Bench Lake wildfire in Idaho Sawtooths cost millions. Who will pay the bill?

BOISE – When fire officials received reports of smoke and flames near a popular Idaho lodge on a mid-July afternoon, they sprang into action. Within days, nearly 200 people were working on the blaze in the Sawtooth recreation area, dubbed the Bench Lake fire.

As crews dumped hundreds of thousands of gallons of lake water from aircraft, carved out fire lines and arranged hoses to protect the historic Redfish Lake Lodge from the flames, investigators worked to determine the cause of the fire south of Stanley. There were no lightning storms that afternoon, and no infrastructure or machinery at the remote mountain lake that could have thrown a spark.

Two weeks after the fire started, officials announced it was human-caused. The exact source is still under investigation. The National Interagency Coordination Center’s latest incident report totaled the cost of the blaze at $12 million.

Human-caused fires are becoming more common, state fire officials said, and the vast majority of U.S. wildfires are started by humans. But it can be difficult to find those responsible. Even when they’re found, the exorbitant cost of suppressing large fires means getting financial restitution can be a long shot.

Josh Harvey, fire management chief for the Department of Lands, called the issue troubling.

“Idaho faces a situation where I think we’re going to continue to see increased human-caused fires,” he told the Idaho Statesman in a phone interview. “I don’t think the general public quite understands the severity of the issue and being on the hook for a large fire that costs millions of dollars.”

Wildfire bills aren’t always paid

In Idaho and across the West, human-caused fires make up the majority of ignitions in a given fire season, according to the Boise-based National Interagency Fire Center. They often burn more acreage than lightning-caused fires, and research has found that human-caused fires are more destructive and spread more rapidly.

This year, humans have started 328 fires on Bureau of Land Management property and 72 fires on state property. U.S. Forest Service officials didn’t respond to questions about human-caused fires on the agency’s land.

The Department of Lands and federal agencies have specially trained investigators and are often joined by investigators from the Idaho State Fire Marshal’s office to determine the cause of the fire. Sometimes it’s easy enough to find the person responsible. Harvey said the Idaho Department of Lands often responds to fires called in by homeowners whose burn piles got away from them or who didn’t take enough precautions when working on machinery near dry vegetation.

Other times, law enforcement and fire investigators rely on eyewitness accounts, campsite reservations or footage from trail or traffic cameras to try to identify potential suspects. A witness led Boise police to 19-year-old Taylor Kemp in connection with the 2016 fire that burned Table Rock. Another identified the teenage boy who started the 2017 Eagle Creek Fire in Oregon’s Columbia River Gorge.

But identifying the person responsible, and issuing an order to pay restitution isn’t necessarily a guarantee that an agency will be reimbursed for firefighting.

In the case of the 2016 Table Rock Fire, which destroyed a home, the price of restitution totaled $423,000. Kemp, who was convicted of a misdemeanor charge of unlawful use of fireworks, has paid about $500 of that and had another $1,200 suspended by the court, online records showed. His last payment was $20 in 2019.

JJ Winters, an attorney for the Department of Lands, said the department has three or four active restitution cases, for which the bills total $2.9 million. Those fires burned in 2020 and 2021. For fires from 2017 to 2019, the agency recovered $1.6 million, Winters said.

“When a fire starts on state-owned land, we can and we do make every attempt to recover the cost of suppression from responsible parties, whether they were set intentionally or not,” Winters said. “If people understand they can be held responsible for the cost of suppressing a fire, they might think twice about it.”

Winters said the agency frequently works with people liable for wildfire costs to work out payment plans. Sometimes homeowners’ or renters’ insurance policies cover negligent incidents, even if they happen on public land or someone else’s property. Winters said when agency officials present a person with a wildfire restitution bill, they encourage the person to talk to their insurance company.

When the responsible party can’t be identified, or can’t pay the bill, taxpayers are left holding the bag. On state-managed land, the costs come out of a dedicated “rainy day” fund.

“These things are impossible to predict and budget for,” Winters said. “We don’t know how many people are going to leave campfires unattended or shoot exploding targets or bring Roman candles into the forest.”

Investigators determine wildfire cause

The amount of restitution for a wildfire typically accounts for the cost of suppression, including firefighter pay and equipment, and any property damage. The price tag can grow as quickly as the fire itself.

There are numerous ways people can start wildfires: burning brush, sparks from off-road vehicles or dragging trailer chains, exploding firearms targets, fireworks and campfires that weren’t properly extinguished. The circumstances typically don’t matter when it comes to liability.

“Anyone starting a fire is responsible for that fire until it is out,” Dennis Becker, dean of the University of Idaho’s College of Natural Resources, told the Statesman by phone. “That can be a purposely started fire or an unintentionally started fire.”

Becker said wildfires needing out-of-state resources – which was the case for the Bench Lake fire – are especially costly. Suppression costs include transport for crews and equipment, plus meals and lodging.

When investigators identify the person who started the fire, they work with prosecutors to determine whether to pursue charges. Intentionally set fires are criminally prosecuted as arson. Accidental wildfires are considered a nuisance under Idaho law and are subject to civil penalties.

Investigators look at burn patterns and other clues to determine a fire’s cause. Becker said lightning-caused fires show signs of a “high-voltage ignition,” like shattered rock or splintered trees. Other factors – such as signs of a fire pit or campsite, the presence of certain chemicals like fuel or lubricant from a vehicle, or friction marks – can help investigators narrow down a cause, according to the National Wildlife Coordinating Group’s investigation handbook.

But those investigations can be especially difficult in the backcountry, where ignitions can start at unmonitored dispersed campsites or in remote areas.

Officials are still looking for the person who started the Moose fire, which ignited from an improperly extinguished campfire near North Fork in the Salmon-Challis National Forest in 2022 and became the state’s largest fire that year.

Negligence, prevention play into prosecution

Harvey said the Department of Lands doesn’t try to recoup its costs in all instances of unintentional wildfires. He said officials consider other factors before they would deem the responsible party negligent, such as whether they were prepared for wildfire conditions and made an effort to contain the blaze.

People should prepare to have fire extinguishers, hoses, shovels or other fire suppressants if they expect to create heat, sparks or flames in an activity, Harvey said. But even the most prepared person can’t always stop a wildfire. The Department of Lands takes that into account.

In some cases, the agency chose not to bill the person responsible for the ignition, because investigators found that the person responsible for the ignition took appropriate steps and did what they could to stop it.

“We as an agency are not out to bankrupt a homeowner or landowner because of a fire,” Harvey said. “We don’t like having to bill somebody for starting a fire.”

Becker said he has been heartened to see people taking fire safety more seriously lately.

“Just the other night, I was going to bed and heard fireworks and thought, ‘That is not what we need right now,’ ” he said.

The next day, his neighborhood social media was “lighting up” with comments from people warning of the wildfire risk and encouraging others to use better judgment.

“That’s a really good trend,” Becker said. “People are becoming educated on the risks with fire during the summer seasons.”

He said living safely with fire is a necessity, since fire can be beneficial in forest regeneration. Rather than trying to eliminate it entirely, people should do what they can to reduce the risks.

“Fire risk is not going away,” Becker said. “I think more and more people are understanding that that’s the case.”

Elizabeth Walsh contributed to this report.