Eau Claire, WI
How exposed is Eau Claire to wildfire?
USFS scores Eau Claire at the 25th national percentile for wildfire risk to structures (close to the middle of USFS's national wildfire-risk range), a figure built from 24,524 real buildings rather than raw vegetation cover. (Source: USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities methodology.)
USFS's separate burn-probability score — fire likelihood alone, before counting what's built there — puts Eau Claire at the 25th percentile, close to its 25th-percentile risk score.
Eau Claire's building exposure, zone by zone
75% of Eau Claire's 24,524 buildings sit in USFS's Minimal exposure zone, with only 14.7% rated Direct — risk here comes from regional burn probability more than proximity to burnable vegetation at the structure itself. At 24,524 buildings, this is a substantial built environment, so the shares below describe a real population of structures, not a handful of edge cases.
Where Eau Claire ranks
Eau Claire's 48th-percentile standing inside Wisconsin outpaces its 25th national percentile — this is a hotter spot than most of its own state, even though the state as a whole runs cooler nationally. Among the 31,521 US communities USFS scores, Eau Claire ranks 23,749 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 521 by building count (1 is largest). Within Wisconsin alone, it ranks 420 of 808 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for Wisconsin on its state page.
Eau Claire and the insurance market
Eau Claire's moderate wildfire rating (25th percentile) isn't the kind of score driving the carrier pullback making news in the highest-risk Western markets — but a standard homeowners quote is still worth comparing on its own terms.
What would actually reduce this score
Even with 75% of Eau Claire outside USFS's Direct and Indirect zones, basic hardening — gutter maintenance, ember-resistant vents — is inexpensive relative to the regional burn-probability risk noted above. Details in the home-hardening guide.
Where Eau Claire's figures come from
The methodology guide shows exactly how USFS turned 24,524 counted buildings into the percentiles shown above for Eau Claire. The exposure-zones guide covers what Eau Claire's dominant minimal exposure actually means, with real examples from across the dataset.