“Inexcusable”—that’s the word the Vatican used to describe Irish Bishop Donal Murray’s sex scandal cover-ups. But why not extend that pithy description to the Richardson administration for its refusal to support transparent, responsible governance?

So begins Kate Nash’s front-page story in the New Mexican this morning: “The Governor’s Office refuses to identify the 59 exempt state employees whose jobs will be eliminated early next year.”

The story goes on to describe the paper’s request, under the New Mexico Inspection of Public Records Act, for a list of names of state employees who are losing their jobs. The paper got 65 pages of e-mails between reporters (seeking the same information) and the Guv’s office, plus a few news releases. Gilbert Gallegos, Gov. Richardson’s deputy chief of staff, told the New Mex it was “not necessary” to provide the names—but Sarah Welsh of the New Mexico Foundation for Open Government expressed incredulity that there wasn’t a list (via the New Mex):

“It’s just amazing that they would put out a press release and refuse to answer the obvious questions,” she said. “It’s hard to imagine they didn’t write this down somewhere,” Welsh said. “Did they memorize the 59 names and then call them?”

It gets better, too. Click HERE to read the lively e-mail exchange between KOB-TV reporter Jeremy Jojola and Gallegos, posted on Jojola’s blog this Monday.

“I find it quite concerning the Governor’s Office is essentially telling me it really doesn’t matter what’s public record,” Jojola wrote Monday on his blog. “[I]f the Governor’s Office doesn’t find it ‘appropriate,’ it won’t release it despite obligations under the Inspection of Public Record Act.”

Obscuring public records is, quite simply, inexcusable. This isn’t a case of national security, in which the end might (legally, at least) justify the means; rather, it seems like an unbecomingly desperate grab at Bush-esque opacity. I’m not saying the state did anything wrong; maybe they truly don’t have a list of the 59 employees, or maybe the various IPRA requests they have received aren’t comprehensive or specific enough to include said list.

What I am saying is that transparent government is the foundation of a democratic society, and when the avenues to transparency—such as access to public records—are blocked, that foundation crumbles.

Update, 11am Thursday: Heath Haussamen over at the New Mexico Independent just tweeted this gem, about his own IPRA request:

Surprise, surprise. Guv gives me nothing but reporter’s e-mails too… and nothing that tells us anything about who he’s laying off and why.

Today, I’m sharing information about the Department of Health. However,  it isn’t about the information I formally requested. Instead, I want to tell you about the front of the envelope containing the DOH’s letter responding to my request.

The letter was the very same letter they’d already sent me in PDF format via e-mail. The state paid $5.54 to send it to me again via certified mail. This isn’t the first time DOH has paid a small fortune to send me a redundant letter.

Here’s how an records request works under New Mexico’s Inspection of Public Records Act. You file a request, the agency has three days to get back to you in writing and another 15 days to produce the documents, unless they’re unusually burdensome. The process is very simple, and made even simpler by recent legislation allowing the public to file these requests via e-mail.

Obviously it costs some time and little money for an agency to produce the information, and that’s unavoidable. It’s just part of the cost of accountability. However, I personally don’t think the state should incur unnecessary expenses.  So, I’ve begun adding to my public records requests a line waiving the 3-day snail mail response in exchange for an email response. Some departments go for that. Some don’t.

Governor Bill Richardson’s office, for example, claims that there is nothing in the law allowing a requester to waive snail mail. There’s nothing in the IPRA, however, that says a requester can’t: The state’s response only has to be in writing.  I don’t think any citizen with an email account would object to saving $5 which would be better spent on, say, school textbooks or health care for the uninsured.

Recently we filed a series of requests with the governor’s office via email. After the three days had elapsed, we emailed Richardson’s office alerting them that if we didn’t receive a response we would take the next step in enforcing the law and contact the Attorney General’s office.

Deputy Chief of Staff Gilbert Gallegos wrote back almost immediately claiming that the letter had been “mailed within the deadline.”  We figured we’d check his claim on the postmark.

Sure enough, we received it later that afternoon.

No postmark. No postage. The letter itself though was dated to comply with the three-day rule.

I called up the southwestern region communications guy for the US Postal Service. He said it was “very, very, very, unlikely” that a letter–even from the governor–would make it through USPS’ system without receiving at least a date stamp in the upper right corner. His best guess was that it was hand delivered.

There’s way for us to tell, I guess, whether the governor’s office really was in compliance or not. At least it didn’t cost taxpayers anything.