Mendoza leads in campaign spending

By Zsombor Peter
Staff Writer

GALLUP — Harry Mendoza looks to be the biggest spender so far in this year's race for mayor. According to the financial reports candidates filed last week, he's raised $5,050 in donations and spent $6,881.

With just over a week to go until election day, he's easily outspending his opponents. According to the same reports, fellow candidates Mary Ann Armijo and Larry Winn have each spent approximately $4,000 so far. Combined, that's only about $1,000 more than what Mendoza has spent on his own.

Ralph Richards, the only other mayoral candidate to file a financial report last week, reported $1,338 in donations but no expenses, despite the appearance of numerous signs bearing his name around town. According to City Clerk Patricia Holland, Richards said they didn't show up on his report because he hadn't been billed yet.

The other three candidates in the race, Jimmy Parish, Ralph Rains and Anna Rondon, did not file reports. The city ordinance that governs financial disclosure only requires them to do so if their donations or expenses exceed $1,000.

They will have other chances to file, though. By the same ordinance, any candidate who hits the $1,000 mark must file a report three times, depending on when he or she gets there: the Wednesday of the third week before the election, the Wednesday of the week before the election, and one last time no later than 30 days after the election. The next chance to file, then, will be Feb. 28.

Modeled after Albuquerque's laws, the ordinance requires candidates to deposit all their contributions even the ones from themselves into a single bank account dedicated exclusively to their campaigns, and to reveal the source of any donation of $100 or more. It also requires candidates to deduct all their campaign-related expenses from the account, which the city may access at any time.

Although the ordinance has rules about what candidates can and can't do, it doesn't provide much deterrence against breaking them. If the city clerk finds, after a hearing, that a violation has occurred, all he or she can do is issue a public reprimand. The option of a $500 fine was taken out of the original draft; however, the City Council can still remove a candidate if he or she wins the election by a two-thirds vote.

Outgoing Mayor Bob Rosebrough, who proposed the rules, has said that the strength of the ordinance lay in what the media did with it, not the city. In 2003, he came under fire for accepting donations from groups suspected of trying to buy influence inside City Hall. Although the allegations didn't stick, being their target did motivate him to make disclosure mandatory in future elections.

Rosebrough ended up spending much more than his opponents in that election. But the biggest bills don't necessarily guarantee victory. Mendoza easily outspent his opponents in 2005's general election for the council's southside seat but ended up losing to incumbent Pat Butler in the runoff.