Pawnee, IL
Pawnee wildfire risk explained
USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities model puts Pawnee at the 5th national percentile for risk to structures, among the lower wildfire-risk places nationally — a score built from 1,479 actual buildings. (Source: USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities methodology.)
USFS's separate burn-probability score — fire likelihood alone, before counting what's built there — puts Pawnee at the 5th percentile, close to its 5th-percentile risk score.
Where Pawnee's buildings actually sit
93% of Pawnee's 1,479 buildings sit in USFS's Minimal exposure zone, with only 7% rated Direct — risk here comes from regional burn probability more than proximity to burnable vegetation at the structure itself.
Where Pawnee ranks
Compare Pawnee's two percentiles: 26th within Illinois, only 5th nationally — a gap of 21 points that marks it as unusually exposed for its own state. Among the 31,521 US communities USFS scores, Pawnee ranks 30,091 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 9,257 by building count (1 is largest). Within Illinois alone, it ranks 1,071 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
At the 5th national percentile, Pawnee rates low 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
With 93% of buildings rated Minimal exposure, Pawnee gets less benefit from structure hardening than a Direct- or Indirect-dominant place would — the home-hardening guide explains why the zone matters.
Where Pawnee's figures come from
Every one of the two percentiles behind Pawnee's 30,091-place national rank traces to USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities dataset — see the methodology guide. The exposure-zones guide covers what Pawnee's dominant minimal exposure actually means, with real examples from across the dataset.