Hopefuls envision different roles for auditor
What exactly does New Mexico’s state auditor do?
The answer depends on which candidate in the Democratic Party primary you ask.
Former state party Chairman Brian Colón is running to focus on waste, fraud and abuse of tax dollars. And state Rep. Bill McCamley is offering a vision of the office as one that takes a broader role in government accountability.
This may seem like a small competition, given that the office only has a few dozen employees. But the auditor’s wonkish duty of monitoring the finances of publicly funded agencies can prove important.
For Colón, it can seem personal.
Colón grew up in part living in Section 8 housing in Valencia County. And he describes the misuse of tax dollars as a sort of affront.
“I understand that when tax dollars are abused or wasted or not used properly, it has a disparate effect on those who need those resources the most,” he said in a recent interview.
Colón graduated from Los Lunas High School and was the first in his family to go to college, earning a degree in finance from New Mexico State University. He went into business and later got a law degree, going to practice with the firm Robles, Rael and Anaya. Colón also became a fixture in community groups, raising money for the University of New Mexico Foundation, the Albuquerque Community Foundation and other organizations. He was a mentor, too.
In 2008, he won election as chairman of the state Democratic Party. That led to a bid for lieutenant governor in 2010, with Colón running alongside Diane Denish in an unsuccessful bid by Democrats to hold the Governor’s Office at the end of Bill Richardson’s administration.
With a breezy and upbeat demeanor, Colón stayed involved in politics, though.
Just last year, he ran unsuccessfully for mayor of Albuquerque against none other
than the state auditor at the time, Tim Keller.
For Colón, the auditor’s office should focus on the nuts and bolts of government.
And he wants the office to do more outreach in communities around the state to support whistleblowers and tipsters.
“It’s whistleblowers that actually bring fraud to the forefront,” he said.
But he cautions against the office taking too much of an activist role. After all, auditors have used their office to target political opponents.
“At some point,” he said. “You cross the line of being a zealous advocate and being the office that is supposed to be 100 percent independent and neutral.”
McCamley, elected to the state House of Representatives in 2012 representing part of Las Cruces, has quickly jumped out front on issues from legalizing marijuana to immigration.
“There are a couple things I’m known for,” McCamley told a gathering of Democrats in Santa Fe earlier this year. “One is putting up a fight.”
And McCamley, who is unabashedly high-energy, has argued the auditor should be a fighter.
The legislator “went viral” on social media a few weeks ago with a television ad in which he takes a hammer to a mock-up of President Donald Trump’s border wall.
And he has proposed using the State Auditor’s Office to measure tax carve-outs for special interests, organize effective economic development efforts and push for putting solar energy systems on public buildings — a step he argues would save the government money.
The office has a fairly arcane job monitoring the finances of government agencies and a wide range of other organizations that receive taxpayer money, from water associations to universities to school districts. That adds up to about 1,500 entities around the state. Fittingly, the state auditor’s seal depicts two eagles standing above the icon of a ledger or “T account.”
But this wonkish duty can be important. And the office has been a springboard. Both Keller and current Attorney General Hector Balderas increased their political profiles while auditor.
Keller, for example, examined the backlog of untested sexual