Chico, WA
How exposed is Chico to wildfire?
Out of every US place USFS scores, Chico lands at the 24th percentile for wildfire risk to structures — close to the middle of USFS's national wildfire-risk range — a figure built from its 1,167 buildings, not the land around them. (Source: USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities methodology.)
Fire likelihood alone (USFS's burn-probability figure) ranks Chico at the 24th national percentile — 0 points above its risk-to-structures score, a gap driven by how much is actually built there.
Chico's building exposure, zone by zone
Most of Chico's buildings (73.9%) sit in the Indirect zone, where wind-blown embers rather than flame front are the mechanism USFS is scoring — ember-resistant vents and non-combustible roofing are the interventions this pattern favors, more than defensible space alone.
How Chico compares
Chico scores 24th nationally and 39th within Washington — close enough that its state context doesn't change the picture the national number already gives. Among the 31,521 US communities USFS scores, Chico ranks 23,965 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 10,857 by building count (1 is largest). Within Washington alone, it ranks 383 of 628 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for Washington on its state page.
Shopping for coverage in Chico
Chico's moderate rating (24th percentile nationally) sits outside the range where wildfire risk alone reshapes an insurance market — still, a homeowner here loses nothing by comparing rates.
Hardening a home in Chico
With ember exposure the dominant pattern in Chico (73.9% Indirect), vent screens and roofing material tend to matter more than lot clearing alone. The home-hardening guide covers both.
More on how this number was built
Every one of the two percentiles behind Chico's 23,965-place national rank traces to USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities dataset — see the methodology guide. For more on what indirect exposure implies beyond Chico, see the exposure-zones guide.