Technical Corrections to the Northwestern New Mexico Rural Water Projects Act, Taos Pueblo Indian Water Rights Settlement Act, and Aamodt Litigation Settlement Act

This bill proposes to authorize deposits of unpaid interest into three trust funds established under water rights settlement agreements in New Mexico. The funds—the Navajo Nation Water Resources Development Trust Fund, the Taos Pueblo Water Development Fund, and the Aamodt Settlement Pueblos' Fund—were created in 2009 and 2010 but were structured in ways that prevented interest from accumulating on the money held in them.

The bill would allow these funds to receive deposits representing the interest that would have accrued if the original agreements had permitted it. This is a technical correction to address a limitation in the original settlement language. For citizens in the affected communities, this would mean additional resources available for water development projects that these settlement agreements were designed to support.

Currently, the bill has been introduced but has not advanced to committee action. Most introduced bills do not progress further in the legislative process.