Sen. Mary Kay Papen and Rep. Janice Arnold-Jones appeared on the television show Report from Santa Fe with Lorene Mills this weekend to discuss the housing authority scandal and a reform bill making its way through the current legislative session.
Senate Bill 20, sponsored by Papen, a Las Cruces Democrat, would expand reforms approved in 2007 to increase oversight and restructure the state’s affordable housing system. Arnold-Jones, an Albuquerque Republican, has been an equal partner in championing the reform, as has Lt. Gov. Diane Denish.
Most of the system toppled in 2006 when the Albuquerque-based Region III Housing Authority defaulted on $5 million in bonds it owed the state. Soon thereafter, the State Investment Council released a report that found widespread misuse of the bond money, which was supposed to be spent on houses. Last month, the state auditor released long-awaited special audits that confirmed the problems.
Papen and Arnold-Jones are pushing the reform bill, but they also spoke with Mills about the case Attorney General Gary King is preparing to take before a grand jury related to the housing authority scandal.
“We’re hoping that… will clear up some of the problems that we have in this state — some of the ethics problems that we’ve seen in this state,” Papen told Mills.
Arnold-Jones also brought up another interesting fact: Region III sold bonds using a French bank, bonds that were misrepresented, so the state is paying arbitrage. CDR Financial Services, the company at the center of a federal grand jury investigation into allegations of pay to play in the Richardson administration, was the underwriter of those Region III bonds, Arnold-Jones said.
You can watch the 30-minute interview right here, courtesy of KNME-TV in Albuquerque: