N.M. residents sue agency over fires

SANTA FE, N.M. — Dozens of residents of a small New Mexico community affected by large wildfires that merged in April are suing the U.S. Forest Service over what they call a failure to provide information about the government’s role in starting the blazes.

The Forest Service has acknowledged that two prescribed burns to clear out brush and small trees that can serve as wildfire fuel sparked two blazes that came together as the largest in New Mexico’s history and the biggest burning in the U.S. right now.

The wildfire has charred nearly 500 square miles in the Sangre de Cristo mountain range at the southern edge of the Rocky Mountains. Several hundred homes have been destroyed.

The lawsuit was filed Wednesday in U.S. District Court in Albuquerque on behalf of 50 Mora County residents.

It asks the court to declare that the Forest Service improperly withheld planning documents for the burns, agreements or contracts with anyone who helped carry them out, and information on the rules and regulations that govern such burns.

Without the information, the lawsuit alleges, the residents “cannot determine the Forest Service’s responsibility — other than media accounts — for starting the fire.”

The Forest Service said it does not comment on pending litigation. It has said erratic winds during one prescribed burn carried embers outside the targeted area. The other wildfire emerged from a burn set on a pile of dead vegetation in January that smoldered for weeks, even under snow.

The agency has put a hold on prescribed burns nationwide pending its own investigation.