{"id":32632,"date":"2023-07-28T13:59:00","date_gmt":"2023-07-28T19:59:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/unm-grant-will-help-underserved-communities-get-water-funding\/"},"modified":"2023-07-28T19:59:00","modified_gmt":"2023-07-28T19:59:00","slug":"unm-grant-will-help-underserved-communities-get-water-funding","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/unm-grant-will-help-underserved-communities-get-water-funding\/","title":{"rendered":"UNM grant will help underserved communities get water funding"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\"The
The Environmental Protection Agency presents UNM\u2019s Southwest Environmental Finance Center with a check for $4 million to help underserved communities navigate the process of applying for federal water project funds on Monday. (Mia Casas\/KUNM)<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

Millions of dollars are coming to New Mexico for water projects through the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act of 2021, but not everyone who needs it has the knowledge or time required to apply.<\/p>\n

The University of New Mexico announced it will receive $4 million to help underserved communities in the state navigate the process.<\/p>\n

The money is going to UNM\u2019s Southwest Environmental Finance Center, led by Heather Himmelberger. At an event on Monday to announce the grant, she said the funds will help her department carry out this work for about five years and fill crucial gaps in the process.<\/p>\n

\u201cThese communities need support to help ensure that the projects they take on fit their needs and capabilities as well as their culture,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

The center works with different levels of government to navigate the financial side of environmental work. In this case, it will help underserved communities identify projects that the funds could cover and apply for them.<\/p>\n

U.S. Rep. Teresa Leger Fernandez said at the event that she\u2019s seen several communities in her district lose out on funding because they didn\u2019t have the money to pay someone to do the work required to apply for it.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn too many of my communities, we don\u2019t have that capacity. Well, that $4 million is gonna help,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

As of June, the federal government has allocated nearly $800 million from the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act for clean water projects.<\/p>\n

This coverage is made possible by the W.K. Kellogg Foundation and KUNM listeners. It is republished here with permission.<\/em><\/p>\n

KUNM\u2018s Public Health New Mexico<\/a> reporting project provides in-depth, investigative and continuous coverage of public health in New Mexico, with an emphasis on poverty and educational equity.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Southwest Environmental Finance Center will carry out projects<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":32633,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[28],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-32632","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-headlines"],"acf":[],"author_name":"Website Administrator","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32632","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=32632"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32632\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/32633"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=32632"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=32632"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=32632"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=32632"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}