The head of the Federal Emergency Management Agency FEMA) said yesterday that the department needs additional money for disaster recovery in New Mexico.
The comments came in response to questions from the state’s senior senator Martin Heinrich at an appropriations committee hearing in Washington.
Concerned about funding being available after the transition to the second Trump administration in January, Heinrich pressed FEMA administrator Deanne Criswell on the issue of delays in compensating victims of New Mexico’s largest wildfire, in 2022.
After Criswell explained that FEMA had added staff members and increased payouts recently, Heinrich argued that it wasn’t enough.
“Seems like the people who are hit the hardest though, are at the tail end of getting compensated," said Heinrich.
"The simple claims have moved, and the more complicated, but also more devastating claims, are often the ones that are not getting done in a timely way.”
Federal legislation passed in 2022 to compensate victims of the Hermits Peak Calf Canyon fire set aside $4 billion.
The blaze started as a result of two prescribed burns merging, raging out of control, and causing widespread damage to homes, businesses, municipalities, and landscape.
Thus far only $1.5 billion has gone to victims through the claims process.
President Joe Biden wrote a letter to Congress asking it to set aside another $1.5 billion for compensation before the end of the year. Criswell agreed that the original $4 billion amount wouldn’t be enough.
“We expect it to be somewhere over $5 billion, and it may even go higher without that ability to transfer that funding," Criswell said.
"We can meet claims today—the claims that we have had submitted, but I will not be able to meet—(Heinrich: 'But down the road that would not be the case').
"I will not be able to meet the claims down the road based on what I believe is an accurate, report from this independent actuary.” Criswell responded.
Also at the hearing fielding questions from Heinrich and other senators was the head of the USDA, which oversees federal forest land, such as the Santa Fe National Forest.
In response to Heinrich, Xochitl Torres Small, USDA Deputy Secretary, said her agency was committed to hiring more
disaster recovery team members for the Hermit’s Peak/Calf Canyon burn scar.
Victims of the fire have less than a month to file claims with the Hermit’s Peak Claims Office. New Mexico’s delegation cosponsored a law last year that would extend that deadline through the end of 2027.
