business backgrounder | economy
After the Fire
Fighting back in a fire-prone region.
Christine Pratt
Eastern Washington communities hit hard by wildfire are pulling together to
rebuild their homes, their businesses and their lives.
WENATCHEE — Big wildfires happen every summer
in Eastern Washington, a high-desert region carved out
of rock by the ice age floods, bestowed with rivers and
lakes and blanketed with timber, desert scrub and fertile
crop lands.
— Jon Wyss, volunteer chairman, Okanogan County
During the dry, summer months an Independence
Long Term Recovery Group and government
Day sparkler dropped from a child’s hand can be as
affairs analyst for Gebbers Farms
effective as a bolt of lightning at setting hilly expanses
of cheat grass and bitterbrush ablaze. The people here
are used to that.
But local experts say the economic impacts of the past summer’s deadly flames could be felt for decades in hardesthit Okanogan County, as displaced families move out, property values decline, lumber yields diminish from blackened
timberlands and cattle herds are reduced until rangeland recovers for grazing.
“These fires have been the greatest challenge of my life, but also the most rewarding,” says Jon Wyss, volunteer chairman of
the Okanogan County Long Term Recovery Group. His day job is serving as government
affairs analyst for the region’s largest fruit grower and cattle rancher, Gebbers Farms.
“People are hurting in the face of disaster. We are the hope for people to get back on
at a glance
their feet. We have to be there for them.”
The group formed last year to shepherd fundraising and recovery efforts following
Wildfires set historic records of
Okanogan County’s 2014 Carlton Complex fires, which destroyed 312 homes and
destruction this past, drought-parched
blackened 257,000 acres, making it the largest in state history. Until this year.
summer. They burned more than
This time around, flames burned nearly 523,000 acres in Okanogan County and killed
1 million acres across the state, almost
three U.S. Forest Service firefighters.
all of it — some 893,000 acres worth
The recovery group is now partnering in its relief efforts with the other wildfire— east of the Cascade Mountains.
stricken counties of Chelan, Stevens, Ferry, and Pend Oreille, as well as the Confederated
Tribes of the Colville Reservation.
The Okanogan County Long Term
This year, damage from structure loss, alone, is estimated at $11 million, Wyss said.
Recovery Group is helping the region
The dollar value of loss in other key sectors is still being refined. Here’s a rundown:
“People are hurting in the face of disaster.
We are the hope for people to get back on
their feet. We have to be there for them.”
recover from a pair of fire seasons that
locals say could leave an impact lasting
for decades.
Local families and businesses are still
struggling and may be for years to
come, but experts say these years of
devastating wildfire will forge a more
fire-smart and fire-resistant region,
better prepared for future disaster.
38 association of washington business
property tax
Estimates show that Okanogan County could lose 3.8 percent of its property value, Wyss
says. That loss could amount to an approximately 18-percent reduction in revenues for
tax-reliant districts, including schools and local water and sewer districts — entities
that are already hurting. Some 512 school structures have been lost over the past two
fire seasons, he says.
Reduced property tax revenues will put pressure on the stricken counties’ public
utility districts and power cooperatives that lost miles of powerlines, poles and fiberoptic cable. Federal and state emergency funding won’t cover the entire loss.