Geno Zamora is very conscious of the media.
After spending years around the media-obsessed Gov. Bill Richardson, how could he not be? The Democrat, one of three seeking his party’s spot on the November ballot in the attorney general race, has been Richardson’s chief legal counsel and a member of two of the governor’s boards.
When I surprised Zamora by showing up a few minutes early for an appointment at his Las Cruces office last week, he was reading Santa Fe County Sheriff Greg Solano’s blog.
Here’s the disclaimer: I’m writing about Zamora because he took the time to come to Las Cruces and asked to meet with me while here. I’ll meet with any candidate for a statewide race who wants to chat when he or she is in town.
Zamora chooses his words carefully. He tries to speak quotably. He is concerned with his image.
An example: In announcing the opening of his Las Cruces office a few months ago, Zamora called this the third largest city in the state, when it’s in fact the second largest. Though the mistake was a campaign staffer’s, Zamora wanted to talk about it with me. After we discussed it, he gave me a new quote.
“We felt it was important to have a campaign office in the second largest city in the state,” he said, emphasizing the word “second.” He wanted the right quote out there.
Zamora, as his campaign finance report revealed Monday, is clearly using his ties to the governor to raise money. He was in Las Cruces for a fundraiser at the home of Richardson supporters Emma Johnson Ortiz and her husband.
A year ago, few delegates at the Democratic Party preprimary convention knew Zamora’s name. This year, he easily won the party’s endorsement for attorney general.
I can understand winning over hundreds of the most involved Democrats when you’re the favored candidate of Richardson, but what about the voters? Polls have shown Gary King far ahead of Zamora and Lemuel Martinez in the primary race.
Zamora said he will win because he has visited every county in the state. He is out to prove he will be the attorney general of the entire state, not just Santa Fe and Albuquerque.
Zamora has backed up those words by opening the Las Cruces campaign office. He’s not the only candidate to say the attorney general should have an office here, but he’s the only one to set the example with his campaign money.
“I decided I needed to put my money where my mouth was,” Zamora told me.
He has all sorts of proposals that sound pretty good. You can read about his plan to clean up state ethics by clicking here.
One promise that stuck with me was his pledge to send attorneys to every county and hold trainings for public officials on laws regarding public meetings, inspection of public records and other issues.
After they are trained, Zamora promised me, he will prosecute violators.
“The further you get from Santa Fe, the less our counties understand the laws, and I have to be the attorney general for the entire state,” Zamora said. “It’s really affected me, traveling my entire state.”
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Zamora and I also spoke about the overcrowding of state prisons. Though the attorney general doesn’t directly deal with that issue, I recently inquired about the candidates’ thoughts on the situation as a way to learn more about their philosophies on law enforcement.
“It’s a delicate balance, because the public wants strict enforcement of our laws, yet the public doesn’t want new prisons,” Zamora said. “The governor and the legislature need to develop appropriate systems for housing criminal offenders.”
He said we need more alternative programs, “such as separate DWI detention facilities and treatment for DWI and drug abuse that will prevent criminals from violating a second, third, or 15th time. … Treatment is good law enforcement because you’re stopping the criminal behavior.”
Actually, Zamora’s original quote included the words “treatment for DWI.” The media-minded candidate asked me a moment later to amend it to read “treatment for DWI and drug abuse.”
I asked the prison question by e-mail a couple of weeks ago. Zamora came to town to answer it. I’m still waiting to hear from Martinez and Republican Jim Bibb, but King responded by e-mail.
“I believe that we should focus on keeping violent offenders in prison for the maximum time available under their sentences. We should not be releasing these offenders early, and if that means building more cells, we should do so,” King said. “I also believe that the state should not depend on private facilities to provide new capacity. If we need new facilities, we should be planning for their construction by the state.”
King also spoke of a need for alternative treatment programs for non-violent offenders.
“These might include community service, halfway houses, increased fines, work-release, intensive probation, etc. for crimes where appropriate. I also think we need to have programs that will reduce recidivism. These would include substance abuse treatment, vocational training and family counseling. The programs could be paid for by savings from the incarceration costs deferred by diverting these non-violent offenders from long-term sentences to more effective and less costly alternatives.”
I’ll let you know when Martinez and Bibb respond.
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Many candidates had a hard time filing their campaign reports online this week. Some republicans have pointed fingers at the secretary of state for not implementing a good system in time for the primary, but some Democrats and Republicans told me the blame lies with the legislature and the governor, who failed to provide enough funding for the secretary of state to get the job done. Apparently, the House passed legislation that would have provided more funding, but it died in the Senate.
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That’s all for today. Thanks for reading, and have a great day!