Among all of the late in the day congressional machinations on Friday was some good news for victims of New Mexico’s largest ever wildfire.
Part of the stopgap spending bill that elected officials passed to keep the government open was additional funding to compensate people suffering losses in the Hermits Peak Calf Canyon Fire-and an extension of a filing deadline for claims.
The continuing resolution passed by congress provides an additional $1.5 billion dollars for disaster recovery, bringing the total federal compensation pool to nearly $5.5 billion.
Prior to passage, individuals and organizations had until Friday, December 20, to submit notice of loss claims in response to the 2022 fire, but the bill included an extension of that deadline to March 14 of next year.
New Mexico senators Martin Heinrich and Ben Ray Lujan and the state’s US representative for district 3 Teresa Leger Fernandez played key roles in getting those New Mexico-specific additions to the legislation through Congress.
Their efforts included communications with president Joe Biden and administrative leaders at the Federal Emergency Management Agency in recent weeks.
