Highland, WI
How exposed is Highland to wildfire?
USFS scores Highland 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 506 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 Highland at the 27th percentile, close to its 25th-percentile risk score.
Where Highland's buildings actually sit
USFS puts 83% of Highland's 506 buildings in the Indirect exposure zone, versus 17% Direct and 0% Minimal — a place where the fire doesn't need to reach the structure directly for embers to.
How Highland compares
Within Wisconsin, Highland ranks higher (50th percentile) than it does nationally (25th) — one of the more fire-exposed places in a state that, overall, scores lower than that. Among the 31,521 US communities USFS scores, Highland ranks 23,529 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 17,250 by building count (1 is largest). Within Wisconsin alone, it ranks 402 of 808 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for Wisconsin on its state page.
What this risk score means for insurance
At the 25th national percentile, Highland rates moderate for wildfire risk — well short of the threshold where insurers have been withdrawing coverage, though comparing a quote costs nothing either way.
What would actually reduce this score
Highland's 83% Indirect-exposure share points at embers, not flame contact, as the main pathway — ember-resistant vents and non-combustible roofing rank ahead of defensible space here. Detail in the home-hardening guide.
More on how this number was built
The methodology guide shows exactly how USFS turned 506 counted buildings into the percentiles shown above for Highland. For more on what indirect exposure implies beyond Highland, see the exposure-zones guide.