Southampton Pine Barrens wildfire plan follows Westhampton Pines fire lessons

The new Community Wildfire Protection Plan covers about 29,000 acres from Eastport to Squiretown Road in Hampton Bays, stretching north to Riverside and Flanders and bounded on the south by Montauk Highway. That footprint puts homes, wooded lots and protected land side by side across a wide swath of central and western Suffolk, where a single fast-moving fire can threaten evacuation routes, smoke conditions and emergency access as much as it does structures.

The Central Pine Barrens Joint Planning and Policy Commission said the effort grew out of lessons from the 600-acre Westhampton Pines fire and other recent wildfire scares. The commission says the region’s fire-dependent ecosystems have become more dangerous because decades of suppression allowed fuel to build up, while development into wooded land has created a wildland-urban interface where fires hit people hardest. Suffolk County already sees more than 800 brush fires a year on average during spring and summer.

Residents got their first look at the plan at an open house May 5 at the Flanders Community Center, where SWCA Environmental Consultants led small-group discussions and used idea boards to gather public input for the 2027 Southampton Pine Barrens CWPP. The commission’s public materials also pointed residents to a survey tied to the same plan, signaling that the document is still being shaped before it is finalized. Officials discussed how communities identify wildfire risk, reduce fuel loads and make homes less likely to ignite, a practical focus for neighborhoods where wooded lots sit close to driveways, roads and fire districts.

The project has financial backing from a $185,000 U.S. Forest Service Community Wildfire Defense Grant, and commission materials say it will be integrated with the existing Comprehensive Prescribed Fire Management Plan for the Central Pine Barrens. The wider fire-management strategy divides the 106,000-acre preserve into five units, giving fire officials a framework for both prescribed burning and emergency response.