Latest southern Colorado news, weather and sports from FOX21 News

COLORADO SPRINGS, COLO. (AP) -- Colorado officials are still begging for money to help repair the damage of last year's wildfires.

Sen. Michael Bennet and Colorado Springs Mayor Steve Bach Friday will visit a ranch decimated in the Waldo Canyon fire to try to keep pressure on Congress to provide relief to Colorado and other western states that burned in 2012. Republicans in the House of Representatives stripped funds to repair wildfire damage from the Superstorm Sandy relief package in January.

Bennet, Sen. Mark Udall and Rep. Jared Polis are urging the federal department of Housing and Urban Development to release money to replace the lost relief funds. They say there is a backlog of $20 million worth of repairs in Colorado's badly burnt watersheds.

(Copyright ©2013 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)