Española mayor calls for state to investigate local corruption
Sánchez says Ethics Commission would be more independent from town politics
In an unprecedented move, the mayor of Española appeared before the New Mexico State Ethics Commission on Friday to ask its members to extend their oversight to include investigating small-town New Mexico politics.
Mayor Javier Sánchez said even though his city’s laws include a provision to start its own ethics commission, “I assure you that people are gonna put people who they have in their pocket on one side or the other” of any issue or investigation.
Bemoaning reports of city councilors trying to push through pet projects that may benefit friends or family members, he said the biggest threat to any old regime is a new regime — which he, as a gay Republican from Texas, represents, even though he has lived in the Española Valley for close to 25 years.
Created by the state Legislature and supported by Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham, the commission is tasked with overseeing compliance with state laws on campaign finances, lobbying, financial disclosures and other aspects of public officials’ conduct.
Sánchez said if the commission could act as an independent and outside investigative party when it comes to local political control and action, “not only would it help Española but a lot of smaller communities where the nature of things is that your city manager is related to the city clerk or whatever the case is.”
He cited a situation where a local police chief raised allegations about a city councilor, whom Sánchez did not name. He said he suggested the council turn over any
possible investigation on the councilor to an outside governing body, but his idea was “shut down” by many councilors.
This is not the first time Sánchez has raised concerns about the way things are run in Northern New Mexico. Over the summer, several local media outlets, including the Santa Fe New Mexican, printed an editorial he wrote in which he urged citizens to work to eradicate the movidas.
“Politicos get elected to one board and quickly maneuver their way onto other boards at the same time,” he wrote. “And if it’s not the politico getting on such a committee, it’s their friends or relatives. These political favors create a dark web of power throughout the community.”
Several members of the commission expressed interest in helping in some manner. Commissioner Frances Williams, who said she experienced similar challenges when she was hired as a consultant for two small cities in New Mexico — which she would not name — thanked Sánchez for coming forward as she shared her own story.
“I found vast corruption and collision in regard to the establishment of salaries, violations of the Fair Wage Act to violations of their own policies and procedures,” she said. “I was appalled.
“I think there’s more corruption going on in these cities and counties than there probably is in the Legislature.”
Member Stuart Bluestone told Sánchez it would help if he first spoke to other mayors around the state to get “wide consensus from them about whether it would be helpful to you and other mayors to have this ethics commission be available for the kinds of problems you are talking about.”
Sánchez, who won a threeway race for his seat in the 2018 election, said after the meeting that he wasn’t looking to blame anyone for the problems he sees in his city. “There are legitimate ways to change things without having to name names or point strong fingers at anyone,” he said.
“A lot of things … they’ve always been done this way.”
But “this has to be poked at,” he said. “For an ethics board to say, ‘Hey, that’s just right. We have to change some things,’ could have an impact.”