Gifford, IL
Gifford, IL's wildfire risk, in USFS's own numbers
Gifford's 527 buildings earn a 1st-percentile wildfire-risk score nationally under USFS's model — among the lower wildfire-risk places nationally. (Source: USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities methodology.)
Separately from the risk score above, Gifford's burn probability — fire likelihood with no building count factored in — sits at the 1st percentile nationally.
What "at risk" means for the buildings here
USFS classifies 85.8% of Gifford's buildings as Minimal exposure, the largest of the three zones here by a wide margin over 14.2% Direct and 0% Indirect — a landscape-level risk rather than a building-by-building one.
How Gifford compares
There's little gap between Gifford's 1st national percentile and its 8th percentile inside Illinois, which means the state comparison mostly confirms what the national score already shows. Among the 31,521 US communities USFS scores, Gifford ranks 31,256 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 16,904 by building count (1 is largest). Within Illinois alone, it ranks 1,327 of 1,445 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for Illinois on its state page.
What this risk score means for insurance
Gifford's low rating (1st percentile nationally) sits outside the range where wildfire risk alone reshapes an insurance market — still, a homeowner here loses nothing by comparing rates.
What would actually reduce this score
Gifford's 85.8% Minimal-exposure share means structure-level hardening matters less here than it would elsewhere — still worth the low-cost basics, per the home-hardening guide.
Where Gifford's figures come from
Gifford's 1st-percentile score and its burn-probability figure both come from the same USFS workbook, documented in the methodology guide. The exposure-zones guide covers what Gifford's dominant minimal exposure actually means, with real examples from across the dataset.