A law passed in the just-finished legislative session offers a little hope to people who were laid off when the San Juan Generating Station and coal mine in Farmington closed.
A long-delayed process is set to begin moving forward again to bring financial assistance to a community where hundreds of people, many from the Navajo Nation, lost their jobs.
A 2019 law known as the Energy Transition Act promised $20 million to help people who lost their jobs when the coal-powered complex closed. But it set a one-year time limit on the process, which expired as legal challenges and the pandemic slowed the implementation of the law.
Now, an amendment to the law removes that time limit.
"It really was a recognition by the legislature that this process has taken longer than what was expected," said Jason Sandel, a businessman and former Farmington city councilor who leads a community advisory committee which has heard proposals for how the money might be spent.
He says now that the new legislation has passed, the committee will make a decision.
"We have some clarity about those affected workers. And so we'll be in short order coming together to finalize a recommendation," he said.
Another law passed in the session provides for a plan to be made for the cleanup of the generating station and coal mine to minimize environmental contamination.
