California is an exporter of ideas, with Silicon Valley and Hollywood being the two most prolific examples. But the recent wildfires throughout the state are exporting another concept — crisis offers the chance to reinvent. Similar to the plumes of the 1930s Dust Bowl that brought so many people into the state, today’s smoke plumes are a motivation to pick up and leave. But that doesn’t need to happen.

The easy explanation for the fires, and the one on the tips of the tongues of most elected officials, is climate change, and while a changing climate’s effects are easy to see, from longer dry seasons and droughts to higher temperatures, what gets overlooked as a contributor are forest and public land management policy. Decades of fire suppression have led to a literal tinder box of forest material — pinecones and needles, branches and fallen trees — and the results should not surprise anyone.

Another overlooked contributor to the fires is, ironically, transm