Hiding Out

I noticed that Mayor Marty is hiding from voters. Last night he flipped off the people who showed up at the North Valley candidate forum by saying he had an endorsement interview with the Fraternal Order of Police. As a former candidate and Mayor I can tell you that those interviews can be done just about anytime. But stop and think about this, Marty opted for a special interest group over voters.

Who can blame him? Some one might ask a question about the city budget. We keep seeing headlines in the Journal about a state special session of the legislature to deal with serious financial problems. Many of those problems are brought on by a precipitous fall in sales tax revenues. Don't forget that tax is also the city's life blood and main source of revenue. But do we see anything being said about this in the Albuquerque Journal? Very little.

Marty will keep dodging these forums as long as he can. But, if he is elected then he will have to deal with the naked truth on the city budget. And he will suffer the fruits of his own overspending(with city council help).

In the meantime, I was disappointed to see Richard Berry, the republican candidate for Mayor, fall back on the mantra of running government like a business. Earth to Berry.....government is not a business. It should not be run like one. It should be run to provide services for it's citizens. I did like Berry coming after the Mayor for taking capital funds to pay for operating expenses. That is topical and serious.

P.S. I am hard on the Journal, but they are suffering from the economy too and have cutback their staff, mostly from attrition. I think though there are two stories they should give better coverage too. One is the Mayor's race and one is the role of state republicans in the firing of the U.S. Attorney. Those stories require a lot of followup!