The Oregon Legislature will meet for an emergency session in December to approve emergency spending to cover the cost of 2024’s wildfire season.
The session will be called by Oregon Governor Tina Kotek under the authority granted to her by Oregon’s Constitution.
“The unprecedented 2024 wildfire season required all of us to work together to protect life, land, and property, and that spirit of cooperation must continue in order to meet our fiscal responsibilities,” Kotek said in a press release. “I am grateful to legislative leaders for coming to consensus that our best course of action is to ensure the state’s fire season costs are addressed and bills paid by the end of the calendar year.”
According to the governor’s office, 1.9 million acres burned in 2024 in Oregon. The statewide average over the last 10 years was 640,000 acres burned.
The state believes the price tag for this year’s fire season will be around $350 million, and while more than half of that will eventually be paid for with disaster relief funds from the federal government, “the state needs to pay its bills as expeditiously as possible,” the governor’s office said.
The news, first reported by OPB, came Tuesday morning. The session will begin Thursday, Dec. 12.
Legislators will be asked to release a total of $218 million to the Oregon Department of Forestry (ODF) and the Oregon Department of the State Fire Marshal (OSFM).
It’s believed that amount will cover the costs assumed by the state to date from the 2024 fire season.
“This includes meeting the state’s financial obligations to small, medium, and large contractors who worked tirelessly to protect and support Oregonians for more than five months,” the press release read.
In northwest Oregon, companies like Bighorn Logging often respond to aid the Oregon Department of Forestry and other agencies at area wildfires.
Locally, state resources were used at numerous wildfires, including the Lee Falls Fire that burned around 240 acres in Cherry Grove, and two small wildfires that sparked in Gales Creek in the city of Forest Grove’s watershed.
“Fighting wildfires of the magnitude we saw this season required a tremendous level of resources that even wildfire experts couldn’t foresee,” said House Speaker Julie Fahey (D-West Eugene & Veneta). “Now, as we approach the end of the year and the holiday season, we need to make good on our commitments and pay our bills so that the contractors who fought fires in Oregon can be made whole. Convening now will enable us to do so, and to chart a bipartisan path forward to address our state’s most pressing needs.”
Chas Hundley is the editor of the Banks Post and sister news publications the Gales Creek Journal and the Salmonberry Magazine. He grew up in Gales Creek and has a cat.
