La Harpe, KS
La Harpe wildfire risk explained
USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities model puts La Harpe at the 50th national percentile for risk to structures, modestly above the national average for wildfire risk — a score built from 415 actual buildings. (Source: USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities methodology.)
Separately from the risk score above, La Harpe's burn probability — fire likelihood with no building count factored in — sits at the 49th percentile nationally.
What "at risk" means for the buildings here
Of La Harpe's 415 counted buildings, 55.7% carry Direct exposure and only 44.3% carry Minimal — a lopsided split that puts defensible-space clearing ahead of vents or roofing as the intervention worth doing first.
How La Harpe compares
La Harpe's 50th national percentile looks worse in isolation than its 31st ranking inside Kansas does — this place is on the milder end for its own state, by 18 points. Among the 31,521 US communities USFS scores, La Harpe ranks 15,912 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 18,924 by building count (1 is largest). Within Kansas alone, it ranks 499 of 721 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for Kansas on its state page.
What this risk score means for insurance
La Harpe's elevated rating (50th 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
With 55.7% of La Harpe in Direct exposure, defensible-space clearing and ember-resistant construction (vents, Class-A roofing) address the exposure this page's own numbers describe, not a generic checklist. See the home-hardening guide.
More on how this number was built
Every one of the two percentiles behind La Harpe's 15,912-place national rank traces to USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities dataset — see the methodology guide. For more on what direct exposure implies beyond La Harpe, see the exposure-zones guide.