Where there’s smoke, there’s fire – and political unity

The acrid smoke from massive wildfires that ignited in rural eastern Washington last Labor Day weekend drifted over the Cascades before blanketing the state’s populous western flank. Ashen clouds darkened the skies above Seattle, Tacoma, and the capital, Olympia, looming like a rebuke of state lawmakers for failing to alleviate a worsening wildfire crisis.

The memory of that spectacle lingered after the haze cleared, and when the Legislature convened in January, a sense of urgency – and unity – prevailed in the statehouse. Republicans joined with Democrats to unanimously approve a wide-ranging wildfire...