Davis County briefed on House Bill 48: state to require wildfire inspections, counties to administer fees

Amber Herrick, the Davis County emergency manager with the sheriff’s office, told commissioners at a May 27 work session that House Bill 48 will require inspections for properties the state designates as high wildfire hazard and that the state will set inspection standards, create a statewide database and publish a fee schedule by Jan. 1, 2026. “All homes in the high hazard risk area will be required to have an inspection, and they’ll be assessed a fee based on their wildfire risk score,” Herrick said.

The law assigns counties responsibility for performing or coordinating inspections while Forestry Fire and State Lands will establish the technical standards and maintain a central database, Herrick said. She described a process in which inspectors record a risk score, recommend mitigation steps that can lower that score and — as a result — reduce the annual fee assessed on a property. “They will be able to tell the individual if you do a,…