Abstract Modifying activities and restricting access through regulation are valuable mechanisms for reducing human-caused wildfire ignitions. Fire stage restriction policies implemented during periods of high fire risk entail three tiers of increasingly restrictive rules intended to prevent ignitions, culminating in forest closures. Stage restrictions are increasingly common on federal, state, and local public lands, yet little social science has documented experiences with this approach. We conducted 13 focus groups across three southwestern US locations–Payson, AZ, Flagstaff, AZ, and Los Alamos, NM–with 108 residents and professionals to document current support, understandings, and applications of stage restrictions. We found that while support for stage restrictions was widespread, divergence emerged regarding the use of forest closures; residents felt that closures were a prevention tool that should be used early and often while professionals saw closures as a last resort due to their logistical complexity and limited evidence of effectiveness. This difference emerged in part because resident participants were uncertain about how decision-making regarding enactment and enforcement of stage restrictions occurred, indicating opportunities for improved communication. Participants also felt that risk predominantly came from urban visitors who were not intercepted by prevention outreach efforts prior to their trips, indicating that the scale of current prevention activities may not align with the geography of public land users in a given location. Leveraging capacity-building public-agency partnerships and advancing documentation of human-caused ignitions present important pathways to more effective use of limited wildfire prevention resources on public lands.
Edgeley et al. (Fri,) studied this question.