The 416 Fire has affected all of us in some way or another. I’m thinking of all the people and animals whose lives have been displaced by this disaster.

Our community, myself included, is sending gracious thoughts to the trained professionals working tirelessly to put this fire out and the local organizations that have been working to prevent wildfires from happening, e.g., FireWise.

I’m certainly grateful to them for their work and contributions during this testing time to Durango.

Scientists, like our local Mountain Studies Institute, have forewarned about weather extremes in our region that will be inevitable due to climate change.

Yes, wildfires are a natural phenomenon in forests. However, we know disasters such as the 416 Fire are going to be more and more likely as our area will increasingly face more extreme droughts.

Yet, preventative solutions to curb climatic changes are not being seriously considered or implemented by the Trump administration.

This administration is recklessly deregulating this country into the wrong side of environmental history!

We need leaders to start fighting for environmental issues, like climate change, which affects our communities’ health and safety. We need political leaders to lead our communities first in climate change prevention rather than making communities plead for action to start climate change prevention solutions.

The Trump administration needs to start employing current solutions to prevent climate change because the arid West will increasingly continue to feel the burn of its consequences.

Claer Foster

Durango