Dent Wants To Make Early Wildfire Air Support Permanent

A bipartisan effort is underway in the state of Washington to make permanent a program that allows rural fire districts to call in aircraft early during wildfires.  Moses Lake Republican Tom Dent recently filed House Bill 2104, saying the policy has already proven valuable by saving money and stopping blazes while they are still relatively small.

"These small rural fire departments can call, and they can request air asset support to come in...when a fire begins, and quite often we can knock these fires down really fast," Dent said.

He added early aircraft response can prevent costly state mobilizations, which typically run into the millions of dollars.  Dent said this temporary policy has strong support from fire chiefs and rural districts across the state.

"We've done a lot of fires, we've knocked down quickly, and we've kept our rural fire departments economically whole," Dent said.  "Everybody loves it because it works."

Dent added the goal this session is simple: remove the sunset and keep the program in place before it expires.

Washington’s 2026 session begins January 12th in Olympia.

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