GOP hits Herrera for delaying release of reports

I wrote on Tuesday about the delay in the release of campaign finance reports for legislative and Public Regulation Commission races. Now, the state Republican Party is hitting the secretary of state because of the holdup.

Though reports were originally due by Monday, problems led to a filing extension until Tuesday, and Secretary of State Mary Herrera doesn’t plan to make the reports available to the public on her office’s Web site until May 26.

“We should demand more from our elected officials. It is highly unreasonable for Mary Herrera to shield public information from public examination for two weeks,” state GOP Executive Director Adam Feldman said in a news release. “Our state government should be continually open, accountable and transparent, but the Democratic establishment that has controlled New Mexico for the past 78 years has prevented it from being so. We’re calling on Mary Herrera to release the state campaign finance reports immediately; it’s a part of her job, and she needs to do it.”

The GOP is right. This is entirely fair criticism. Herrera, when running for office in 2006, hit her predecessor, Rebecca Vigil-Giron, in part because of the poor online campaign finance reporting system in the office. Herrera pledged to improve it. She has not, at least yet.