I am writing today to announce the closure of the New Mexico Independent. After three and a half years of operation in New Mexico, the board of the American Independent News Network, has decided to shift publication of its news…
While environmental activists played their part yesterday during demonstrations at the capitol building, going so far as to dress up as solar panels and to sing the tune of “You Are My Sunshine,” their counterparts, the anti-cap-and-trade contingency who has…
Roughly one quarter of University of New Mexico students are unimpressed with the state’s flagship public school, according to a survey that questioned college students about their higher education experiences.
Rebecca Vigil-Giron is under investigation by New Mexico’s attorney general for her role in the use of federal voter education funds while she was secretary of state, reported Thomas Cole of the Albuquerque Journal over the weekend.
Using funds provided under the Help America Vote Act, Vigil-Giron paid Gutierrez & Associates $6.3 million from 2004-06 for an advertising campaign, but the company can’t account for how $3 million of that was spent. Vigil-Giron now works for the Department of Workforce Solutions.
Neither Vigil-Giron or her boss, Betty Sparrow Doris, said much to Cole about the investigation, but it seems to me that oftentimes these sorts of statements actually say a lot. Refusing to talk about the investigation, including whether she’s the target of a grand jury investigation, Vigil-Giron said, “I’m not allowed to speak to anyone at this point.”
And Betty Sparrow Doris said Vigil-Giron was still an employee at Workforce Solutions but wouldn’t say whether she had been asked to resign, although the “impact” of Vigil-Giron remaining with the Department was discussed: “We had conversations with her about the impact of her being with us.”
GRIPgate
The national press is still on the New Mexico beat, with the New York Times taking a look at New Mexico’s ethics laws in light of the investigation into whether a financial consulting firm got a lucrative contract with the state after making several large contributions to political action committees formed by Gov. Bill Richardson.
The Times characterized New Mexico has having “few” ethics laws, and quoted several New Mexicans, including Matt Brix at the Center for Civic Policy. “We have a system that is wholly out of whack and out of sync with what other states have done and what the federal government has done to try to regulate money and politics,” said Brix. “That invites all kinds of problematic situations.”
