Secretary, MD
Secretary wildfire risk explained
USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities model puts Secretary at the 55th national percentile for risk to structures, modestly above the national average for wildfire risk — a score built from 317 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 Secretary at the 54th percentile, close to its 55th-percentile risk score.
Where Secretary's buildings actually sit
Only 39.8% of Secretary's 317 buildings carry Direct exposure and 0% carry Indirect; the remaining 60.3% are Minimal, which shifts the risk driving this page's score toward the surrounding landscape rather than any one structure.
Secretary against the rest of the country
Compare Secretary's two percentiles: 78th within Maryland, only 55th nationally — a gap of 23 points that marks it as unusually exposed for its own state. Among the 31,521 US communities USFS scores, Secretary ranks 14,086 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 21,183 by building count (1 is largest). Within Maryland alone, it ranks 117 of 527 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for Maryland on its state page.
What this risk score means for insurance
At the 55th national percentile, Secretary rates elevated 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 60.3% of buildings rated Minimal exposure, Secretary gets less benefit from structure hardening than a Direct- or Indirect-dominant place would — the home-hardening guide explains why the zone matters.
More on how this number was built
The methodology guide shows exactly how USFS turned 317 counted buildings into the percentiles shown above for Secretary. For more on what minimal exposure implies beyond Secretary, see the exposure-zones guide.