Barker: Otter on fire
A wildfire burns, Friday, Aug. 24, 2012 near Featherville, Idaho. A burnout maneuver has so far been successful in reducing fuels between Featherville and the 187-square-mile wildfire that forced the central Idaho community's evacuation a week ago, officials said Saturday.
Idaho Gov. Butch Otter told reporters last week, after touring the Trinity Ridge and Halstead fires by helicopter, that he backed federal firefighting commanders’ plans for protecting his state.
His support for the plans — putting resources in front of communities, while allowing the fires to burn into wilderness and where past fires have reduced fuels — shows that the West is evolving to accept the new realities of fire.
Like hundreds of others who own second homes in the forest communities along the South Fork of the Boise River, Otter had been up at his cabin in Pine the week before getting it ready for the fire at his door.
“It seems like it takes an incident like this to get people to do what they should have done before,” Otter said.Rocky Barker, Idaho Statesman Full story.
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