Fortunately for parts of Eugene's densely forested South Hills, we've ducked fire in the urban rural interface.

In Fall of 1991, the Berkeley East Hills caught fire which spread quickly through dense tree stands. A couple thousand acres, homes, and 25 lives later firefighters and rain put it out. A Berkey forestry associate of mine tried to work with at risk neighborhoods on some practical preventive scenarios to no avail.

South Eugene badly needs preventive wildfire planning and work along with some good fire reponse scenarios. With longer hotter summer dry spells and more ignition sources, it's statistically just a matter of "when" not "if".