Abstract: Fire is the answer! What was the question? In this session, guest presenter Heather Heward explores how historic and contemporary relationships between humans and fire in the Western United States have contributed to the recent decades of larger and more severe fires in the region—and how we might relate to fire more effectively in the future. With a colloquial style, Heward employs useful metaphors, such as the accumulation of credit card debt as an analog for fuels build-up in Western forests to explore our options for reducing this fire deficit. Heward advocates for the use of prescribed burning and details local and landscape level opportunities for the application of fire on the landscape to reduce large-scale, high-intensity wildfires. The session closes with Heward’s tips & tricks for communicating about the changing nature of fires in the West.