People came from Hatch in the north and Chaparral in the south Tuesday to discuss recent flooding with the Doña Ana County Board of Commissioners, and the extent of the ongoing tragedy became apparent.
Public Works Director Jorge Granados told commissioners that the “whole county is pretty saturated.” He detailed rains that started the last week in July and, since then, have drenched every community in the county at least once and caused damage in many.
The most serious damage, obviously, was in Hatch, which found itself underwater a week ago when water spilled out of an overwhelmed arroyo and into downtown.
Gov. Bill Richardson toured the damage today. He sent a request to President Bush Monday asking him to declare the county a federal disaster area. U.S. Sen. Jeff Bingaman, D-N.M., announced today that he has sent a letter to the FEMA director in support of such a declaration, which would free up federal money for those affected by the tragedy.
State law prevents the county and state from doing anything but repairing public infrastructure, leaving residents whose personal property has been devastated to hope for the mercy of President Bush.
The county has, thus far, spent $140,000 on man hours and equipment to respond to the tragedy, Granados said. He has not yet tallied the cost of materials. Every county public works employee except those who work at the airport has been pulled off other duties to respond to the flooding, he said.
There has been so much work that, before flooding began, the county was about two weeks ahead of schedule on all construction projects, and is now six weeks behind schedule, Granados said.
Commissioner Bill McCamley suggested that it’s time to consider adding a development impact fee to fund upgrades to the county’s flood control system, and Commissioner Oscar Vasquez-Butler said “uncontrolled growth around arroyos” has to stop.
“When you see this devastation, it’s going on around arroyos and it’s about time this county act responsibly,”
Flood Commissioner Paul Dugie said the flood control system is aging. In addition, he said Placitas Arroyo, which has breached twice in Hatch in the past week, is on private property. Dugie and a resident of Hatch both said the arroyo should not be the responsibility of a private landowner, but Dugie said it would be quite expensive to take on such a project.