The state owns only about 3% of California’s wooded acreage. Some land is owned by cities, counties, Native American tribes and private holders. Former President Trump criticized California’s fire management:

But in fact, the biggest forest landlord in California, by far, is the federal government, which manages 18 national forests in the state.

The U.S. Forest Service has a longtime policy of putting out every fire, and quickly, which has packed the federal land with fuel to burn. And its budget falls short of the cost of needed work to reduce that fuel.

If a burned-out forest is replaced by chaparral or brush, that landscape loses more than 90 percent of its capacity to take in and store carbon.