Sponsors (6)
Introduced February 6, 2025 by Alejandro Padilla · Last progress February 6, 2025
The bill centralizes wildfire science and real‑time intelligence to improve prediction, response, and public‑health protection, but does so at increased federal cost and with governance, authority, privacy, and interoperability risks that could limit near‑term effectiveness for some local jurisdictions.
Federal, state, tribal, and local emergency managers and agencies will receive coordinated, science-based wildfire prediction and decision-support tools to improve response planning and situational awareness.
Homeowners and communities near wildland‑urban interfaces will get improved fire‑risk assessments, real‑time forecasts, and evacuation/mitigation planning support to reduce losses to life and property.
Firefighters and first responders will gain interoperable, real‑time data interfaces and testbeds for tools, improving on‑the‑ground response effectiveness and responder safety.
Taxpayers will face increased federal costs because creating and operating a new joint Center and its IT/infrastructure will require dedicated funding and transfers.
State, local, and tribal managers may see priorities shifted or implementation slowed because centralization could duplicate existing regional coordination centers and create complex interagency governance.
The Center's recommendations may be limited in practical effect because endorsements are non‑binding and narrow statutory definitions could make future adaptations or broader uses legally difficult.
Based on analysis of 4 sections of legislative text.
Creates a joint interagency Wildfire Intelligence Center and Board to centralize real‑time modeling, interoperable data, and decision‑support for wildland and wildland‑urban fires.
Creates a joint interagency Wildfire Intelligence Center within the Departments of Agriculture, Commerce, and the Interior and a governing Board to centralize real-time modeling, data, and decision‑support for wildland and wildland‑urban interface fires. The Center will provide interoperable IT and consolidated analytic tools for federal, State, Tribal, local, academic, and private partners, offer a nationwide fire risk catalog and air‑quality forecasting for smoke‑health guidance, and host a testbed for new decision‑support tools. The Act expresses a non‑binding congressional view that wildfire work needs integrated, multijurisdictional science and data efforts, endorses findings that current capabilities are fragmented, and directs the Board to pick a permanent headquarters within one year; the text provided does not specify appropriations or detailed funding mechanisms.