Trying to add a payment method? You can do this on the 
QuickTake:
Mount Pisgah, a prominent recreation site in Lane County, has no designated fire agency to lead the response in the event of a wildfire. The result? The county could be on the hook for all the costs of fighting a fire on the mountain.
As wildfire season burns throughout Oregon, one of Lane County’s most prominent and fire-prone recreation landmarks has no designated agency to provide fire service.
No current contract is in place to cover 1,518-foot Mount Pisgah and about 2,200 acres of Howard Buford Recreation Area southeast of Eugene. A previous agreement with the Oregon Department of Forestry expired in 2023.
Lane County Commissioner Heather Buch highlighted the gap July 9 when the commissioners received a briefing on the 2025 wildfire season.
“We somehow dropped the ball on renewing the contract,” Buch said at the meeting, adding it may have been due to staff turnover at the county or state agency.
Since the 2020 Holiday Farm Fire, Buch has spoken out about the region’s changing climate. That blaze crested mountain ridges and swept into the foothills of Springfield before winds shifted and slowed its advance. Fast-moving fires are increasingly blurring the line between wildland and urban areas — a danger underscored by the Los Angeles fires earlier this year.
Mount Pisgah faces a high risk of ignition and fire can spread quickly through the dry forests and meadows in the summer.
Neither the county nor the state is blaming the other. The oversight underscores a broader issue for Buch and Chris Cline, district forester for the South Cascade District of the Oregon Department of Forestry. Cline, in looking over maps of the county and fire districts that cover them, said he saw numerous parcels of land – some public like Mount Pisgah and others private – that have no designated fire agency assigned to them.
Across Lane County, fire protection is provided by a variety of agencies, including fire districts, the U.S. Forest Service and municipal fire departments for cities.
The lack of an assigned fire agency for Mount Pisgah does not mean that fire crews would not respond, whether from the Oregon Department of Forestry or surrounding agencies.
Crews from surrounding agencies can respond. But it also means that the county would have to pay for those services — and the costs potentially could be higher than they would have been under the former agreement.
Logistically, it also raises other questions, such as which agency would be in charge at the mountain if a fire broke out. However, Cline said, the first agency to respond likely would set up a command post.
Cline was the last party to sign the county’s agreement with the forestry agency, which began in 2020 and ran for three years. Cline moved to a different role in Salem with the agency and returned to the South Cascade District, based in Springfield, after the contract expired. Upon his return and review of maps, he said, he came across various parcels without assigned fire coverage — and the expired agreement covering Mount Pisgah.
“An interesting concern to me is that if there is a fire on unprotected land, land in a county, the ultimate responsibility is back to the county commissioners,” Cline said.
Mount Pisgah is located outside the South Cascade District and the former agreement created a legal mechanism for the forestry agency to take the lead on wildfires there for the county. That agreement had a flat rate of slightly more than $8,000 a year, with a provision for the agency to show up with its engines, bulldozer and personnel. If the agency incurred extra costs or needed to call in more personnel or equipment beyond a base level of service for a large wildfire, the county would pay.
Without an agreement, Cline said, the agency’s South Cascade District can help as needed. But it’s also responsible by law first and foremost to protect landowners in its 1.13-million acre district.
For the other parcels, Cline and other officials will continue to review them and, he said, provide coverage as they can. It doesn’t mean that fire coverage cannot happen there, but it creates complexity about responses when they are outside a district’s jurisdiction.
“If we’re responding to that, then we’re actually, we’re all just kind of responding in good faith,” Cline said.
While that’s a decision for the county, not the forestry agency, Cline said he’s confident that discussions will continue and the issue is not insurmountable.
“We are leaders and community members,” Cline said. “We live here, we work here.”
At the meeting, county staffers told Buch they are aware of the issue. And while Mount Pisgah represents that broader issue, Buch also focused on the specifics:
“We’re in wildfire season now and Mount Pisgah is one of our golden parks,” she said.
Ashli Blow contributed to this report.
