GRANTS, NM – On Friday June 21, the City of Grants and other areas in Cibola County saw flash flooding due to heavy rainfall and damage to both public and private buildings, vehicles, and transportation roadways, because of this both the city and the county declared being in a State of Emergency and Disaster.
CIBOLA COUNTY
The Cibola County Commission called an Emergency Meeting on June 25, in order to pass a resolution declaring a disaster in the County of Cibola due to the flooding. The resolution states, “On June 21, 2024, at 1634 hours, a flood event began due to a copious amount of rain, affecting several homes, vehicles, and transportation roadways (bridges and roads) throughout Cibola County… the Cibola County Emergency Manager has reported numerous instances of flooding throughout the County, particularly impacting the areas of Bluewater, Milan, Grants, Cubero, and Lobo Canyon… the flooding has resulted in undue human suffering and hardship and threatens the safety, health, welfare, and wellbeing of the citizens and local economy of the County of Cibola… [the Cibola County Board of Commissioners] do hereby declare the County of Cibola to be in a state of Emergency and disaster for the purpose of exercising necessary emergency powers, expending local resources, and requesting aid, assistance, relief programs, and funding that may be available from the State of New Mexico.”
Manager Kate Fletcher said that within one hour seven emergency calls came through the dispatch center for rescues. Due to this the county had to close many of their roads, and mobilized all of their available departments, the road crews, maintenance crews, and law enforcement. She said, “The City of Grants got hit very, very hard and we have been assisting them in multiple areas, we want to continue that.” Commissioner Daniel Torres asked, “The road crew and everything, are they taking care of the areas that are rural and getting hit just as hard as Grants before they’re focusing on Grants?” Fletcher responded that yes, and that they mobilized two crews to Cubero and Seboyeta before the storm hit. Fletcher said, “When we realized that our areas outside, we’re not getting hit as bad, that was when we did mobilize them into the city. Yes, we will always take care of what we have, but we also have to think about the people and the safety.”
CITY OF GRANTS
The City of Grants City Council called an Emergency Meeting on June 26, in order to pass a resolution proclaiming an ongoing flooding disaster in the City of Grants.
The resolution states,
“Over the preceding weeks, rains have caused flooding that destroyed or severely damaged roads and, in some instances, made egress and ingress to local businesses or residences impossible… road crews have been working around the clock to repair the damage… the City of Grants City Council determines the above-described flooding constitutes on going disaster. Staff is hereby directed to procure whatever aid, funds, or resources that may be available to assist in preventing further damage and in making the repairs necessary to bring infrastructure impacted by the flooding back to a functioning condition… the Council authorizes the use of all available resources of the City to assist in the City’s response to this situation.”
Mayor Erik Garcia said that this recent flooding on June 21 was a devastating 100-year storm that resulted in severe damages to homes, businesses, vehicles, and roads. Mayor Garcia said that despite this the city is making progress in their infrastructure highlighting the newly installed first street pump street and how it worked as intended draining the street within an hour. He said that despite this they have a lot of work to do for the infrastructure within the city and there are discussions regarding a possible ordinance that would require citizens to maintain drains and drainage channels that are on the citizens private property. Mayor Garcia said that it is difficult to fix the drainage channels as well if they are located on private property, he said that they will work on cleaning the ditches and will request from the Governor to clean the ditches, but they will not be able to touch private property. Councilor George Garcia said it was amazing to see the response of the community, with individuals helping each other and entities coming together to pack sandbags. Mayor Garcia also mentioned multiple times that the city needs to work on the bio-park project, which according to him will assist with drainage to slow down the water.
Members of the community went before the council to bring grievances regarding damages from the flooding. Multiple individuals spoke about the flooding on McBride Road, Mt. Taylor Edition and on the old highway. One individual mentioned that there is one ditch in the area that is at ground level and ends up flooding the entire area due to the water having no where to go. They mentioned that past the bridge many of the ditches are also filled with various items. The individual said, “You guys need to come and look and talk to these people. I’m not blaming anybody, it’s an act of God, yeah, but there is stuff that we can do… You guys can say we’re going to clean out [the ditches], or you are going to pay for all the people’s houses that it’s going to affect.”
Lisa Rains, who owns Secure Storage on McBride Road, spoke about the damages that have occurred at Secure Storage. She said, “That water was so violent, that it came in. I mean it didn’t just rise up in there, it was violent we had a cement pad to hold our gate, it tossed it, it completely threw it.” Rains also mentioned that they experienced a lot of flooding in their various units and there is a large amount of sludge in each unit. She said, “My concern is this damage has already happened. We’re trying to take care of our 150 customers over there, some of them have lost everything and I don’t know what to tell them. My concern is if there’s more rain, what’s going to happen because there is no ditch back there.”
One individual that was present at the meeting asked the council, “Are we ready for the next one, are we ready for the next storm?” Mayor Erik Garcia responded, “No, ma’am we’re not.”