But Senate Rules Chair Linda Lopez says bills will be voted on in the coming days
This article has been updated.
For nearly two weeks, the New Mexico Independent webcast ethics hearings from the Senate Rules Committee — some of them with the help of Mark Bralley — and substantive ethics reform discussions took place each time. But on Monday, NMI was unable to do it. Without a camera in the room, no ethics reform was discussed.
NMI was back today. KUNM’s Jim Williams was also present and recording the meeting. So, there was hope that something would happen.
“Is it a coincidence that (Monday’s) was the one Rules meeting during the past couple weeks in which the webcast camera crew from the New Mexico Independent wasn’t present?” wrote Steve Allen, executive director of Common Cause New Mexico, in an e-mail to supporters. “Hard to say. Today, though, I’m happy to note that the NMI webcast of Senate Rules resumes along with a live blog of the proceedings.”
But it didn’t make a difference. No ethics bills were discussed today. More time was spent discussing antelope during a confirmation hearing for a Game and Fish official than anything else.
“I thought the cameras might help today. No such luck,” Allen wrote on NMI’s liveblog of the committee meeting.
There was a promise today that ethics bills will be moving quickly in the coming days. Linda Lopez, D-Albuquerque and the Senate Rules chair, said the committee is still in the process of drafting a committee substitute bill that will propose banning or requiring the disclosure of campaign contributions from state contractors, and it should be ready for consideration on Friday.
She also promised to begin discussion on the proposal to create a state ethics commission “first thing” Friday, but said working out disagreements and drafting a committee substitute bill that combines several existing bills related to that controversial proposal will “take a little more time.”
And Lopez said a committee substitute bill related to enacting campaign contribution limits will be ready for the committee to consider next week.
There was some skepticism about those promises on NMI’s liveblog.
“Seeing is believing,” wrote Barbara Wold, who runs the blog Democracy for New Mexico.
Friday’s meeting is scheduled to begin at 8 a.m. It’s not yet clear whether the meeting will be webcast by NMI.
Update, 12 p.m.
I’m told that Ched MacQuigg of Diogenes’six has also been helping with the NMI webcasts.