Dems attack Rep. Pacheco on ethics
Website hits lawmaker in effort to win back House
A new website blasting the incumbent is part of the party's efforts to gain a majority in the state House.
In its efforts to win back control of the New Mexico House of Representatives, the state Democratic Party has created a website dedicated to attacking state Rep. Paul Pacheco, an Albuquerque Republican they say is vulnerable on ethical grounds.
Pacheco, a retired Albuquerque police officer who won election to his first twoyear term in 2012, is running against former Sandoval County Commissioner Daymon Ely, a Corrales lawyer, in House District 23. It is considered a swing district, known for close elections, so the Pacheco-Ely contest is one of the most watched races this year.
Targeting Pacheco is part of the Democrats’ push to pick up enough seats to gain a majority in the House, where the current political makeup is 37 Republicans, 32 Democrats and one vacancy. Democrats already hold a majority in the state Senate.
The website is called “Pay-toPlay Pacheco.” On the homepage, beside an X’ed-out, sepia-tone photo of Pacheco, is text that says, “Paul Pacheco isn’t looking out for us. As KRQE News 13 reported, he requested nearly $1 million in a construction project that benefited his brother, who was the project’s architect. So far, $230,000 of this funding has been secured. … Tell Paul Pacheco that we’ve had enough of his corrupt pay-to-play politics.”
Albuquerque City Councilor Pat Davis, who also is executive director of the political advocacy group
Progress Now New Mexico, filed a complaint with the Attorney General’s Office about Pacheco’s involvement in securing state funds for the ASK Academy in Rio Rancho. The complaint points out that Pacheco’s brother, David Pacheco, is the architect for the charter school.
“From 2014 through 2016, Rep. Pacheco, at his sole discretion, sponsored more than $1.2 million in taxpayer-funded capital outlay funds to the project managed by and for the profit of his family, without disclosing such a relationship as required by law,” Davis’ complaint says.
It’s true that Pacheco did request and secure funds for the school. The Legislature approved and the governor signed $230,000 of those funds.
The state Government Conduct Act, which Davis quotes in his complaint, says, “A state agency shall not enter into a contract for services, construction or items of tangible personal property with a legislator, the legislator’s family or with a business in which the legislator or the legislator’s family has a substantial interest unless the legislator has disclosed the legislator’s substantial interest and unless the contract is awarded in accordance with the provisions of the Procurement Code … ”
The act specifies that a legislator’s family includes siblings.
It’s true that Paul Pacheco didn’t formally disclose his brother’s involvement.
The question is whether the legislator knew that his brother was the architect for the school when he began seeking the capital outlay funds. He told KRQE he didn’t. The station quoted Pacheco saying that he never tried to hide that fact once he found out. However, the lawmaker did not present evidence that he actually took the step of disclosing his brother’s involvement.
Pacheco didn’t return phone calls from The New Mexican. He told KRQE the complaint was part of a “smear campaign” against him.
The 39,000-square-foot school for grades 6-12 opened in 2015. Since then, Pacheco has helped secure $90,000 in funds for expenses including equipment, furniture and sports facilities such as a track and ball fields.
It’s not clear whether these later funding requests would represent conflicts of interest. The complaint doesn’t say whether there were any architect fees for David Pacheco involved in those facilities.
The website also claims that Paul Pacheco “took large campaign contributions from another contractor on the same construction job.” No documentation of this claim can be found on the site.
Asked about this on Friday, Democratic spokeswoman Felicia Salazar pointed to two $500 contributions to Pacheco — one on July 21, 2015, the other on April 4 — from Rachel Matthew Development Corp., a Corrales company that designed the ASK Academy.
The anti-Pacheco website also has a section documenting several votes Pacheco has made during the past two years. These appear to be actual votes on legislation — and amendments on legislation — issues in which most Democrats were on one side and most Republicans on the other.
The language used to describe each vote provides good examples of partisan framing. For instance, the website slams Pacheco for voting for Senate Bill 159, which was the 2015 capital projects bill — a collection of what is commonly known as “pork” projects.
“Paul Pacheco voted YES on an amended bill that cut 77 percent of proposed funding for projects for senior citizens, including feeding hungry seniors, providing home services, and rebuilding run-down senior centers,” the website says.
House Republicans in the final days of that session heavily amended the bill, setting off major acrimony and partisan bickering that lasted through the end of the session. The 77 percent figure is accurate. The Republicans cut more than $8.6 million in spending on senior centers around the state. Of that, more than $400,000 was for meals, dining facilities, kitchen equipment and vehicles to deliver food to seniors.
Though the bill passed the House, with Pacheco voting for it, it died on the Senate floor. Later that year in a special session, the Legislature passed a compromise bill that restored the senior center funding. Pacheco voted for the compromise, which passed unanimously.
Other bills noted on the website were driver’s license bills that Pacheco sponsored in 2015 and 2016. The website says last year’s bill would have established “a discriminatory driver’s license system and catered to a radical out-of-state, anti-immigrant agenda over the public safety of New Mexicans.” This bill passed the House but failed in the Senate in 2015.
Though out-of-state antiimmigration groups probably would have approved of Pacheco’s bill, there were plenty of New Mexicans who agreed with it as well. Gov. Susana Martinez, during a five-year battle to repeal a law that allowed undocumented immigrants to get driver’s licenses, constantly pointed to polls showing voters in the state to favor such legislation.
The website describes the 2016 driver’s license bill as one that would “force New Mexicans into a discriminatory driver’s license system that wasted taxpayer dollars and threatened public safety.”
The original form of the bill Pacheco sponsored this year, which passed the House, basically was the same as the previous license bills Martinez backed. It would not have allowed undocumented residents to legally drive in the state.
This year, however, the Senate voted for a compromise. The bill created a two-tiered system that authorized issuance of licenses that comply with the federal Real ID Act to those who want such a card, as well as driver’s privilege cards to those, such as the undocumented, who can’t meet the stricter identification requirements of the Real ID compliant cards.
Though initially he resisted the Senate version, Pacheco eventually voted for the compromise when it went back to the House.