I made numerous trips to Las Cruces in the 90's; we had an operation at White Sands, at the time, and we all mostly stayed in Las Cruces and would drive out to the White Sands Missile Range (WSMR) each day. There were many employees of various contractors that did the same as we did. When we had a live test, it was sometimes difficult to find accomodations in Las Cruces, as there were so many people in town.
The city can't afford to pay the extortion request, because if they did, every crazy terrorist in the U.S. would be doing exactly the same thing in Anytown, U.S.A. The extortionists don't stand much of a chance of collecting in this situation, and you can be assured that the FBI, as well as the New Mexico State investigators, will be all over the situation. If the extortionists activate their threat, it will be short-lived (at least, let's hope so).