some of the opportunities and challenges of using prescribed fire in steep terrain surrounded by homes and forested watersheds. Prescribed fire can reduce understory vegetation and ladder fuels, but implementation requires extensive planning, suitable weather conditions, coordination among agencies, and careful consideration of potential risks.

Glorieta has a history of working with prescribed fire partners to reduce hazardous fuels and improve forest conditions. In January 2021, the All Hands All Lands Burn Network supported pile burning across 30 acres at the Camps. The network returned in January 2022 to lead a 70-acre pile burn and provide training and education for Glorieta staff. Collaborative pile-burning efforts continued into early 2023.

These projects demonstrate how sustained partnerships can help private landowners implement treatments while building local capacity and experience with prescribed fire.

In 2024, Glorieta partnered with the Santa Fe National Forest, New Mexico Forestry Division, and the Forest Stewards Guild to plan a 130-acre prescribed broadcast burn. The burn was not implemented because weather conditions were unfavorable.

Although a planned burn may be postponed, that decision is an important part of responsible fire management. Prescribed fire depends on suitable weather, fuel moisture, operational readiness, and other conditions that allow managers to meet treatment objectives while managing risk. The ability to wait for the right conditions is essential to using fire safely and effectively.

The most recent pile burn at Glorieta took place in February 2026, continuing the property’s work to manage accumulated fuels. Together, these examples illustrate that prescribed fire is not a one-time project, but an ongoing process that depends on planning, partnerships, and the right conditions.

Different Treatments for Different Locations

The group also discussed mastication as another tool for managing vegetation. Mastication uses machinery to break down standing vegetation into smaller pieces that remain on the forest floor. It can be useful in locations where mechanical treatment is practical but removing slash or safely burning it may be difficult because of terrain, access, or nearby infrastructure. It may also be considered where maintaining the appearance and function of recreational areas is a priority.

However, mastication involves trade-offs. Unlike pile burning, which consumes much of the treated woody material, mastication leaves that material on site. A continuous layer of masticated material can affect surface fuel conditions and potentially influence fire behavior in the short term. It can also temporarily limit understory plant growth as the material decomposes. These effects depend on the amount and distribution of material, site conditions, and how the area is managed over time.

Choosing the right treatment means weighing these benefits and limitations against the goals for each location. Thinning can reduce stand density and improve forest structure, mastication can break down vegetation where mechanical treatment is appropriate, and pile burning or prescribed fire can consume woody material and other fuels.

In practice, these methods can complement one another as part of a broader forest management plan. The goal is to select treatments that address immediate fuel management needs while supporting long-term forest health and wildfire resilience.

Field Tour Stop #2: Hagan Creek

Participants gather in a ponderosa pine treatment area where forest thinning has reduced tree density and masticated woody material remains on the forest floor. Mastication can help manage vegetation where other slash disposal methods are impractical, but the resulting surface fuels require consideration of short-term fire behavior, soil conditions, and longer-term forest recovery.

Working Across Boundaries

At Hagan Creek, participants explored forest management on U.S. Forest Service land just north of the Glorieta Adventure Camps boundary. The stop highlighted how treatments on neighboring properties can complement one another as part of a broader landscape approach to wildfire resilience.

Decades of fire suppression have contributed to overstocked forest conditions in many areas of the Southwest. When trees grow at higher densities, competition for water and other resources can increase, while accumulated vegetation and woody material can contribute to hazardous fuel conditions.

Thinning helps address these challenges by reducing stand density and fuel loads while creating a healthier mosaic of trees across the landscape. Rather than removing trees uniformly, managers develop prescriptions that retain groups of ponderosa pine and consider factors such as tree spacing, disease, mistletoe, pine beetle infestation, and the desired arrangement of retained tree groups. This approach allows managers to reduce density while maintaining forest structure and diversity. The objective is not simply to remove trees, but to shape conditions that support a healthier and more resilient forest over time.

Example of heavy equipment with masticator attachment

The U.S. Forest Service completed a 145-acre mechanical mastication treatment at Hagan Creek in April 2026. The project used specialized equipment to crush and rearrange vegetation and woody fuels. Alongside thinning and other forest management practices, mastication can help modify fuel conditions where mechanical treatment is appropriate.

Forest management at Hagan Creek also supports watershed goals. Improving forest structure and reducing excessive competition for water can contribute to healthier forest conditions, while treatment outcomes depend on site characteristics and how the work is designed and maintained.

The Hagan Creek stop illustrated why forest restoration requires a combination of treatments tailored to conditions on the ground. Coordinating management across public and private lands can help address forest conditions at a broader scale, recognizing that the benefits and challenges of wildfire management extend beyond individual property boundaries.

Looking Beyond Acres Treated: Soil Health and Research

In addition to examining forest treatments, participants learned about research designed to monitor how management affects soil health over time. Researchers are using observational plots and soil cores to measure indicators such as soil carbon, nitrogen, and moisture across areas with different treatments and areas without treatment. The research also includes sites where pile burning has occurred.

These measurements establish a baseline for evaluating how soil conditions change following forest management and over time as environmental conditions change. Tracking soil health alongside vegetation and fuel conditions can help managers better understand the broader effects of treatments and inform future decisions.

Monitoring is an important complement to on-the-ground work. Acres treated provide one measure of progress, but they do not tell the entire story. Understanding how treatments affect forest structure, soils, and other ecosystem characteristics helps build a more complete picture of whether management is meeting its long-term goals.

Key Takeaways

Collaboration Makes Landscape-Scale Work Possible

Wildfire risk crosses ownership boundaries, making partnerships between private landowners, federal agencies, state forestry programs, and local organizations important to effective forest management. Glorieta’s partnerships and investments demonstrate how private landowners can advance work on their properties, while complementary treatments on neighboring public lands can contribute to broader landscape goals.

Treatments Must Match Conditions on the Ground

Thinning, mastication, pile burning, and prescribed fire each have different benefits and limitations. The appropriate approach depends on forest conditions, terrain, access, nearby infrastructure, treatment objectives, and the ability to implement the work safely. Combining methods can help managers address immediate fuel concerns while supporting long-term forest health.

Protecting Developed Areas Is Part of a Broader Strategy

Fuel breaks and forest treatments can help reduce wildfire risk around infrastructure, but they work best as components of a broader strategy rather than stand-alone solutions. Participants also discussed the importance of managing vegetation around staff buildings and campsites and maintaining defensible space around developed areas.

Monitoring Helps Measure Long-Term Outcomes

Research at Hagan Creek highlights the importance of looking beyond the number of acres treated. Monitoring soil conditions, vegetation, and other ecological indicators can help managers understand treatment effects, evaluate progress, and adapt future management as conditions change.

Community Engagement and Capacity Matter

Prescribed fire and other forest management practices require planning, coordination, and public understanding. Training opportunities and partnerships, such as those supported by the All Hands All Lands Burn Network, can help build the knowledge and capacity needed to carry out treatments over time.

Bringing It All Together

Pile burning at the Glorieta Adventure Camps

The Glorieta Adventure Camps field tour offered a practical look at how forest management, community protection, and ecological research can work together to build wildfire resilience. The property’s ongoing investments in forest management, professional planning, and partnerships provide an example of how private landowners can take an active role in reducing hazardous fuels and improving forest conditions.

The tour also demonstrated that no single treatment can address every wildfire challenge. Fuel breaks can create opportunities for suppression, thinning and mastication can modify vegetation and fuel conditions, and prescribed fire can help reduce accumulated fuels when conditions allow. Monitoring adds another layer by helping managers understand how these treatments affect the forest over time.

Hagan Creek reinforced the importance of looking beyond property boundaries. Forest management on public and private lands can complement neighboring efforts, contributing to a more coordinated approach to wildfire risk, forest health, and watershed resilience.

These lessons are especially relevant to the Santa Fe Fireshed, where wildfire preparedness depends on coordinated action across a landscape of communities, public lands, and private properties. Continued collaboration, site-specific management, community engagement, and long-term monitoring can help build the capacity needed to reduce wildfire risk while supporting healthier forests.

The work at Glorieta and Hagan Creek illustrates that wildfire resilience is not achieved through a single project or treatment. It is built over time through sustained investment, partnerships, and management decisions that account for both the needs of people and the health of the surrounding landscape.

Fire Fridays #195: Equity as the Baseline for Community Mitigation

Fire Friday #195: Equity as the Baseline for Community Mitigation

Hello Greater Santa Fe Fireshed,

Like many places in the Western US, the majority of the state of New Mexico faces high wildfire risk and a widening socioeconomic disparity among its residents. The need to address fire hazards has never been greater, but mitigation activities are time-intensive and expensive. Traditional mitigation programs often rely on who has the money, time, or resources to apply for grants and cost-share programs or prepare their properties; this approach, however, can cause low-income, underserved, or vulnerable communities - who often live in higher-risk areas - to fall through the cracks. Equitable Mitigation Programs (EMPs) fix this gap by actively providing financial aid, technical help, and language access to people who need it most. As the folks from Fire Adapted Methow Valley put it, “to truly be a fire adapted community, we can’t leave behind the folks without access to resources or the ability to do mitigation work.”

This Fire Friday features:

Enjoy the autumn,
Rachel

Equitable Mitigation Programs

What is equity in disaster planning?

Although the overall trend in wealth has been upward in the U.S., over the past four decades income inequality has been increasing as well. Natural disasters exacerbate this gap. The financially poor are more vulnerable to natural catastrophes because of geographic location (e.g. the industrial zone effect) and poorer quality of housing. Being less able to afford investments in mitigation or insurance has a direct correlation with increased recovery costs following a natural disaster (Efficient and Equitable Design of Wildfire Mitigation Programs, 2007).

Creating intentional equity in disaster preparedness can help close the gap - but what exactly is equity? The answer to that question is both elusive and central when working toward fire adaptation. Finding a definition starts by asking another question: “What does each person need to prepare for and recover from a disaster in this community?” and, essentially, how can we ensure that they have the resources to meet that need?

It might seem that wildfire is a great equalizer since all community members in proximity to a wildfire are affected; however, neither wildfire impacts nor the ability to prepare one’s home, oneself and loved ones are experienced equally by all. A suite of factors influences wildfire outcomes, including, but not limited to, access to emergency alerts, and having an emergency plan, a way to carry out that plan and a place to evacuate to. In addition, outcomes depend on the ability to retrofit one’s home, reduce surrounding fuels and opportunities for ember ignition and fire spread, and provide safe ingress and egress (Developing an Equitable Wildfire Risk Mitigation Program, 2023). Equity carries the implication of unequal advantage held by some groups through recognition of knowledge and experience (recognitional equity), involvement in governance procedures (procedural equity), and the distribution of burdens and benefits across a population (distributional equity;). The conditions that lead to unequal advantage shape experiences and conceptions of resilience across a community (Equity in resilience: a case study, 2025). The practice of equity requires the recognition that we are not starting from the same place given historic and present systems of oppression (Equity in Action, FACNet, 2018).

Financial and geographic inequity get the most attention, but we also need to think about age and physical limitations and how that might impact ability to mitigate disaster risks. More than 11% of the U.S. population live in areas with moderate-to-high wildfire risk. Over the past 15 years, the vast majority (87%) of population growth in higher wildfire risk locations has been among people over the age of 60, many of whom had been living in higher risk places for years and are growing older (i.e., aging in place). This percentage is expected to increase over the next 20 years as the population as a whole continues to age, and it is particularly pronounced in the West. Older people face a greater relative risk of dying in a fire than younger people, and older people need different kinds of resources and programs tailored to their unique needs to mitigate the risk from wildfire (Aging and Wildfire Risk to Communities, 2025).

We know that there is a lack of equity in fire adaptation - resources are most available to those who have the luxury of time to pursue them, so financial and professional assistance tends to go to communities and individuals who do not have the greatest need. Even though no one is immune to the effects of climate change, the historically marginalized, financially poor, ability limited, and geographically isolated are, increasingly, feeling the brunt of its catastrophic effects. People impacted by adversity know better than anyone else what they need, and it is up to them to define the terms of their preparedness and recovery.

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What are EMPs?

Those who have the ability or means to reduce wildfire risks and do so will likely have far better outcomes than their neighbors who cannot. If the intention of equitable fire adaptation is to improve wildfire outcomes for everyone who lives in the community, then mitigation and other resiliency work needs to incorporate measures that bring equity to the outcomes of that work. In short, this means all residents, regardless of their circumstances, who they are, and their histories, must have access to the means to ensure that they, their homes and any surrounding land are prepared for wildfire. This is where Equitable Mitigation Programs, or EMPs, come in.

EMPs seek to provide a roadmap for filling the gaps left by traditional mitigation programs. For example, many state and federal financial assistance cost-share fire mitigation programs are unlikely to serve those who have the most to lose from wildfire, such as people who rent, and those who cannot meet the 25%-50% match required, or those who have mitigation treatment needs not covered by the cost-share programs (e.g. cost-shares only paying for defensible space thinning, not removal of human-generated fuels in the home ignition zone or home hardening). EMPs also recognize that everyone is in this together – each person’s situation and actions impact others because fire knows no boundaries and overall community preparedness can dictate whether or not your home survives, even if you as an individual have taken mitigation actions on your property. With proper individual, collaborative and community-wide preparation, community members, their homes and infrastructure in their built environment can withstand wildland fire without relying strictly upon fire suppression.

Finally, EMPs work under the assumption that everyone – regardless of their means or ability – must have access to the information, resources and assistance they need to prepare for and be safe during a fire, and to have a clear way forward to recover from wildfire (Developing an Equitable Wildfire Risk Mitigation Program, 2023).

While lower income rural households have fewer resources to mitigate wildfire risks, at least one institutional trend holds promise for improving equity in wildfire protection. Coordinated multi-partner networks - which include traditional actors such as government entities and nonprofits, as well as newer actors like individual neighborhoods and households - can help homeowners mitigate the worst risks through information and educational resources, technical assistance, and in some cases, limited funding, to help with wildfire safety (Considering equity in wildfire protection, 2021).

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How to develop EMPs in your community

The Equitable Mitigation Program Cycle Timeline, a Gantt chart illustrating major steps of each program cycle and the overlap between consecutive cycles over a 27-month time period.

First, understand that equity does not happen overnight. Actions can be taken now to improve equity, but building and implementing a fully-fledged EMP takes dedication and a lot of time. An EMP’s framework must be based on the unique characteristics of the targeted landscape and the community living there, including their specific needs, strengths and challenges. An assessment can help identify:

  • The likely EMP clients (those who need the help) and their likely contribution levels. Social or community service organizations, including certain affinity groups and faith communities, can help identify clients.

  • The likely EMP workforce members (those who can provide the help).

  • What type of technical assistance will be most impactful.

  • What type of financial assistance will be most helpful.

  • The specific barriers for historically marginalized, underserved and overburdened community members that must be mitigated to clear the way for fire preparedness activities.

 

Community Wildfire Mitigation Guiding Principles are the foundation for effective work with communities. From: Community Wildfire Mitigation Best Practices Toolbox

High-level overview of EMPs

  • Target funding to high-need areas. Direct government grants, tax relief, and low-interest loans to historically under-resourced or high-risk neighborhoods rather than on a first-come, first-served basis where wealthy residents dominate.

  • Provide free labor-based support. Avoid expecting low-income or elderly homeowners to pay out-of-pocket or perform heavy physical labor (like clearing 0-5 feet of defensible space or cleaning gutters); instead, provide free local crews and volunteer programs.

  • Include renters and manufactured home residents. Expand wildfire hardening programs, retrofits, and smoke-relief plans to cover renters, mobile home parks, and other often overlook housing types who often face high eviction or displacement risks and lack landlord-funded upgrades.

  • Engage communities early. Involve local residents in designing Community Wildfire Protection Plans (CWPPs) so that local knowledge, language needs, and cultural values guide where and how work is done.

  • Update codes without punishing residents. When modernizing building codes or defensible space ordinances, pair them with financial assistance so low-income families are not priced out, fined, or displaced by compliance costs

To develop an EMP Plan in your community, you can follow all of some of these steps (depending on your needs):

  • Establish a baseline. Research, gather, and analyze data on equity-focused mitigation organizations, community stakeholders, and existing local plans, studies and reports.

    • Identify the common themes that emerge evaluate and begin to conceptualize the desired outcomes and objectives for the EMP and the community and possible program parameters (scope and methodology), e.g., who will you serve, what mitigation treatments will be performed, and who will perform the mitigation treatments.

  • Based on what you learn, determine what you will do by preparing a strategic plan which includes:

    • The program framework

    • The roles and responsibilities of EMP leadership, staff, contractors and collaborating partners

    • A budget for program start-up and management

    • A multi-year funding plan

  • Determine how you will carry out the program by finalizing program component procedures, criteria, protocols, timelines and systems.

Once the plan has been developed, you can begin implementation:

  • Partner/network outreach and onboarding (who can help and in what ways?)

  • Creation of a treatment menu (what specific assistance can the EMP offer?)

  • Client identification, outreach, and onboarding

  • Mitigation treatment planning and scheduling (including prioritization by risk and access)

  • Mitigation treatment implementation

  • Post treatment follow-ups

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Resources for EMP development

Learn more and access resources for development in the EMP Toolkit Report, Toolkit Procedures, and Toolkit Timeline from FAC Net and Fire Adapted Methow Valley.

Access tools and resources to guide community-based mitigation in the Community Wildfire Mitigation Best Practices Toolbox from Coalitions and Collaboratives.

Additional Resources

Local news

Some Taos forest users welcome increased thinning for reducing fire risk (9/22/26)

From the Santa Fe New Mexican: “In recent months, the look of the forest along and around N.M. 518 near Taos has changed as tens of thousands of trees have been thinned and harvested from the area. The Carson National Forest’s McGaffey Forest and Rio Grande del Rancho Watershed Restoration project was proposed in 2018 and underwent review under the now-gutted federal National Environmental Policy Act in 2023. A Tussock moth outbreak had already changed the look of the landscape, with defoliated, reddish-brown trees sticking out against the green forest. The insect damage along N.M. 518 is a symptom of what foresters say is the central challenge facing Northern New Mexico’s forests: overgrowth due to a century of fire suppression in fire-adapted landscapes.

Forestry professionals’ response to the simultaneous, large-scale, landscape-altering projects was to celebrate what they consider the culmination of years of work and planning. Conversely, many nearby residents are shocked by the thinning and timber harvesting… On Sept. 11, the Taos Valley Watershed Coalition hosted a field trip to the McGaffey Ridge project site, an opportunity for forest officials and other stakeholders to observe and analyze the project work. Most Taos Valley Watershed Coalition field trippers assessed the project largely in terms of reducing the threat of catastrophic wildfire.

Some Taos County forestry professionals said even if they don’t agree with the values of the federal government, directives aimed at increasing resource extraction help them achieve their goal of thinning the forest to reduce fuel loads and wildfire risk.”

“As the coordinator for the Taos Valley Watershed Coalition for seven years, I’m thrilled about the pace and scale of work being accomplished around the Taos. And I’m just as thrilled about the continued dialogue happening on the ground about how best to implement this work to maximize the benefit to our community and our ecosystems.

— J.R. Logan, Taos County

Read the Full article

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Upcoming Legislation

Reforestation is an issue of growing importance across New Mexico as we deal with the impacts of wildfire, drought, beetle kill, and a simultaneous decline in natural forest regeneration. In light of this, this week’s newsletter contains information about a legislative action that could greatly impact reforestation in the state: GO Bond 3.

The 2026 General Obligation (GO) Bond 3 includes $17.65 million to construct, furnish, and equip the New Mexico Reforestation Center (NMRC) nursery facilities in Mora County. Currently, the NMRC does not have adequate seedling capacity to replant the state’s burn scars, and funding for the Center is a critical next step in addressing this gap. GO Bond 3 includes funding for the third of five planned greenhouses (the first two are already under construction using state and federal funding) at the NMRC. Passing this initiative will not increase tax rates. 

 NM Reforestation Center Background
Reforestation is essential for stewarding healthy forests and mitigating against catastrophic post-fire flooding. The New Mexico Reforestation Center grows native, drought tolerant tree seedlings to replant our state’s forests post-wildfire. The Center was formalized in 2022 through a partnership between the Forestry Division at Energy, Minerals, and Natural Resources Department, New Mexico State University, New Mexico Highlands University, and the University of New Mexico. The agency and universities work together to grow seedlings, plant trees, do public outreach, and conduct research and climate modeling to maximize seedling survival rates and thus increase the pace and scale of reforestation. The state currently produces between 250,000-300,000 seedlings annually at NMRC facilities. However, it has been estimated that on existing burn scars in New Mexico, there is a need for approximately 385 million trees!

Current legislative action
In 2026, the New Mexico State Legislature is including $17.65 million in House Bill 248, the 2026 Capital Projects General Obligation Bond Act, for planning, designing, and construction to build out reforestation capacity in Mora County to better meet statewide demand for seedlings. GO Bond 3 will be on the ballot for approval by voters this November; if it passes, resources will be available in the summer of 2027 to fund a third NMRC greenhouse which will expand seedling capacity to 2.5 million per year.  

Learn more about GO Bond 3 in this opinion piece from State Forester Laura McCarthy.

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Webinars

27 October 2026 at 12pm MDT: 4D-FUELS: Semi-Automated Forest Structure and Fuel Mapping to Support Treatment Planning and Monitoring in the Southwest

Dry forests in the western US are exposed to heightened risks of large, contiguous high-severity fire patches and limited forest regeneration. Forest managers use fuel reduction activities to address these challenges, however there is room for growth. Planning fuels reduction activities and monitoring their effectiveness could be made more efficient with accurate, up-to-date maps of forest structure that measure changes in forest structure caused by disturbances and treatments.

Join the Southwest Fire Science Consortium for a webinar on the 4D-FUELS system, a semi-automated system in Google Earth Engine that maps forest structure and fuels on an annual basis at a 10 meter by 10 meter resolution. This webinar will offer actionable information and a tool tutorial for individual working in Forest Management.

Register Now

Fire Friday #194: Factors That Influence Prescribed Fire Decision Making

Happy Friday Greater Santa Fe,

During this time of year, the informational posts on fire awareness websites such as NM Fire Info start shifting from updates and warnings about active wildfires to announcements about planned and upcoming prescribed fires. When these notices about a prescribed burn planned near your community pop up, you may wonder: how do natural resource managers decide it is a good time to light these intentional fires?

Preparing for and carrying out a prescribed burn involves much more than a simple determination of whether the “weather is good.” Every day leading up to, during, and after ignition, the burn boss and planning team evaluate a range of factors to determine if conditions are appropriate to start a burn, continue ignitions, or discontinue an in-progress burn. This week’s newsletter takes a close look at some of the factors that influence those decisions. The following is a detailed dive into the decision-making that goes into intentional fire; it generally focuses on prescribed burns implemented by federal and state-affiliated agencies (rather than other types of intentional fire, such as cultural burning). For a shorter overview of this topic, click here to access a write-up from Friends of Balcones Canyonlands.

This Fire Friday features:

Hope you are well,
Megan

Factors that Influence Decision Making During Prescribed Fires

Role of the prescribed fire burn boss

The prescribed fire burn boss is a qualified individual responsible for directing and supervising prescribed fire operations. This individual acts to ensure that specifications outlined in the prescribed burn plan are followed before, during, and after the burn (a “burn plan” is a detailed document outlining the purpose of the burn, site information, a description of the area (like fuel types and topography), pre-burn factors (like ideal weather and required crew size), contingency plans (what to do if something goes wrong), what criteria would lead to the cancelation of a burn, and a fire suppression plan).

Burn bosses lead a team to accomplish a burn including field supervisors that direct firefighters, outreach communications, logistics, fire planners, and collaborators at permitting agencies and many more. Burn bosses operate in accordance with policies depending on their jurisdiction or agency, National Wildfire Coordinating Group (NWCG) standards, and applicable federal, state, and Tribal regulations. The burn boss implements the prescribed fire plan under the direction of the appropriate agency leadership. A key part of their responsibility is assessing conditions on the ground and making go/no-go decisions about whether the burn should begin, continue, be modified, or be stopped.

The decision-making process can be thought of through five main questions:

  1. Can we burn? Are regulations, restrictions, permits, approvals, and required notifications in place?

  2. Should we burn today? Are weather, fuel, smoke, and site conditions appropriate?

  3. Can we achieve our objectives today? Will the expected fire behavior produce the desired ecological or fuels-treatment effects?

  4. Can we safely manage the fire today? Do we have the people, equipment, control lines, communications, and contingency resources necessary?

  5. Should we continue burning? Are actual conditions and fire behavior remaining within the approved parameters?

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Weather and Fuel Conditions

A prescribed burn plan is written for a range of acceptable weather and fuel conditions (e.g. 40-65°F and 30-70% relative humidity), rather than a single ideal temperature or humidity. The Forest Service describes these prescribed fire “burn windows” as periods when weather, anticipated smoke dispersion, and vegetation conditions align with and are anticipated to result in the accomplishment of a project's objectives. Weather is an especially important consideration because it directly affects fire behavior, fuel moisture, and smoke production and dispersion.

Some of the key weather variables evaluated include:

  • Temperature – Temperature influences fuel drying and, along with other weather conditions, can affect fire intensity.

  • Relative humidity – Lower relative humidity generally contributes to drier fuels and can increase fire speed, spread, and intensity; Higher relative humidity can reduce fire behavior, sometimes to the point of preventing meeting burn objectives.

  • Wind speed – Wind affects the rate and direction of fire spread, flame length, spotting potential, and the ability of crews to control the fire. Wind can also contribute to the drying of fuels ahead of a flaming front by hastening evaporation and reducing moisture, potentially increasing potential fire intensity.

  • Wind direction – Managers need to understand where both the fire and smoke are likely to move.

  • Atmospheric stability and other atmospheric conditions – These influence the vertical movement of air, which directly impacts wildfire intensity, smoke dispersion, and erratic fire behavior. When considering the impacts of a prescribed fire on nearby communities, this influences whether smoke is likely to disperse or remain near the ground.

  • Recent, current, and future forecasted weather – Conditions leading up to the burn are important because they influence fuel moisture and how vegetation will respond to the fire. The forecasted weather must be within the parameters written into the burn plan in order for the burn boss to make the decision to proceed with ignitions.

Weather is only part of the equation. The condition of the fuels (flammable materials on the ground) that are going to be burned is also critical. The moisture content of live and dead vegetation is a result of the cumulative effects of past and present weather. Because of this connection, fuel moisture helps evaluate how current and forecast weather may affect fire behavior. If fuels are too wet, a fire may not carry or consume enough fuel to accomplish its objectives. If fuels are too dry, fire behavior may become more intense or difficult to control.

Burn managers evaluate moisture in fine fuels, such as grasses and needles, as well as larger dead fuels, such as branches and logs, and live vegetation, such as grasses, shrubs, and trees. They also consider fuel loading (the amount and arrangement of fuel within the burn unit). The type and continuity of these fuels influence how a fire will behave.

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Desired fire behavior and project objectives

A burn plan is developed long before flames are applied to the landscape. The burn plan is a time for managers to develop the goals of the burn, such as habitat improvement, or wildfire risk reduction and then determine what conditions are necessary to produce the desired fire effects while keeping fire behavior manageable for firefighters.

Burn managers are therefore not simply asking, “Can we burn today?” They are also asking, “Will burning today produce the fire effects we want?”

For example, a project and plan may have larger goals like watershed protection or fire risk reduction and then identify specific on the ground targets such as:

  • Consume a particular amount of surface fuels.

  • Reduce small trees or ladder fuels.

  • Achieve a desired level of total fuel consumption.

  • Reduce invasive vegetation.

  • Improve or maintain wildlife habitat.

At the same time, the burn plan establishes conditions intended to avoid undesirable effects, such as excessive tree mortality, crown scorch, soil heating, or smoke production. This is one reason a day with conditions that are technically suitable for burning may still not be the right day to conduct a particular prescribed fire. The fire needs to behave in a way that helps accomplish the project's objectives.

read a nwcg prescribed fire plan template from the gallinas watershed rx

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Smoke Managment and Air Quality

A burn can be appropriate from a fire-behavior perspective but still not be appropriate to ignite because of smoke.

Prescribed fire is planned in advance to reduce unwanted smoke impacts. A smoke management plan is an important component of many prescribed-fire plans, and weather, fuel conditions, and smoke transport all factor into smoke-related decisions. Smoke management considerations can include where smoke is expected to travel, whether smoke is likely to disperse or settle; nearby communities, roads and potential visibility impacts; schools, hospitals, and other sensitive receptors; existing air-quality conditions; and forecast atmospheric conditions.

A burn may therefore be postponed even when the fire behavior forecast looks favorable if smoke is expected to affect a sensitive area or create unacceptable visibility or air-quality impacts.

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Burn site conditions

Conditions within the burn unit can also change the decision to ignite, even when the weather looks favorable. Before burning, managers evaluate the specific fuels, topography, control features, and surrounding conditions of the unit. Fuels are the most easily changed component of a burn and extensive work goes into changing fuels conditions to make the burn successful. These include removing fuels along the border of the burns or completing treatments within a burn area that change fire behavior. However, sometimes these conditions can change between the time a burn is planned and the day it is scheduled. For example, a recent wind event could put additional downed material across a control line, changing the fire behavior and risk assessment even though the weather remains within the prescription.

When developing a burn plan, managers evaluate and address:

  • Fuel continuity and loading.

  • Adjacent vegetation and fuels outside the burn unit.

  • Slope and topography.

  • Drainages and other landscape features.

  • Roads, trails, and other potential control features.

  • The condition of control lines.

  • Nearby structures and infrastructure.

  • Access for fire personnel and equipment.

  • Whether holding resources can reach all portions of the unit.

Immediately before a burn, the site is reevaluated and these observations help managers determine whether the conditions on the ground still match the assumptions and expectations built into the burn plan.

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Fire behavior and ability to control it

Even when weather and fuel conditions are within the desired range, managers need confidence that the fire will behave as expected and remain manageable. Field observations can help managers evaluate how the fire is responding to the day's conditions. Before beginning ignitions across a burn unit, crews may conduct a test fire—a small, carefully selected ignition used to observe how the fuels are igniting and how the fire is behaving under current conditions.

The test fire can provide valuable information about characteristics such as:1) ignition and fuel consumption, 2) rate and direction of spread, 3) flame length and fireline intensity, and 4) spotting potential and potential for unwanted fire behavior.

The actual behavior of the test fire can then be compared with what was expected in the burn plan. If the fire behaves differently than anticipated, the burn boss may decide to adjust operations, pause ignitions, or stop the burn altogether.

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Staffing, Equipment, and Operational Readiness

A burn may be within prescription and the environmental conditions may be appropriate for ignition, but the prescribed fire still may not start if the necessary people or equipment are not available. This is an important distinction: weather conditions alone don't make a burn a “go.” The entire operation needs to be ready. Operational readiness can include having appropriate and qualified personnel available and on-site including a burn boss and necessary supervisors, ignition and holding crews, as well as engines and water resources. There also needs to be appropriate and available medical resources and adequate contingency resources. Contingency resources are firefighters that are not committed to the burn. but are dedicated to supporting any escapes of the fire outside of the planned area.

The burn team needs to be prepared not only for the expected fire behavior, but also to respond if conditions change or the fire behaves outside expectations.

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During the Burn

Importantly, the start of ignition does not mean the burn is committed to continuing regardless of what happens. Conditions can change throughout the day. Wind can increase or shift direction, humidity can change, fuels can burn differently than expected, smoke can begin moving toward a sensitive area, or crews may identify an unexpected condition on the ground. During a burn, managers continuously monitor factors such as wind speed and direction, relative humidity and temperature, fire behavior and fuel consumption, spotting, smoke movement and dispersion, holding effectiveness, and overall fire effects.

If conditions move outside the parameters established in the burn plan—or if the fire begins behaving differently than expected—the burn can be modified, paused, or stopped.

Ultimately, a prescribed fire is the result of many factors coming together. The right weather is necessary, but it is only one piece of the puzzle. Determining whether it is the right time and place to put fire on the ground is a dynamic decision that combines considerations of weather, fuels, fire behavior, smoke, site conditions, project objectives, impacts, operational readiness, and more.

Upcoming Events and Additional Resources

NM Wildland Urban Fire Summit (NM WUFS)

Registration is open for the 2026 New Mexico Wildland Urban Fire Summit! Join community leaders, fire professionals, land managers, nonprofits, and agencies from across New Mexico his October 14-16 in Silver City for three days on wildfire preparedness, mitigation and recovery for resilient communities.

Hear success stories, visit treatment projects in the forest, and sit in small-group sessions designed to help you build connections and deepen your knowledge of wildfire adaptation.

Registration is $50 for students, members of the public and nonprofit representatives, and $150 for government attendees. Hope to see you there!

Learn more and Register to attend

Do you assess wildfire risk to homes or structures in New Mexico — or want to learn about offering home wildfire risk assessments? Join the Forest Stewards Guild, NM Forestry Division, and City of Santa Fe Fire Department for a FREE half-day Home Assessment Workshop and Learning Exchange in Silver City, NM October 14.

This workshop will instruct attendees who are new to the process on how to perform home assessments, provide ecotype-specific recommendations for wildfire mitigation around homes, and review programs to help homeowners in high-risk areas to retain insurance. The workshop will also connect and enable knowledge sharing between fire departments, fire service professionals, land management organizations, county governments, and fire adapted communities’ leaders.

REgister Here

The New Mexico state forester rescinded statewide fire restrictions in response to recent rains which have reduced the threat of wildfire across the state.

“Late season precipitation has helped to alleviate wildfire spread,” said State Forester Laura McCarthy. “While fire restrictions are lifting, the public should continue to be vigilant about preventing human-caused wildfires, especially when conducting fall agricultural burns and at hunting camps.”

Read the full release

Read the Full Release
 

Upcoming Webinars

Thursday, 10/8/26, 12:00pm MDT: Spurring Adaptation to Altered Fire Regimes in the Sonoran Desert

Fires in the Sonoran Desert have historically been infrequent and relatively small, with only a limited need for fire prevention measures. However, climate change and invasive species have led to more frequent and large wildfires in this ecosystem, promoting widespread changes in vegetation communities and declines in native species. Managers are starting to adapt by reducing fuel loads and are considering novel techniques for inhibiting fire spread.
Join this webinar from the Southwest Fire Science Consortium to learn about a new interactive decision-support tool for land managers working in the Sonoran Desert to assist them with prioritizing fuel reduction treatments to minimize fire risk and protect intact ecosystems. While this webinar focuses on the Sonoran Desert, the process of developing this tool and findings from the workshops that informed its creation will be applicable to managers working elsewhere.

Register Now

Register Now

Fire Friday #193: WUI Mitigation Codes, Standards, Programs, and Guidance

Hello Greater Santa Fe Fireshed community,

No single code, standard, program, or guidance document can address every aspect of wildfire mitigation. Each approach has a different purpose, scope, and level of applicability, and each has potential limitations. Understanding these differences can help communities identify the tools that best fit their needs and build more comprehensive wildfire mitigation strategies.

Inspired by a comparative analysis conducted by the Community Wildfire Planning Center for the state of Washington, this Wildfire Wednesday explores the landscape of wildfire mitigation codes, standards, programs, and guidance, with examples of how each can support wildfire resilience.

This Fire Friday features:

Hope you all are just as happy to see moisture in the air as I am!
Megan

There are both regulatory and voluntary approaches to mitigating wildfire risk to structures, individual parcels, neighborhoods, and communities. While these approaches can overlap, understanding the differences between codes, standards, programs, and guidance can help communities determine how each tool can contribute to a broader mitigation strategy.

Codes

Codes are sets of regulations, rules, or requirements established by a recognized authority or government agency. They typically establish minimum requirements and can be legally enforceable, meaning compliance is mandatory within the jurisdictions where they have been adopted. Failure to comply may result in penalties, restrictions, or other enforcement actions.

Codes applicable to the wildland-urban interface (WUI) can address a variety of vulnerabilities in the built environment. Depending on the code and how it is adopted, requirements may address building construction and materials, access to homes and subdivisions, emergency water supplies, fire protection planning, defensible space, hazardous vegetation, fences, and other combustible materials.

International Code Council’s International Wildland-Urban Interface Code (IWUIC)

The International Wildland-Urban Interface Code (IWUIC) is a model code published by the International Code Council (ICC), a nonprofit association focused on building safety. The IWUIC establishes requirements and minimum standards for land use and the built environment within designated WUI areas.

The IWUIC includes requirements related to access and water supply for individual structures and subdivisions, fire protection plans where applicable, ignition-resistant construction, defensible space, automatic sprinkler systems, and optional appendices. It also references standards published by the ICC and other organizations that provide additional requirements for construction materials and methods.

NFPA 1 Fire Code, Wildland Urban Interface (Chapter 17)

NFPA 1 Fire Code is a model code published by the National Fire Protection Association (NFPA). The Fire Code establishes minimum requirements intended to provide a reasonable level of fire and life safety and property protection from hazards created by fire, explosions, and other dangerous conditions.

Chapter 17, Wildland-Urban Interface, focuses specifically on planning, construction, maintenance, education, and management measures intended to protect life and property from wildfire. Key elements include assessing a structure and its surroundings—referred to as the Structure Ignition Zone (SIZ)—developing a wildland fire hazard mitigation plan, and addressing other fire hazards in wildfire-prone areas, including vegetation, brush, fireworks, and explosives.

Standards

While codes are legally enforceable documents and specify what needs to be done, standards typically describe how to meet code requirements. Standards are documents or specifications developed by recognized standard-setting organizations. They establish consistent approaches to processes, services, systems, materials, or practices. Unlike codes, standards are generally voluntary unless they are referenced or incorporated into a legally enforceable code, regulation, or other requirement, but adherence to standards is often seen as a mark of quality, safety, or best practices.

NFPA 1142 Standard on Water Supplies for Suburban and Rural Firefighting

NFPA 1142, Standard on Water Supplies for Suburban and Rural Firefighting, provides a method for determining the minimum water supply needed for structural firefighting in areas where there is no water supply or where existing supplies are inadequate. The standard addresses approved and alternative water supplies, dry hydrants, and calculations for minimum water supplies for structures with and without exposure hazards, as well as structures equipped with automatic sprinkler or other fire suppression systems.

IBHS Wildfire Prepared Home Technical Standard

The Wildfire Prepared Home™ Technical Standard defines science-based requirements used to evaluate whether a property qualifies for a Wildfire Prepared Home designation. Developed by the Insurance Institute for Business & Home Safety (IBHS), the standard provides detailed specifications intended to reduce vulnerabilities that can contribute to home ignition during a wildfire.

In winter 2025, the NM Fire Planning Task Force adopted Wildfire Prepared Home as the statewide voluntary standard for home hardening and defensible space in New Mexico.

Programs

WUI mitigation programs are often designed to reduce wildfire risk at the parcel, neighborhood, or community scale. They may be administered by government agencies, nonprofits, or other organizations and can vary considerably in their purpose and requirements. Some programs are primarily educational and do not require participants to complete specific mitigation actions. Others provide a designation or recognition when participants complete defined actions or meet established criteria.

IBHS Wildfire Prepared Home Program

Wildfire Prepared Home is a program of IBHS, a nonprofit scientific research and communications organization supported by property insurers, reinsurers, and affiliated companies. The Wildfire Prepared Home program offers two designation levels: Wildfire Prepared Home Base (Essential) and Wildfire Prepared Home Plus (Enhanced). Each level has different mitigation requirements, which are identified in the IBHS Wildfire Prepared Home Technical Standard.

The program uses an owner-driven process. Homeowners take the lead in completing a home checklist, completing required mitigation work, and submitting an application and photographs for review. Homes that meet the requirements receive a certificate from IBHS. The process can take anywhere from a few months to many months, depending on the amount of work required. Program fees include an application fee and annual review fee, and recertification is required every three years.

NFPA Firewise USA

Firewise USA® is administered by the National Fire Protection Association (NFPA) and provides a collaborative framework to help neighbors in a geographic area get organized, find direction, and take action to increase the ignition resistance of their homes and community and to reduce wildfire risks at the local level. New Mexico has numerous communities from the across the state voluntarily participating in the national Firewise USA® recognition program.

Recognized Firewise USA sites are required to have a minimum of eight dwelling units and a maximum of 2,500. The process includes completing a community wildfire risk assessment, developing a three-year action plan with annual communitywide priorities, and implementing mitigation activities. Common activities include community education workshops, Firewise Days, and sharing wildfire preparedness information at local events. Participating communities track volunteer hours and costs to document their investments and meet program reporting requirements. There is no application fee to participate, but communities must meet an annual investment requirement, which can be met through documented volunteer hours, in-kind services, or monetary costs.

Guidance

Guidance generally refers to recommendations, models, frameworks, or suggested approaches for addressing a particular issue. Unlike codes, guidance is not typically legally enforceable. It can nevertheless provide valuable information and frameworks for communities, planners, homeowners, and other practitioners developing wildfire mitigation strategies.

Many national organizations have developed guidance related to community wildfire risk reduction. The examples below represent just a few of the resources available.

APA: Planning the Wildland-Urban Interface

The American Planning Association (APA) is a professional organization providing resources for planners and communities on a wide range of planning topics, including hazard mitigation, disaster recovery, and the WUI. Planning the Wildland-Urban Interface, published in 2019, provides planners with an in-depth introduction to the WUI and wildfire basics, covering challenges, trends, and historical context along with content on understanding wildfire ignition science. The report also provides solutions through a holistic planning framework and practical guidance on how to address WUI and wildfire challenges in plans, policies, and regulations, opportunities for collaboration with fire departments, federal and state agencies, and other key stakeholders.

NIST: Hazard Mitigation Methodology

National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) is non-regulatory government agency within the U.S. Department of Commerce that develops standards, guidelines, and best practices. NIST’s Fire Research Division’s research projects and programs cover a range of WUI and fire topics, including fire risk reduction in communities, improving WUI community fire protection through fire-resistant building design and materials, and more.

NIST’s Hazard Mitigation Methodology (HMM) is a comprehensive performance-based approach to WUI fire hazard mitigation for structures, parcels, and communities. The proposed methodology was developed to reduce structural losses in WUI fires by hardening structures and parcels across a community. The HMM demonstrates the complexities of structure hardening, and how and why hazards associated with both fire and ember exposures need to be mitigated, describes the relationships between exposure and hardening within the methodology, and addresses housing density, structure separation distance, and parcel layouts. The HMM was designed to address current building stock with efforts made to limit retrofit expenses; while developed primarily for retrofits it can be applied to new construction.

Fire Adapted Communities Pathways Tool

The Fire Adapted Communities (FAC) Learning Network supports and connects people and communities working on wildfire resilience across the country. FAC Network tools include sources such as a Fire Adapted Communities Pathways Tool and a Fire Adapted Communities Self-Assessment Tool (FAC SAT). The FAC SAT helps communities assess their fire adaptation efforts and to plan and track their capacity to live safely with fire over time, while the FAC Pathways Tool helps communities identify a set of strategies which are tailored to their strengths and needs, and based on practices which have been successful in communities similar to theirs. These tools help communities complete their own assessment to better understand their fire adaptation needs, priorities, and opportunities.

Each of the codes, standards, programs, and guidance resources highlighted above offers potential benefits, but each also has limitations. The differences in scale, scope, requirements, and intended users are important when considering how these tools fit into a broader wildfire mitigation strategy. For example, some programs provide detailed home-hardening standards but do not address larger parcels that may require more tailored vegetation management to address hazardous fuels in Zone 3. Similarly, some codes and standards may provide robust requirements for assessing the Structure Ignition Zone but may not address the neighborhood or community scale, or may offer limited flexibility for local conditions.

These differences highlight why no single code, standard, program, or guidance document can provide a comprehensive wildfire mitigation strategy on its own. Instead, communities can consider how different approaches complement one another. Codes may establish baseline requirements, standards can provide technical specifications, programs can support implementation and community engagement, and guidance can help communities plan and adapt strategies to local conditions.

Additional Resources

FACTSHEET:
Fire Regimes of the Southwest

The Fire Regimes of the Southwest Series, developed by the Southwest Fire Science Consortium, explores fire regimes of different vegetation types, examining historical fire frequency, intensity, extent, and seasonality. The document below can be used to easily share fire regime series fact sheets and videos on six ecosystems in the Southwest.

TOOLKIT:
Local Funding Options for Wildfire Resilience

Headwaters Economics published a guide to help leaders identify local funding strategies for wildfire resilience that could work best for their communities. The guide includes tips for local wildfire funding measures, revenue strategies, and community examples.

View the Full Guide

VIDEO:
Biochar's Role in Forest Restoration

A new video by #forestproud highlights how biochar can support post-fire recovery while creating innovative wood products that benefit forests and communities. The film explores how biochar supports forest health, improves soil productivity, creates new markets for low-value wood and forest byproducts, and helps reduce wildfire risk through active forest management. It also showcases biochar applications from forest restoration projects to agricultural landscapes.

https://youtu.be/S16DIBjP8KM?si=byD-pEbeXKciyAXF

The GSFFC is a coalition of public and private organizations. The GSFFC is not a subdivision of the State of New Mexico, as defined in the state’s Open Meetings Act, §§ 10-15-1 to 10-15-4 NMSA 1978. Although federal agencies participate in the GSFFC, the Coalition is not a federal advisory board and was not created by a federal agency, as defined by the Federal Advisory Committee Act (FACA), 5.U.S.C. app. 2, §§ 1 to 16 (2012). The GSFFC operates informally to support its partners, and is not incorporated as a non-profit, 501(C)(3), partnership, or other legal status.