{"id":10411,"date":"2009-12-17T11:14:32","date_gmt":"2009-12-17T18:14:32","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.nmpolitics.net\/index\/?p=10411"},"modified":"2009-12-18T07:23:51","modified_gmt":"2009-12-18T14:23:51","slug":"guv-releases-no-info-on-outgoing-appointees","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/2009\/12\/guv-releases-no-info-on-outgoing-appointees\/","title":{"rendered":"Guv releases no info on outgoing appointees"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Gov.

Gov. Bill Richardson (Photo by Heath Haussamen)<\/p><\/div>\n

Gov. Bill Richardson\u2019s office formally responded today to my request for information about the 59 political appointees<\/a> who are losing their jobs and \u2013 surprise, surprise \u2013 the response included no information about those people who are losing their jobs.<\/p>\n

As happened late Wednesday in its response<\/a> to The Santa Fe New Mexican\u2019s Kate Nash, the governor\u2019s office provided me only with a number of e-mail exchanges between Richardson spokesman Gilbert Gallegos and reporters about the news that the governor was laying off the exempt employees.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe have enclosed the documents responsive to your request. With the delivery of these documents, we consider this request closed,\u201d the governor\u2019s records custodian, Marcia Maestas, wrote in a letter<\/a> I received this morning.<\/p>\n

But as Nash reported this morning<\/a>, the N.M. Foundation for Open Government<\/a> takes issue with the governor\u2019s responses to the records requests.<\/p>\n

From Nash\u2019s article:<\/p>\n

\u201cSarah Welsh, executive director of the New Mexico Foundation for Open Government, said there\u2019s no doubt the information is public.<\/p>\n

\u201c\u2018It\u2019s just amazing that they would put out a press release and refuse to answer the obvious questions,\u2019 she said.<\/p>\n

\u201c\u2018It\u2019s hard to imagine they didn\u2019t write this down somewhere,\u2019 Welsh said. \u2018Did they memorize the 59 names and then call them?\u2019\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The state\u2019s Inspection of Public Records Act<\/a> doesn\u2019t require government agencies to create documents in response to requests. That\u2019s why requests must be comprehensive, because you\u2019re seeking documents that already exist. Rather than asking for a list of the 59 people losing their jobs, I asked for \u201cany information available (such as, but not limited to, a list) about which 59 exempt employees are having their positions eliminated, which departments they work in and what salaries they were being paid before their positions were eliminated.\u201d<\/p>\n

Apparently, the governor\u2019s office possesses no documentation about the layoffs. No lists. No plans drafted by cabinet secretaries who were considering who would lose jobs. No letters, e-mails or faxes to those losing their jobs. No salary information about those losing their jobs.<\/p>\n

And, most importantly, the governor\u2019s office has apparently not communicated in any way that creates a record (memo, e-mail, voice mail, fax, etc.) with any other state department about the employees who are losing their jobs.<\/p>\n

Find that hard to believe? Me too.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Gov. Bill Richardson\u2019s office formally responded today to NMPolitics.net\u2019s request for information about the 59 political appointees who are losing their jobs and \u2013 surprise, surprise \u2013 the response included no information about those people who are losing their jobs.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11,1],"tags":[112,118,111,107],"class_list":["post-10411","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news-and-analysis","category-uncategorized","tag-bill-richardson","tag-economy","tag-open-government","tag-roundhouse"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10411","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10411"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10411\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10411"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10411"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10411"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}