WildfireRiskFinder

Kutztown, PA

How exposed is Kutztown to wildfire?

Moderate
30thpercentile nationally

Out of every US place USFS scores, Kutztown lands at the 30th percentile for wildfire risk to structures — close to the middle of USFS's national wildfire-risk range — a figure built from its 1,772 buildings, not the land around them. (Source: USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities methodology.)

USFS's separate burn-probability score — fire likelihood alone, before counting what's built there — puts Kutztown at the 29th percentile, close to its 30th-percentile risk score.

Kutztown's building exposure, zone by zone

1,772Total buildings
8.1%Direct exposure
77.5%Indirect exposure
14.3%Minimal exposure

Most of Kutztown's buildings (77.5%) 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.

Kutztown against the rest of the country

There's little gap between Kutztown's 30th national percentile and its 39th percentile inside Pennsylvania, which means the state comparison mostly confirms what the national score already shows. Among the 31,521 US communities USFS scores, Kutztown ranks 22,010 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 8,143 by building count (1 is largest). Within Pennsylvania alone, it ranks 1,221 of 1,991 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for Pennsylvania on its state page.

What this risk score means for insurance

At the 30th national percentile, Kutztown rates moderate for wildfire risk — well short of the threshold where insurers have been withdrawing coverage, though comparing a quote costs nothing either way.

Hardening a home in Kutztown

With ember exposure the dominant pattern in Kutztown (77.5% Indirect), vent screens and roofing material tend to matter more than lot clearing alone. The home-hardening guide covers both.

Where Kutztown's figures come from

Every one of the two percentiles behind Kutztown's 22,010-place national rank traces to USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities dataset — see the methodology guide. The exposure-zones guide covers what Kutztown's dominant indirect exposure actually means, with real examples from across the dataset.