KOAT Channel 7 recently did an excellent story about the propensity of cities throughout New Mexico to make big payouts to citizens who have been denied access to basic public records. The Rio Grande Foundation has won multiple lawsuits including one against the City of Albuquerque but we are not alone. The City of Albuquerque’s taxpayers have paid out more than $330,000 over the Keller Administration’s repeated denial of public records.
The KOAT story includes comments from the Foundation for Open Government, local attorney James Gover, and the Rio Grande Foundation. You can find the full story here or by clicking the image below:
I am glad to see that KOAT covered the story,. This is why we need honesty and integrity in journalism and news reporting. We need watchdogs like Rio Grande Foundation and reporters to keep government transparent.
So now we know some of our taxpayer money is being wasted paying off challengers wanting public information that should be available to them. What can we do about it? Yes, we can vote for new leadership, but that’s 4 years away.