Grants development group loses license

Copyright © 2009
Gallup Independent
By Helen Davis
Cibola County Bureau

GRANTS — Like other non-profit improvement organizations in the former boom town of Grants, the Cibola Communities Economic Development Foundation inherited a basket full of difficulties when new management came on board.

“It is my responsibility. I am working on it and am desperate to remedy it,” Star Gonzales, executive director of the foundation said.

Gonzales said that many of the records from former boards and directors cannot be found. She said she has been concentrating on trying to bring new businesses to the Cibola area and has not made updating the organization’s records a top priority.

According to the Public Regulation Commission, the foundation’s status with the commission is “license was revoked ... name unavailable.” A spokesman in the PRC Compliance department said all is not lost for the foundation — they have until July to bring their records up to date. The organization’s license was revoked because annual reports updating directors, addresses and officers have not been received since 2005.

Anyone making inquires to the PRC will find that the foundation’s address is 515 W. High St., which is the Cibola County building and no longer houses the foundation office.

The current office is in the Grants MainStreet Project building on Santa Fe Avenue.

Gonzales said she has sent in the annual reports but the PRC has returned them for corrections such as directors’ addresses. Gonzales explained that some of the directors do not want to supply a home address for the PRC records, which are publicly accessible. She said they will return the forms again with work addresses supplied.

Phil Sisneros, media spokesman for the New Mexico Attorney General’s Office, said the AGO has no record of the organization, they never registered with the Charities Registrar, which is required of all domestic non-profits.

Penalties for failure file PRC reports or to register with the AGO are substantial. “If a charity is late with their annual report, the annual penalty is $100. If a charity has not registered with our office there is an annual penalty of $100.

If a charity registered with our office but has been delinquent three years or more I have them reregister and I charge them $100 for the past three years,” Sisneros wrote in an e-mail response to the Independent.

He added that a letter has been sent to the foundation and they have until April 17 to respond.

The economic development foundation holds contracts with the Grants city government and Cibola County’s governing body and is charged with business retention, business expansion, and business recruitment, along with any other service that will enhance opportunities for business development, according to both city and county contracts.