The cost of forest fires is out of control. Every year, forest fires result in nearly $700 million in property damage nationwide. On top of that, fire suppression tactics — what fire officials do to contain wildfires once they’ve started — carry a price tag of as much as $1 billion a year. And that number will reach $1.8 billion by 2018, according to a recent report from the U.S. Forest Service.

No doubt something must be done. Humans cause 90 percent of wildfires, and cigarettes are central among those causes. Smoking is appropriately banned in national and state parks, but last month the National Park Service took the wrongheaded step of banning electronic cigarettes in national parks as well.

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