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The
State of Disclosure in New Mexico
New Mexico earned an F again in 2007, with
low rankings in all but the Electronic Filing
category.
Candidates
in New Mexico must report detailed information
about contributors giving $250 or more, including
occupation but not employer data. Large,
last-minute contributions are reported before
Election Day. Candidates must disclose details
about expenditures, but reports do not include
subvendor details. Loan disclosure is weak,
and independent expenditure reporting is
not expressly required under the law. Concerns
about the state’s weak ethics and campaign
finance laws (ranked 43rd this year) contributed
to the formation of the Governor’s Task
Force on Ethics Reform in 2006. Following the
legislature’s failure to adopt most of
the governor’s recommendations in 2007,
the task force recommended a special legislative
session focused on ethics reforms.
New Mexico earned an A again for its electronic
filing program in 2007. Electronic filing became
mandatory for all statewide and legislative
candidates in 2006, though the requirement
was not well received by state lawmakers, who
attempted to repeal the mandate in 2007. If
not for a gubernatorial veto of Senate Bill
363, the electronic filing requirement would
have been eliminated.
New
Mexico again received an F in the Disclosure
Content Accessibility category. A new system
for displaying electronic filings, including
the ability to sort itemized contributions,
moved the state a few places up in the rankings,
but the site still has ample room for improvement.
Though plans for a searchable database of campaign
data were reported in Grading State Disclosure
2005, New Mexico’s disclosure site still
does not offer this valuable tool. Despite
the move to electronic filing in 2006, more
timely access to disclosure records online
has not followed. According to a March 1, 2007
Associated Press article about SB 363, “Many
reports from the 2006 election year still cannot
be accessed online.”
New
Mexico earned another F in the area of web
site usability, dropping from 43rd to 45th
in the rankings in 2007, due to a slightly
weaker performance in the usability test. The
Secretary of State’s web site does offer
contextual information to the public, including
a list of candidates, disclosure requirements
and campaign finance restrictions, and both
original and amended campaign reports. The
site could be enhanced by providing overviews
of the totals raised and spent by candidates
in a given race to allow easy comparison to
other campaigns, as well as overall spending
in the state.
→ Quick
Fix: Add information
describing whose reports are available
online, what data is included, and what
time periods are covered to give site
visitors a better sense of the scope of
the disclosure web site.
♦ Editor’s
Pick: Itemized contributions from
electronically-filed reports can be sorted
online by numerous fields, including
date, occupation, and amount. View
image
 Disclosure Agency: Secretary of State
Disclosure Web Site: http://www.sos.state.nm.us
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