Portage, UT
Portage, UT's wildfire risk, in USFS's own numbers
Portage sits at the 93rd percentile nationally for wildfire risk to structures — in USFS's highest wildfire-risk band nationally — per USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities model, built from its 189 counted buildings, not vegetation cover alone. (Source: USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities methodology.)
Fire likelihood alone (USFS's burn-probability figure) ranks Portage at the 94th national percentile — 0 points above its risk-to-structures score, a gap driven by how much is actually built there.
What "at risk" means for the buildings here
Of Portage's 189 counted buildings, 76.2% carry Direct exposure and only 0% carry Minimal — a lopsided split that puts defensible-space clearing ahead of vents or roofing as the intervention worth doing first.
Where Portage ranks
Portage ranks lower within Utah (71st percentile statewide) than its 93rd national percentile suggests alone — a calmer spot in a state where wildfire risk generally runs high. Among the 31,521 US communities USFS scores, Portage ranks 2,123 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 25,299 by building count (1 is largest). Within Utah alone, it ranks 98 of 326 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for Utah on its state page.
Portage and the insurance market
Portage's 93rd-percentile, very high rating is the kind of score behind a broader national pattern: insurers pulling back from the highest wildfire-risk markets, non-renewing or declining new policies outright, most visibly in California. Shopping around, not assuming automatic renewal, tends to matter here.
What would actually reduce this score
With 76.2% of Portage 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 Portage's 2,123-place national rank traces to USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities dataset — see the methodology guide. For more on what direct exposure implies beyond Portage, see the exposure-zones guide.