Hey Big Spender

Ex-Mayor Jim Baca finally relents and comments on his blog about the October 4 mayoral election. He says he was prompted by what he calls Mayor Marty Chavez's "campaign untruths" about fiscal matters, as well as Marty's extravagant spending record. Well worth a read.

Also highly recommended (if you haven't read it yet) is Jerry Ortiz y Pino's Alibi column on city finances under Chavez. Excerpt:

. . . I just saw a television ad for Mayor Chavez' re-election which made my jaw drop. In it, while standing first in a deep trough and then on a high pile of dirt (get it?) he takes credit for restoring Albuquerque's fiscal health. Now that's cajones! The guy did nothing to promote the quarter cent tax increase that bailed out the city and his administration from the depths of the trough (they were digging fast down there, too). He sat quietly on the sidelines while Griego, Councilors Debbie O'Malley, Martin Heinrich and others expended enormous political capital to get the tax passed.

As Baca says:

Marty is always ready to take credit for good things whether he had anything to do with those things. (Witness putting his name on the baseball stadium and the museum expansion.) But the least he can do is tell the truth in his slick advertising. Otherwise we might construe he is ethically challenged.

You might say.

And still on the topic of money, be sure to read for a terrific take-down of Vern Raburn, President and CEO of Eclipse Aviation, and Vern's terrible op-ed against the living wage in this morning's Albuquerque Tribune.