Montana paid about $15 million to combat fires that burned roughly 167,000 acres in 2000, said Bob Harrington, the state forester.
Three years later, fires burned about 200,000 acres - although some of that was a cheaper-to-fight grass fire in eastern Montana - but the state's bill is estimated at between $27 million and $30 million.
Senate Minority Leader Jon Tester, D-Big Sandy, has asked the Legislature to audit this year's fire bills to find out why they climbed so high so fast, especially when the amount of acres burned has not grown as fast as the costs of fighting fires.
Harrington said Wednesday that there are two main reasons Montana's share is so high this year.
For one thing, the Federal Emergency Management Agency has changed the way it helps states pay for wildfires. In 2000, Harrington said, the agency declared the entire state a disaster area fairly early in the fire season. After that, the federal government paid the entire cost of all wildfire costs in the state.
"Now, FEMA rarely does a statewide (disaster) declaration," he said.
This year, the agency never declared the entire state a disaster, but would declare only individual fires disaster areas. The agency was even reluctant to declare whole counties disasters, Harrington said, and would do so only if several FEMA-paid fires were burning in that county. Even with that designation, the agency now pays 75 percent of the firefighting costs, leaving the state to make up the rest.
"That's a big impact in out-of-pocket costs," Harrington said.
Plus, he said, the state also got hit with some garden variety bad luck: Several of the largest and most expensive fires to fight this year were burning on lands for which the state is responsible. That means the state picked up the firefighting tab.
Finally, this summer's fire season was different from most. Fires burned everywhere, not just in western Montana forests. This year, there were fires burning from the plains of eastern Montana to Idaho, which complicated firefighting and made the overall season more expensive, Harrington said.
Harrington said FEMA's help was still substantial. If the federal agency didn't intervene, Montana would be looking at a $63 million firefighting bill, instead of half that amount.
He also said that a change in the way the state attacks fires may have saved the state lots of money. This year, Montana sent out more teams to douse fires before they got larger than 10 acres. Those crews doused hundreds of small fires.
"They caught 96 percent of all the fires," Harrington said. "That saved us millions."
Tester said Wednesday he was glad for the explanation, but still wanted to know more about where the firefighting money went and why. He also said the reduction in federal help may change the way the Legislature budgets for firefighting.
Traditionally, Tester said, lawmakers have not really questioned how much money the state spent on fires, largely because the costs were so small compared to the overall state budget. Also, lawmakers haven't designated a set amount for firefighting. Fire bills have been paid after the fact with money from the state's general fund.
Now, with the costs growing rapidly - and the state's budget growing ever more taut - lawmakers need to keep a closer eye on where and how all money is spent.
"These are Montana tax dollars that are just as important as any other dollars we spend," Tester said. "We need to be concerned about where the money is going."
Senate President Bob Keenan, R-Bigfork, agreed, saying the state first needs to find out from FEMA how the agency intends to pay for fires from now on. Then, Keenan said, lawmakers should consider setting aside a contingency fund for firefighting.
He cautioned, however, that digging into firefighting costs would not be easy.
"You end up talking about the reduction of hazardous fuels, the underbrush, the lack of thinning and the natural cycles of forest fire," he said. "It's an emotional issue."
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