Passaic, NJ
Passaic wildfire risk explained
Passaic's 6,472 buildings earn a 13th-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, Passaic's burn probability — fire likelihood with no building count factored in — sits at the 17th percentile nationally.
Passaic's building exposure, zone by zone
Most of Passaic's buildings (98.4% of 6,472) fall outside USFS's Direct and Indirect zones entirely — that doesn't zero out the score above, it means the risk is regional, not structure-by-structure. At 6,472 buildings, this is a substantial built environment, so the shares below describe a real population of structures, not a handful of edge cases.
How Passaic compares
Passaic scores 13th nationally and 1st within New Jersey — close enough that its state context doesn't change the picture the national number already gives. Among the 31,521 US communities USFS scores, Passaic ranks 27,427 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 2,683 by building count (1 is largest). Within New Jersey alone, it ranks 696 of 700 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for New Jersey on its state page.
Passaic and the insurance market
At the 13th national percentile, Passaic rates low for wildfire risk — well short of the threshold where insurers have been withdrawing coverage, though comparing a quote costs nothing either way.
Lowering exposure, not just insuring around it
Even with 98.4% of Passaic 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.
More on how this number was built
Passaic's 13th-percentile score and its burn-probability figure both come from the same USFS workbook, documented in the methodology guide. For more on what minimal exposure implies beyond Passaic, see the exposure-zones guide.