Southern Oregon Tourism Suffers Due to Wild Fires

You step outside into a dense cloud of smoke and begin to smell the forest burning like a giant campfire, only able to see the outline of the mountains that fill the skyline east of Ashland. You put on your facemask on and go about your day pretending like you aren’t in a giant cloud of smoke, this is what life was like in Ashland this summer.

Summer in Southern Oregon usually means a few wildfires, but they have never as big as impact as they did this year. With a total of 1880 fires in Oregon alone this summer it had a large impact on the air quality in the Rogue Valley, especially Ashland. I spent the summer here working and it was crazy not seeing the blue sky for weeks at a time. Ashland developed a spooky vibe over the course of the summer, with locals wearing smoke masks to protect their lungs and the lights glistening through the smoke.

This smoke may sound cool at first, but it had a larger impact than most may realize. Downtown Ashland relies on the Oregon Shakespeare Festival to bring tourist to town to spend money at shops and restaurants, but due to air quality OSF had to cancel 22 shows thus far into the season. Each canceled show loses the festival $60,000 each, and that’s just to see the play.

Ashland’s restaurant business dropped about 30% due to lack of tourists and locals leaving town to escape the smoke. I work at The Black Sheep, an English pub in downtown Ashland and the smoke greatly impacted our business. We went from being packed to making shifts unbearable due to lack of customers, the smoke was not good for anyone. Hotels also lost a lot of money due to large group cancelations leaving the rooms empty and not having enough time to fill them.

A total of 846,411 acres were burned in Oregon during the summer of 2018, causing $514.6 million dollars in damages as well as having a large impact on people’s health. If I went on a walk for no more than 5 blocks without a face mask, I would have a headache, as well as chest pain. The Air Quality really effected the elderly and retirement community in Ashland forcing them to go elsewhere and not put money into our economy.

While businesses are still recovering from the major loss in tourism this summer, it is tough to not notice all the shops closing their doors for good when walking through downtown Ashland. This is a direct impact of the smoke, and it is bound to be worse next summer. Luckily Ashland is pretty good about removing underbrush to help prevent forest fires in the valley, however other places are not taking those preventative measures. By removing underbrush, it prevents the risk of a wildfire beginning in the first place, which may have limited growth of many the fires this summer.

While we will never be able to control lightning storms, we can at least take preventative measures to help reduce the risk, because Ashland can never experience another summer like this one. With climate change becoming a real issue and causing diverse weather patterns every preventative step needs to be taken. Local newspapers have even told the general public to try to eat out at least once a week to help get those business back into good financial standing. If Ashland’s restaurant industry continues to lose over 25% of its business every summer, it will eventually lead to most restaurants closing for good.

Now that Halloween is just around the corner there is no need to fret about wildfires and air quality anymore, but we do need to take the preventative steps to reduce fire risk and help local businesses stay afloat.