Heath Haussamen / NMPolitics.net
Las Cruces City Hall.
In the past, if you wanted to see who was donating to candidates in mayoral, city council and municipal judge races in Las Cruces, you had to buy copies of reports from the City Clerk’s Office.
Starting with this year’s Nov. 3 election, the Clerk’s Office plans to make such finance reports — which detail how campaigns are raising and spending money — available on its website free of charge.
Staff in the City Clerk’s Office still have to work out a few details, said senior office assistant David Aguayo. But “that is our plan, to go ahead and start putting that information online. So many people are depending on the Internet nowadays,” Aguayo said.
Plus, making the reports available online will save time for employees, who in the past have had to copy the documents for people who requested them.
“This makes it easier for everybody,” Aguayo said said.
The change will bring Las Cruces in line with New Mexico’s other most-populated cities. Albuquerque and Santa Fe have been putting finance reports online for years. Rio Rancho has reports from its 2014 election online.
Finance reports for candidates in state races such as governor, legislator and district judge are on the Secretary of State’s website, as are reports for political action committees.
Jeffery Isbell, a political operative who ran the unsuccessful attempt to recall three Las Cruces city councilors earlier this year, said he’s pleased that the city plans to start putting finance reports online.
“I applaud this effort by the city clerk as a step towards greater transparency,” he said.
Isbell also encouraged the clerk to post finance reports from the past four years online “so we can have a full picture of those that may have donated to any incumbents that are running for re-election.”
Regardless of whether the clerk does that, NMPolitics.net is publishing those reports online today so the public can easily access them.