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Prescribed burning: what Florida, Alabama and South Carolina law and the Georgia Forestry Commission say about certified burn managers

How four Southern states define a certified prescribed burn manager, what the written plan and the permit must cover, and how each source words the protection from liability for a certified burn.

Checked against the sources at the bottom of this page on October 9, 2026. Rules, fees and pay change: the source has the last word.

This page reports what the official source says. It is not legal advice: ask the office named here. It follows the Florida Statutes, the Alabama Forestry Commission's pages on the Prescribed Burn Act, the South Carolina Code of Laws and a Georgia Forestry Commission certification page. Georgia's own statute sections were not read for this page; the commission page names them. It sets no rule for tree crews and says nothing about burning debris from a removal job, which is covered in the tree waste and chip rules.

The four sources side by side

StateWho is certified and what a certified burn needsLiability wording
FloridaFlorida Statutes section 590.125. A certified prescribed burn manager is a person who completed the Florida Forest Service's program and holds a valid certification number. The Service adopts the rules for certifying and decertifying managers from their experience, training and record of compliance. A written prescription before authorization, the landowner's specific consent, authorization from the Service before ignition, adequate firebreaks, and enough people and equipment to contain the fire. The statute has the manager on site with a copy of the prescription, supervising until the burn is completed.The owner, leaseholder or agent is not liable under section 590.13 for damage or injury from the fire, a reignited smoldering burn or the smoke, unless gross negligence is proven. The Service is not liable for burns it authorizes. A certified burner who violates the section commits a second degree misdemeanor.
AlabamaPrescribed Burn Act, section 9-13-270 on. Certified Prescribed Burn Manager. The commission's burn manager page says the course is being revised, with an online part and a one-day in-person course and test. At least one certified manager supervising, a written prescription that is witnessed or notarized before the burn, a burning permit from the commission, and compliance with state law and rules.No owner or agent conducting a burn in compliance with the article is liable for damages or injury from fire or smoke unless shown not to have used the degree of care required of others in the same position (section 9-13-273(a)).
South CarolinaPrescribed Fire Act, Code of Laws title 48, chapter 34. Section 48-34-20 defines a certified prescribed fire manager as someone who completed a certification program approved by the State Commission of Forestry. A written plan that complies with the state smoke management guidelines, prepared before authorization and kept on site, and a certified manager present who supervises from ignition until the burn is judged safe (section 48-34-40).Section 48-34-50: not liable for damage from the fire unless negligence is proven, and not liable for damage from the smoke unless gross negligence or recklessness is proven. Section 48-34-60 says a person may conduct a prescribed fire without a certified manager present.
GeorgiaGeorgia Forestry Commission certification page. The page says applicants need a passed written test, two years of experience and a record of having been in charge of five prescribed burns before they are certified. The page lists a code of ethics, a smoke management plan and a prescribed burn plan resource, and names the state's prescribed burn laws as Official Code of Georgia section 12-6-90 and sections 12-6-145 through 12-6-149.The page says certification can reduce the liability of people conducting outdoor burning. It gives no statute wording.

Definitions of the burn itself

Each state defines the activity in its own words. Florida's statute defines prescribed burning as burning by broadcast for vegetative fuels under specified environmental conditions, with measures to stop spread beyond a predetermined area. It treats pile burning of land-clearing and tree-cutting debris that originates on the site as a separate certified activity, with its own certified pile burner and written plan, a burn finished no later than 1 hour after sunset, or at least 1 hour before sunset in an area the Service marks as smoke sensitive. Alabama's act defines prescribed burning as fire applied under control to naturally occurring plant fuels for ecological, forestry, farming and wildlife purposes. South Carolina's act says the burn is also known as a controlled burn.

What the Alabama plan must hold

The commission lists minimum contents for a prescribed burn plan. They include the owner's and the burner's details, the manager's certification number, the acres, county, section, township and range, fuel type and amount, topography and purpose. They also include manpower and equipment, firing techniques, areas that smoke could harm, the range of weather wanted (surface and transport wind, relative humidity, temperature, minimum mixing height, dispersion index), a sketch of the area, and the manager's signed and witnessed or notarized signature with the permit number.

Nuisance and property right wording

Florida says a certified prescribed burn is in the public interest, is not a public or private nuisance when conducted under the state air pollution statutes and rules, and is a property right of the owner. South Carolina's section 48-34-40 uses the same public interest, nuisance and property right wording for burns that follow its guidelines. Alabama's commission page quotes section 9-13-271(a), which calls prescribed burning a landowner property right, and reads it to mean that only a statute, not an agency rule, can restrict it.

Sources