{"id":4208,"date":"2009-02-04T12:00:00","date_gmt":"2009-02-04T18:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.nmpolitics.net\/index\/2009\/02\/state-agency-wont-release-gripgate-records\/"},"modified":"2009-02-04T12:00:00","modified_gmt":"2009-02-04T18:00:00","slug":"state-agency-wont-release-gripgate-records","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/2009\/02\/state-agency-wont-release-gripgate-records\/","title":{"rendered":"State agency won’t release GRIPgate records"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

New Mexico Finance Authority rejects requests for subpoenas and the records sought by those subpoenas<\/span><\/p>\n

Though at least two other state agencies have publicly released similar documents, the New Mexico Finance Authority<\/a> is refusing to hand over subpoenas it has been issued in the federal investigation into allegations of pay-to-play in the Richardson administration.<\/p>\n

The finance authority is also refusing to release the documents sought by such subpoenas.<\/p>\n

I and Trip Jennings, a colleague at the New Mexico Independent<\/a>, sought the records in two separate requests made under the state\u2019s Inspection of Public Records Act<\/a>. The first, a narrow request, sought only subpoenas that have been issued in the federal investigation. The second, broad request sought all subpoenas related to any federal investigation received by the finance authority, and all documents requested in those subpoenas.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe New Mexico Finance Authority is denying your request, as release of the requested documents could compromise or impede an ongoing federal investigation,\u201d Reynold Romero, general counsel for the finance authority, wrote in separate letters denying the requests.<\/p>\n

The denials contrast with the release by the Governor\u2019s Office last month of a Sept. 22 subpoena it was issued in the federal investigation. The news agency Bloomberg<\/a> obtained the document in response to a public records request. In addition, the University of New Mexico released to Bloomberg a subpoena it received in a separate federal investigation<\/a>, also in response to a public records request.<\/p>\n

The state\u2019s public records act applies to all government agencies, including NMFA. It covers the vast majority of government records, but allows a few exceptions, including patient medical records and certain types of law-enforcement records.<\/p>\n

In an interview, Romero said he is \u201cnot familiar\u201d with the release of subpoenas by the other state agencies, adding that, \u201cWe\u2019re just dealing with ours.\u201d Asked to cite the exemption to the public records act that allows denial of the requests from me and Jennings, Romero didn\u2019t name any of the specific exemptions listed in the act. He instead cited the provision that allows exemptions \u201cas otherwise provided by law.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cOur position has remained that we don\u2019t want to impede or in any way compromise the investigation,\u201d Romero said.<\/p>\n

Similar requests Jennings and I made to the Governor\u2019s Office are awaiting a formal response, which, under the act, is due this week.<\/p>\n

Newspaper\u2019s requests also denied<\/span><\/p>\n

Last week, the Governor\u2019s Office refused to release documents to The Santa Fe New Mexican<\/a> related to the office\u2019s dealing with CDR Financial Products<\/a>, the company at the center of the federal probe. The grand jury is investigating whether a California company received a state investment contract that paid almost $1.5 million in exchange for $110,000 in contributions to two Richardson political action committees and his 2006 gubernatorial re-election campaign.<\/p>\n

In denying two requests from The New Mexican, that office\u2019s records custodian, Marcie Maestas, wrote that the office \u201cis prohibited from releasing records of this nature pursuant to the federal rules governing grand juries. There are countervailing public policy considerations that warrant denial of your request as well, including, but not limited to this office\u2019s effort to cooperate and not unduly interfere with the federal grand jury investigation.\u201d<\/p>\n

The finance authority, meanwhile, responded to a records request from The New Mexican by saying it had located \u201csome of your requested documents\u201d but needed more time to complete the request, according to the newspaper\u2019s Saturday article.<\/p>\n

Leonard DeLayo, executive director of the New Mexico Foundation for Open Government<\/a>, was quoted by The New Mexican as saying he\u2019s not sure whether the documents requested by the newspaper are exempt from the public records act. I have written the foundation seeking advice on whether NMFA violated the public records act in denying the requests from me and Jennings.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

New Mexico Finance Authority rejects requests for subpoenas and the records sought by those subpoenas Though at least two other state agencies have publicly released similar documents, the New Mexico Finance Authority is refusing to hand over subpoenas it has been issued in the federal investigation into allegations of pay-to-play in the Richardson administration. The […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4208","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4208","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=4208"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4208\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4208"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4208"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4208"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}