Selected Stories from the Current Issue

REGIONAL HISTORY

COMMUNITY

Projects of Resilience
in the Southwest 

Building Communities

by Creating Special Places

New Mexico’s Megafires Mark a Turning Point

For People, Land, and the Forest Service

By William DeBuys

By Allan Affeldt

In this article I advocate for the social importance of architectural beauty and community memory. Such investments make communities stronger and healthier, both economically and culturally. The sense of place in many communities is inextricably bound up with historic downtowns and historic architecture, but the importance of historic preservation in community planning and revitalization is often overlooked—largely because it is notoriously difficult to finance and reuse historic properties.

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Firefighters don’t normally allude to early English epics, but in a briefing on the massive Hermit’s Peak/Calf Canyon Fire in northern New Mexico, a top field chief said, “It’s like Beowulf: it’s not the thing you fear, it is the mother of the thing you fear.” He meant that the flames you face may be terrifying, but scarier yet are the conditions that spawned them, perhaps enabling new flames to erupt behind you with no escape possible. The lesson is a good one and can be taken further. If tinder-dry forests and high winds are the mother of the thing we fear, then climate change is the grandmother.

ENVIRONMENT

The Sangre de Cristo Mountain Initiative

An Audacious Commonsense Proposal

By Charles Curtin

In this and the previous issue of Green Fire Times, I have reviewed the many challenges facing communities that burned in recent wildfires. There are many complaints about what is wrong, and I’ve contributed some myself—but few proposals for proactive, viable solutions. We’ve got one, and we ask communities, our leaders, policymakers, funders and foundations to take a break from business as usual, give us a listen, and invest in a new approach. Because with national attention and vast amounts of resources pouring into the region, we’ll likely never have a better chance to fundamentally improve our forest and watershed stewardship and the health of our mountain landscapes and communities.

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