Wildfire is as much a part of summer in Coconino County as popsicle stains and cannonballs into swimming holes. Fire, almost inevitably, comes with the season.

The northern Arizona county covers so much ground, it clocks in as the second-largest in the country. While part of that land mass is vast desert landscapes, a significant portion includes the largest ponderosa pine stand in the world. And in a dry climate, that can create problems. 

When wildfires sweep through a pine forest, they scorch away trees and plants and bake the soil like a kiln firing pottery. Instead of soaking into the soil, rainfall rapidly runs off the surface causing flash floods. That means rural communities across Coconino County are not only at risk from catastrophic wildfires. They’re also vulnerable to dangerous floods that follow. 

In and around Flagstaff, the county seat, a series of wildfires in recent years has created conditions ripe for hazardous flash flooding, some powerful enough to carry away trash cans, cars, and even residents. A 12-year-old girl tragically lost her life in a flash flood in 2010 following the Schultz Fire, which burned at least 15,000 acres.

After the Schultz Fire in 2010, the area experienced the 2,000-acre Museum Fire in 2019. In 2022, Coconino County battled both the 26,000-acre Pipeline Fire and the 19,000-acre Tunnel Fire. 

The two fires in 2022 later resulted in 45 major flood events.

In areas scorched by wildfires, known as burn scar areas, mitigation efforts could save lives. A downpour the area received in early July tested the efforts of the county’s flood control district manager, Lucinda Andreani and her team.

“We had a good test of the system,” she said. “And it worked.”

Andreani is referring to a multi-million-dollar flood mitigation system the county recently completed by utilizing $60 million in funding from the Natural Resources Conservation Service and $42 million from the U.S. Forest Service. That federal funding was spread across nine watersheds to address the capture of sediment and reduce erosion. 

Along with the new system, the county shored up more conventional flood control measures, such as retention basins and storm drains. The combined efforts reduce the risk of damage to about 1,500 homes, Andreani said. Without federal investment in the project, it would have taken the county up to 20 years to be able to complete on its own.

“This is our third rodeo. We have a lot of experience in this arena,” Andreani said of flood mitigation, which the county has gained attention for in other areas of the country. “We have developed this system of mitigation and key to that system are these on-forest watershed restoration measures. Lots of places build traditional flood mitigation. It’s much more challenging in this environment because our flood flows have gone up 10 to 31 times per fire.”

County supervisor Patrice Hortsman called the wildfire to post-wildfire mitigation a vicious cycle for Coconino County. Relationships, across the varied layers of government, are critical to response, recovery, and restoration.

“It has been an incredible partnership,” Hortsman said of everyone involved in the mitigation funding efforts. “We never would have been able to do it had it not been for the relationships with our Senators, the USDA, our congressional representative at the time, the Department of Interior a little bit, and with the state of Arizona.”

As a supervisor, Hortsman has to work with municipal and Tribal governments as well as state, congressional and federal offices. This coordination ahead of an emergency, Hortsman said, ensures that all stakeholders are at the table. 

For Andreani, flood mitigation projects are more than wildfire recovery. They are public safety projects. And she’s grateful the funding was available to not only create safer water flow throughout the county, but also to put minds at ease.

“Without the partnerships, we could not have done the extent of mitigation we were able to do,” she said. “This is life threatening. And what we hear from people in the communities is that there is so much fear that people can’t sleep at night. What we hear when we’re done is relief.”