Senators still stewing over lease bill misstep

Property owners made no campaign donations, committee told at hearing

SANTA FE — During a committee hearing Feb. 23, Republican state Sen. Steven Neville assured fellow legislators there had been no campaign contributions made by the owners of an Albuquerque building to either lawmakers or Gov. Susana Martinez.

Later in that same meeting, General Services Secretary Ed Burckle identified for lawmakers the majority and minority owners of the building, the former Bank of the West Tower.

However, a simple search of the state’s online campaign contribution database would have shown that the owners have, in fact, made hefty contributions to the governor and her political committee.

Some senators were still stewing Sunday, a day after the revelation of the more than $20,000 in campaign contributions led the Senate to take

the extraordinary step of recalling from the House a bill it had already passed — legislation that would have extended a lease at the office building in question.

While Burckle and Neville have insisted the omission was an honest mistake, some senators say they feel they were misled.

“I think it was reasonable for the Legislature to rely on what we were told,” Sen. Joseph Cervantes, D-Las Cruces, said Sunday. “We don’t investigate and fact-check every thing we’ve been told by Cabinet secretaries.”

He also said there could be further inquiries into the issue, including a possible request that Attorney General Hector Balderas’ office review it.

Meanwhile, New Mexico Democrats sent out a Sunday statement blasting Martinez and describing the incident as an ethical failure.

The majority owner of the building, ICO Central San Mateo LLC, and the company’s manager, Alexander Moradi of California, gave $20,800 to Martinez and her political committee in 2014 and 2015, according to a Journal review of state campaign finance records.

A minority owner, Aaron Hazelrigg, also reported giving $5,400 to the governor’s political committee in 2015. Hazelrigg also reported giving $1,000 to state Auditor Tim Keller, a Democrat, in 2014 and previously contributed to a Democratic Bernalillo County assessor candidate.

A Martinez spokesman on Saturday disputed suggestions that there was an attempt to mislead legislators, saying the contributions had been properly reported and were publicly available on a government website.

The legislation in question, Senate Bill 430, would have bypassed usual procurement rules to allow the state to continue leasing the contributors’ property.

The two office buildings in question are located near San Mateo and Central in Albuquerque. The state leases 228,000 square feet of office space in the buildings, and former Gov. Bill Richardson had a satellite office in one of them.

Under a proposed seven-year lease extension, a new 20,000 square-foot building would have been constructed adjacent to the buildings for the Children, Youth and Families Department’s temporarily wellness center for foster children, according to committee testimony.

The agency has been searching for several years for new office space in Albuquerque.

A previous CYFD plan to buy an office complex in southeast Albuquerque unraveled in 2015 after the Journal reported the administration planned to pay more than six times more than the complex had been acquired for just months earlier.

The issue of the new wellness center is a priority for Martinez, a spokesman said Sunday. The Governor’s Office also said the two-term Republican governor never met with the buildings owners — who gave her campaign cash — about the lease and does not recall ever having met them.