Udall, Bennet Request Emergency Funding for Flood Recovery, Wildfire Mitigation

Press Release

Colorado U.S. Senators Mark Udall and Michael Bennet today are urging Senate Appropriators to provide emergency funding to support Colorado's continuing recovery efforts in the aftermath of September's destructive floods. The senators also requested additional resources for wildfire mitigation that would help avoid greater fire suppression and recovery costs in the future.

Udall and Bennet are requesting the resources from the Emergency Watershed Protection (EWP) program, which is designed to support efforts to restore eroded watersheds and damaged drinking water infrastructure. The senators are also pushing for targeted funding through the Hazardous Fuel Reduction accounts, in order to prevent catastrophic wildfires and save the federal government money in the long-term.

"Colorado's need for additional EWP funding...has increased dramatically in the past two months, as Coloradans begin the task of recovering from this fall's historic flooding. As the state and a number of municipalities begin to rebuild and recover from this disaster, they also face an urgent need to stabilize riverbanks and re-channel waterways across a number of different streams that these floods significantly altered," Udall and Bennet wrote to the Senate Appropriations Committee. "In addition, we also urge the Committee to free up additional resources for hazardous fuel reduction in order to reduce the frequency and severity of catastrophic wildfires...Additional funding for hazardous fuel reduction in the Forest Service budget, and an increase in funding for FEMA predisaster mitigation, can help avert far greater costs in the future, and prevent the devastation that occurs from disasters like the Colorado Waldo Canyon, High Park or Black Forest Fires of 2012 and 2013, all of which destroyed hundreds of homes."

Udall and Bennet have led efforts to secure emergency assistance from federal agencies following devastating natural disasters like September's floods and the wildfires that have ravaged the state over the past several years. They helped lead a delegation-wide effort that successfully lifted the cap on the amount of emergency transportation resources Colorado could access to rebuild damaged infrastructure from the floods. The senators also led the Colorado delegation to urge the President to quickly declare an emergency when flooding began to ensure that emergency funding was available for response and recovery efforts.

The senators also led Colorado's Congressional delegation in successfully urging President Obama to designate the Black Forest and Royal Gorge Fires as major disaster areas and pushing the SBA to quickly approve a disaster declaration for the West Fork Fire Complex. They were also instrumental in securing Emergency Watershed Protection funds for areas affected by last year's High Park and Waldo Canyon fires.

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