TAOS — Not many people live in southeastern Taos County, but the few residents and property owners there who suffered damages from the Hermits Peak/Calf Canyon Fire feel forgotten.
They fear their losses won’t be compensated as part of the $2.5 billion federal Hermits Peak Fire Assistance Act, which was incorporated into a continuing appropriations bill signed into law by President Joe Biden.
Antonia Roybal-Mack, one of a handful of New Mexico attorneys representing hundreds of wildfire victims, said residents in neighboring Mora and San Miguel counties, who saw far more devastation from the wildfire and its aftermath, have had a tough road to win compensation from the federal government, whose controlled burns sparked the blaze.
But, she said, residents of Taos County will “need to go sue because [Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham] or President Biden decided Taos County should not be included in the damages.”
She also questions the process through which all residents affected by the wildfire will receive compensation.
Federal disaster declarations are based “on the number of people affected,” Roybal-Mack acknowledged. She added, “If you’ve driven down N.M. 518, there’s absolute burn in Taos County.”
When the state’s largest-ever wildfire swept into Taos County in May, firefighters prevented the blaze from burning any structures. But residents of Angostura, Vadito, Tres Ritos and other communities near the Taos-Mora line lost income and food supplies during a two-week evacuation period, and acres of private forest was scorched in the blaze, damaging watersheds.
Many residents are also concerned their water quality has been affected by contaminants from the burned watersheds above their homes during heavy monsoon rains.
“It’s not the fire; it’s the aftermath,” said Stephen Barr, who lives in a small cabin at El Lodge in Angostura, where he manages several additional rental cabins and pays the bills as a part-owner.
His goal was to own the property and turn it into a glamping destination or equine therapy camp for autistic children. Now Barr’s dreams are pinned to the outcome of likely lawsuits against the federal government.
El Lodge, which Barr noted was built in 1948 or 1950, sits about a mile west of Mora County.
“I lost business; I lost all the rent for two months; I lost $150 per night for 60 nights on the lodge, which still has smoke damage,” Barr said, sitting inside his rustic cabin between N.M. 518 and the Rio Pueblo. A ridge burned by the wildfire stands on the other side of his home.
“I’m not going to be able to rent it this whole winter season; I took it off Airbnb completely,” Barr said, adding he’s concerned about the water supply at El Lodge, which he fears may be contaminated as a result of the fire. “Sipapu [Ski and Summer Resort] opens on Nov. 18; I should be booked solid.”
He’s been denied insurance for the property, “which I need to have to run this business the way I had intended to,” Barr said. “I have exhausted my entire IRA. I am now most likely not going to be able to complete the purchase of this property and restore it to it’s former glory as I had planned and provide jobs to the local community and revenue in the form of hotel taxes and ecotourism dollars. Instead, this historic property will just rot into the ground.
“Had it been a lightning strike that caused it, I’d feel differently,” Barr added. “But to me, this was a case of arson — or at the very least, criminal negligence — on the part of the Forest Service.”
Across the county line in Mora County, where Biden ordered the Federal Emergency Management Agency to expand eligibility for costs related to all manner of losses, folks are largely still waiting for compensation. Damages run the gamut from burned homes and vehicles, lost livestock, livelihoods and recreational business properties to water system damage and the destruction wrought by catastrophic flooding that followed the blaze.
“I can tell you what they’re experiencing right now” in Mora and San Miguel counties, Roybal-Mack said. “What people are experiencing right now is a real humanitarian crisis, where the government did the $2.5 billion today, but they’re experiencing lines to come apply for U.S. Department of Agriculture funds, for the Small Business Administration. It’s a full-time job for people with full-time jobs who have lost everything and are trying to rebuild. It doesn’t help with the humanitarian crisis today.”
She said, “I just got off the phone with a family, and their entire well went out [Nov. 7]. … When they went to try and fix it, they realized the whole thing is corroded from the floods. They don’t have money; they don’t have water, and they need to replace the well. They’re experiencing homelessness, sleeping on their children’s couches; some are sleeping in makeshift tent shelters that they have decided to try and weather the winter in.”
Recently, she said, she learned FEMA had approved just 22 people for trailers, while there are hundreds without homes.
A New Mexico Environment Department spokesperson confirmed the Agua Pura Mutual Domestic Water Consumers Association in Chacon and the Buena Vista Mutual Domestic Water Consumers Association east of Mora “are still hauling water for their customers due to fire impacts” and noted the state doesn’t have jurisdiction over private wells, so there’s no estimate of how many private wells within the burn scar have failed.
The Environment Department “provided testing for fire-impacted communities at three water fair events” this year,” the spokesperson wrote, but “does not have additional plans to test domestic well water at this time.”
“Well-owners seeking water testing can do so through a certified laboratory,” the email continued.
Taos County Commissioner Candyce O’Donnell sympathizes with Barr and his neighbors but said the state was unable to justify declaring a disaster in Taos County.
Nora Meyers Sackett, press secretary for Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham, confirmed “the wildfire damages in Taos County do not meet the federal threshold required for federal disaster assistance.”
But, Sackett, said, “The limitations of the FEMA programs [is] why the Hermits Peak Fire Assistance Act is so important. While the guidance for funding distribution is still being finalized, our understanding is that affected residents of Taos County would be able to apply for Hermits Peak–Calf Canyon Act funding. This is an important aspect of the Act that the governor has strongly advocated for and will continue to push for, in addition to every possible federal dollar to make New Mexicans affected by the federally-caused wildfires whole.”
Roybal-Mack questions whether FEMA is “capable or prepared to handle this.”
She added it doesn’t make sense to task the federal government with designing, implementing and administering a program to compensate people for harm it caused.
“It goes against the model of every mass disaster we’ve had in this country, where the entity that caused the harm, i.e. the federal government, is the entity that tells you how much harm they caused and decides how much money you get for the caused harm,” she said. “In every other disaster, the entity that caused the harm pays money, but somebody else — an independent administrator — decides what dollar amount is on that harm.”
Roybal-Mack said she wants a retired, or even sitting, district judge to oversee the administration of claims, not a federal agency.
“There are probably 10 retired District Court judges who would be fantastic claims administrators that understand New Mexico. We really need to push hard that FEMA does that,” she said.
