Although preparations for the upcoming wildfire season remain the same, for Clark County Fire District 13, the prospect of responding to wildfires without the added support of Larch inmate fire crews makes this year a little more complicated for the volunteer-heavy fire agency.
The Larch Corrections Center, east of Hockinson, went into a “warm closure” in October 2023, with inmates no longer staying in the minimum-security facility. Among the inmates at the corrections center were inmate wildland fire crews that served the southwest Washington region.
“As far as preparations and Fire District 13 is concerned, it’s the same thing as every year,” Chief Bryce Shirley said, adding there are key differences, however. “We’re not the same as Fire District 3 or other Clark County fire districts in the sense that we [don’t] have a tremendous amount of paid personnel. We’re generally a combination fire department. We currently have a full-time paid division chief, one line firefighter and the rest are part-time or volunteers.”
Fire District 13 currently has Shirley and a full-time line firefighter along with three part-time, paid firefighters. Shirley said approximately 15 volunteers make up the rest of the department’s manpower.
Shirley added the impact of having no Larch crews, given the district’s proximity to Yacolt, Larch Mountain and other forested lands, is fairly significant. The longer the fire district has to wait for a long time for outside help at a big fire episode, the larger a wildland fire can grow before either offensive or defensive firefighting approaches can be made. And combined with frequent winds in the area, the results can be devastating.
“It’s summer and it gets hot, and when you have significant wind events and red-flag warnings and all that stuff going on, if a fire starts, the quicker you can get there with more people, the better off you are,” Shirley said.
Based on the state’s low snowpack and forecasts for a dry and warm summer, the Washington Department of Ecology declared a drought emergency for most of the state in April, including Clark County.
Fire District 13 responds to the Yacolt Burn State Forest, and along with a growing rural population and recreational usage, the fire district’s land is prone to wildfires.
With Larch inmate crews not readily available, fire personnel from Clark County fire departments will likely be on scene longer, leading to impacted response times to a regular call load.
“It’s the same thought process along the lines of the quicker you get there, the better it is,” Shirley said. “The longer that we remain on scene and out of service for another response [it impacts other responses] because once we’re on that incident, we are committed until we can turn it over. That just moves that chess piece off the board. So, staffing being what it is for Fire District 13, it’s not as though we have an abundance of staffing. And then you start to rely on mutual aid from surrounding districts. It’s a domino effect.”
Once the Washington state Department of Natural Resources (DNR) is able to get enough crews on a scene, whether it be via helicopter firefighting or hand crews, area fire agencies are available to send units off to other calls. This summer, area fire chiefs are under the looming question of when they will arrive, however.
Clark-Cowlitz Fire Rescue and Clark County Fire District 3 chiefs have previously told the Reflector they don’t know how long a response from DNR will take this fire season.
“I hate to use the word interesting [but] it is interesting to kind of see how these things happen and what the results of the decisions are, but it’s not without risk,” Shirley said. “So, if we were choosing, we would go back to the way that it was before where we have the resources at Larch, but of course, we don’t have that luxury.”
Shirley is also the chief for North Country EMS ambulance service that serves northern Clark County, southeastern Cowlitz County and western Skamania County, a broad area that’s no stranger to wildfires. He said the lack of Larch Crews will have impacts beyond fire districts, extending to ambulances and other emergency services for medical calls, accidents and more.
“I think it will be interesting to see how it impacts North Country EMS, especially if fire personnel are stuck at a wildland fire for an extended amount of time,” Shirley said. “The fire district response has a list of priorities, let’s say for instance, discussing a motor vehicle accident scene, the fire district has responsibilities and priorities that the ambulance personnel aren’t equipped to deal with. And so if you start committing those resources to other events, of course that has an impact on the ability of the ambulance system to deal with things that would generally be the fire district’s responsibility, for example heavy extrication, stabilization of vehicles, things of that nature."
“I hate to look at it as though it’s a chessboard, but it really is,” Shirley said. “You remove a piece that has a pretty significant part to play, and it just makes the situation more complicated and more difficult to manage safely and efficiently.”
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