Thread: Bill Richardson adviser worked for firm feds probing

Bill Richardson adviser worked for firm feds probing
By Associated Press
Wednesday, January 7, 2009 - Added 1m ago


SANTA FE, N.M. — One of Gov. Bill Richardson’s close friends and advisers worked as a consultant for the California firm at the center of a federal pay-to-play probe that derailed the governor’s appointment as commerce secretary.

Mike Stratton’s consulting firm worked for CDR Financial Products to advise on business in New Mexico at the time the company was hired to work on bond deals with the New Mexico Finance Authority.

Federal investigators are now scrutinizing whether CDR’s work, for which it earned nearly $1.5 million in fees, was influenced by political contributions that CDR and its chief executive David Rubin made to Richardson’s political committees.

Stratton, a longtime Democratic political consultant, has been friends with Richardson for more than 25 years. He advised Richardson — and raised money for him — during the governor’s failed bid for the 2008 presidential nomination.

Stratton did not immediately return telephone messages Wednesday.

Richardson said Wednesday there was no wrongdoing in how the state awarded the work to CDR.

"In my view, the state and its officials have done nothing wrong. They behaved with the best of intentions and the best conduct," Richardson said at a news conference in Albuquerque.

Stratton worked for CDR as a business development consultant until at least 2007, CDR spokesman Allan Ripp said. He was not sure exactly when Stratton started working for the company, but said it was in the early 2000s. Richardson took office in January 2003.

Stratton’s consulting had "not anything to do with political contributions," Ripp said.

CDR and Rubin contributed $110,000 to Richardson political committees in 2003-2005.

The largest contribution was made in 2004 and helped pay expenses for some of Richardson’s staff and supporters at the Democratic National Convention. Stratton worked with the governor during the convention, helping Richardson carry out his role as convention chairman.

The $75,000 contribution was made June 18, 2004, just days before CDR was awarded a no-competition state contract to reinvest bond escrow proceeds.

The Finance Authority’s chief financial officer recommended CDR for the work in a memorandum dated June 23, 2004, and the authority’s board approved the selection June 30.

Bill Sisneros, executive director of the Finance Authority, said he received numerous telephone calls from Stratton’s firm in June 2004.

Joan Coplan, a senior consultant for Stratton and Associates, had telephoned him repeatedly about the opportunity for reinvestment of the bond proceeds held in escrow and the authority’s possible use of CDR. Stratton’s firm was "kind of pitching their guy" for the escrow reinvestment, he said.

"The only person that was lobbying the Finance Authority was Michael Stratton’s office," Sisneros said.

The escrow restructuring was approved by the authority’s board as a "sole source procurement" of services with CDR — with no competitive bid process before the firm’s selection. Sisneros said the agency needed to act fast before the reinvestment was precluded by a change in federal regulations.

Sisneros said it was a "market driven transaction" — not influenced by Stratton’s firm or the governor’s office. No one in the governor’s office contacted him about the possible transaction with CDR.

"Nobody ever instructed me to use them," he said.

Sisneros said federal investigators have questioned him about his contact with Richardson’s former chief of staff, David Contarino, on the CDR deals. Sisneros said he had discussed the escrow reinvestment plan with Contarino but was not instructed to hire CDR.

"Even to this day I’ve never had a conversation with Gov. Richardson about CDR," Sisneros said.

Richardson on Wednesday praised Contarino as "an outstanding public servant" and said he had the "utmost integrity, talent and he’s responsible for some of the successes of our administration."

CDR had previously been selected through a competitive process to help assemble a bond financing deal for a $1.6 billion state transportation package.

Rubin also made a $25,000 donation to a Richardson committee in late October 2003, when the Legislature was debating the transportation construction program.

That contribution went to the Moving America Forward committee, which the governor had formed to increase voter registration among Hispanics and American Indians. Rubin also gave $10,000 to Richardson’s re-election campaign in 2005.

The $75,000 contribution went to a little known committee called Si Se Puede! Boston 2004 Inc. At the time of the convention, the largest amount of money raised by the committee came from CDR and other companies that helped put together the complex bond financing package for the transportation program.

http://tinyurl.com/8hbcu2

As long as this racist is in trouble, I don't care why.
Keep him away from our Government.
Let him have a play-date in jail with Illinois Governor!