Governing Wildfire Risks: What Shapes County Hazard Mitigation Programs?

Abstract

Land use policies and programs offer a diverse set of strategies for management of wildfire risk. Many county governments have only recently begun to implement such strategies, and relatively little research has been conducted on county activity in wildfire risk reduction such as hazard assessment, plan making, regulation of land use, and subdivision design. Based on a questionnaire survey, the authors explore influences over choice of risk reduction strategy by county governments. Our findings underscore the importance of governance variables including intergovernmental grants in development of mitigation programs.