The City of Española violated the New Mexico Open Meetings Act due to the failure of the City Clerk’s Office to document the time and location of a recessed meeting earlier this year.
According to a letter sent to the city by the New Mexico Department of Justice on Oct. 8, an OMA complaint was filed regarding the June 24 meeting. During this meeting, which lasted less than 20 minutes, councilors voted to recess until July 8.
The original complaint highlighted an attempt to hold a meeting on June 30 with the same agenda as the meeting on June 24, or eight days earlier than originally agreed to by council.
The DOJ sent an inquiry letter to City Clerk Carla Ann Martinez in August, requesting documentation and an explanation as to why the council recessed and attempted to hold the meeting on June 30.
The department suspended its investigation of the original complaint upon discovering the June 30 meeting did not occur due to lack of a quorum. During this process, they discovered this technical violation.
“However, while the June 24, 2025, meeting minutes indicate the meeting was recessed to July 8, 2025, it does not specify the time or location for the continuation, which is a technical violation of Section 10-15-1(E),” the Oct. 8 letter states.
The DOJ required the council to take corrective action by including an agenda item for its next regularly scheduled meeting on Oct. 14, outlining the violation and that the council re-vote on the recessed meeting in compliance with OMA.
Afterward, the clerk must submit the agenda, minutes and link to a recording of the meeting.
City Attorney Frank Coppler attempted to prevent this mistake from happening during the June 24 meeting. According to the minutes, he told councilors and Mayor John Ramon Vigil that they had to identify the time and date of when the recessed meeting would occur.
While Martinez’s response to the DOJ included the time and date of the upcoming meeting, the minutes contained the error.
The motion to recess by District 4 Councilor Justin Salazar-Torrez did not include the time or location of the recessed meeting, minutes show, but did include the date.
While this may seem like a small mistake, District 4 Councilor Samuel LeDoux said it is indicative of a nonchalant attitude some councilors and the clerk’s office have toward meeting minutes.
Years of treating the minutes as an afterthought caught up with them, he said.
“They often look like first drafts of transcriptions rather than a thoroughly polished product and I think this OMA violation is a wake-up call that we need to take these records more seriously,” he said.
As of Monday, the city’s website has been updated to more prominently advertise upcoming public meetings.
The homepage now contains a section titled “Upcoming events” with a flyer showing the dates and times of all council and committee meetings in October, along with information on how to access the meetings live through Zoom or how to listen to them on KDCE. It also states nine locations within the city where a public notice about the meetings are posted.
City Manager Lauren Reichelt believes these changes were made in response to the OMA Violation and that it is the role of the clerk’s office to advertise meetings.
“I’m really glad to see it is being done,” Reichelt said. “It is incredibly important to me that we comply with the Open Meetings Act.”