Federal officials will wrap up their offices in Roswell as at least one employee heads to California to respond to ongoing fires.

In a press release, FEMA said it would continue working with the New Mexico Department of Homeland Security and Emergency Management.

The application period for federal disaster assistance from the Roswell floods closed on Thursday, Jan. 2. However, residents have an additional 60 days to provide a late application, but an explanation for the delay must be provided “by phone, in writing or in-person,” according to the website. Those applications are reviewed on a case-by-case basis.

Talking Disaster

Maria Padron, who’s worked for FEMA for 25 years, managed public affairs for the South Fork and Salt fires and the destructive Roswell floods.

Padron announced her reassignment to the California fires, in an email Tuesday, writing. “My city needs me. I had been redeployed to Los Angeles.”

In a call with Source NM, she said hers is the only reassignment she knows of.

Source NM: The U.S. experienced a near-record number of destructive storms, and that’s poised to escalate, considering the effects climate change is having. Do you have anything to say to the people experiencing disasters, many for the first time?

Padron: Always be prepared, have a prepared kit in your car, because you never know when a disaster is going to strike. People need to be aware of what’s going on with the climate, and their surroundings at all times.

In your departure letter, you said ‘your city needs you,’ and you went to school in Carson, California. How do these fires personally affect you?

I live in – not quite the Valley. I live in a safe place, away from the hills. I have two friends, they’ve lost their homes, one in Pasadena the other in Pacific Palisades. So even though I wasn’t affected, I’m affected indirectly.

Is there anything you learned from Roswell or Ruidoso that you think is going to inform your work in LA?

You know, it’s a different ball game. This one is a catastrophic event. There were 1,000, maybe – I forgot how many houses were destroyed in Ruidoso – but this one is miles and miles of destruction. Every disaster is a different ball game, but lessons learned: If you live close to the mountains, in the woods, you need to be prepared all the time for emergencies.

Source NM note: more than 1,400 structures including more than 856 homes were destroyed in the South Fork and Salt Fires.

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The Rail Runner arriving at the Santa Fe Depot (Photo by Austin Fisher / Source NM)

The U.S. Department of Transportation has will provide more than $172 million for a swath of New Mexico transportation projects, the state’s congressional delegation announced Tuesday.

The federal funding comes via the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, and “reflects” the law’s intention, U.S. Sen. Martin Heinrich (D-NM) said in a statement: to ” improve safety for everyone using our roads, grow local economies, lower transportation costs, and create high-quality jobs New Mexicans can build their families around.”

The funded projects include:

• $61.8 million to the City of Las Cruces for the Mesa Grande Drive Extension Project

• $44.8 million for the state Department of Transportation for the Allison Road Grade Separated Crossing Project, which will support improvements to BNSF Railway infrastructure and Amtrak’s Southwest Chief route in Gallup, New Mexico

• $36.1 million to the state transportation project for reconstruction of two segments on the NM 128 mainline and three major intersections at WIPP Road, Buck Jackson and Orla roads in Carlsbad

• $22.4 million to the Rio Metro Regional Transit District to construct a new Rail Runner expression operations and maintenance facility

• $3.3 million for McKinely County/BNSF’s rail crossing elimination project

• $2 million for the City of Gallup for its 2nd and 3rd street crossings community planning project

• $1 million for the City of Clovis for its New Mexico Corridor Improvement Project

• $480,913 to the Mescalero Apache Tribe for a snowplow and salt spreader

• $158,448 to the Pueblo of Taos for capital improvements for two of the pueblo’s bus stops to upgrade them to American with Disabilities Act standards

“These projects will ensure safer roads for pedestrians, cyclists, and motorists, while making our rail systems safer and strengthening the links between our communities,” U.S. Sen. Ben Ray Luján (D-NM) said in a statement

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