EUGENE A. TAFOYA

INVESTIGATIVE REPORTER

PART FOUR

During the early part of January 1994 I had many long telephone

conversations with Eugene Tafoya. The subjects we discussed ranged from his intense dislike for the Secretary of the Interior, Bruce Babbitt, to our mutual love for white wine and blue cheese. Later in the year, when Gene would be in and out of the hospital, I would leave messages for him identifying myself as "the blue cheese lady". Somehow that little joke between us always seemed to lift his spirits even as his illness took its toll.

The last article about the Bureau of Land Management that Gene sent to me was the Fourth in the Series, but it does not indicate that it was the final article in that series. In fact, the piece concludes with the teaser "NEXT WEEK...Where did the $1.2 million dollars go?" The Courier, like many small newspapers, paid its price for independence and ceased publication. I have been unable to locate any archive for this journal but I will continue to try to determine if Tafoya's series continued. The fourth part of the series appeared on January 20, 1994.

Last week many alleged abuses by supervisory bureaucrats employed by the Bureau of

Land Management were cited. This included blatant sexual harassment of a female

employee (one of many) and the alleged rape of another employee, who was

handicapped. In neither case, or in any of the other situations cited, was anything done,

and the question that enters my mind is...Why isn't anything done?

Sometimes the answer to the most complex of questions is right out there in the open, in

places we might least expect them.

Today I was reading a story that read in part, "They

through us off our land, they lie to us, they

discriminate against us, they kill us, they exploit us in

every way." Do these words sound familiar? They

sound like they might be words from people here in the

United States. Yet they are the words of the Indians

fighting desperately to correct injustice in the south of

Mexico. These are honest people whose rights were

eroded away a little at a time and finally said... enough

is enough. The only question now is how many innocent lives will be taken before

justice is done?

I have found after two wars (Korea and Vietnam) and several tragedies that: it is usually

the innocent that suffer most. The Indians in Mexico are not fighting for that condo in

Florida, a vacation to Europe, big cars, $500 dollar suits, chartered and leased airplanes,

or any of the other luxury items held in such high esteem by the casiques of the world

[meaning the wealthiest people who exert great socio-economic and political control].

They are fighting for schools for their children, hospitals for their sick, food for their

families, and they are doing it with rocks and machetes. If this sounds like I am

sympathetic with the Indians...YES...I AM!

What is the connection you might ask? Well, we have our own brand of casiques, well

paid bureaucrats in our federal government. Here is but one example:

A now retired BLM executive (he was the New Mexico BLM Director, a federal position)

is the BLM executive who leased a private aircraft (with permission, of course) at the

taxpayers expense. This is the person that certain BLM employees claim would bump

other BLM officials off of flights so that his wife could accompany him.

According to sources, the New Mexico State Director had a shortfall in his budget one

year and could not afford to fly his leased twin engine aircraft. So allegedly he

engineered the closure of a BLM mustang horse facility outside of Oklahoma City,

Oklahoma, which had cost the taxpayers $200,00 to build, and transferred that money

to his operational account in New Mexico, so he could continue to fly his leased aircraft.

The taxpayers got it again! There are those in the know in the BLM in New Mexico, that

call the aircraft, and the affair, "Larry Air". A pun, of course. After all you have other

airlines, why not "Larry Air?"

BLM employees claim that over $200,000 from the horse program that was shut down

was moved to Santa Fe to pay for lease payments, service, pilot time, etc., on that

aircraft.

Please understand that this was all perfectly legal and proper, but please explain to me

why a leased, very-expensive aircraft, could possibly have been justified in the first

place. And were his wife's trips, if indeed she did go with him, reimbursed to the

government?

Now, I am told, that the Oklahoma City facility is going to be reopened again. Guess

who is going to pick up the tab? Right, you the taxpayer. This is not all of the waste by

any means.

I am told that a BLM office located in Silver Springs, Maryland, directs the Mustang

Horse and Burro Adoption Program East of the Mississippi and that office charges more

for adoptions (upwards to $500 per head) than does the BLM counterpart West of the

Mississippi, which only charges $125 dollars for adoption of a mustang.

The mustangs are gathered from public lands throughout the Western United States

under federal mandate and are to be auctioned to the public or put out to pasture on

approved sanctuaries.

And what if there is money left over in their operational budget or from mustang sales?

At the end of the year the money is all accounted for...Right? Wrong...At the end of

the year any money left over is NOT USED to pay off the national debt. It goes for the

entertainment of our casiques of the East.

They have a name for it. According to sources, it is called "Leaving The Money On The

Table". If there is any money left on the table (taxpayers' money), then selected

bureaucrats go to Kissimmee, Florida, a posh resort area, where they rent the top

portion of the Holiday Inn and have a party. At the taxpayers expense, of course. This

includes car rentals, and according to sources, not the small cars, they get the "BIG

CARS" and such other luxuries as may strike their fancy (at taxpayers expense). Their

party lasts for a week at a time. It is scheduled like a spring break so our overworked

bureaucrats can get away from it all for awhile, according to sources.

I am sure the event is outwardly justified as some very important top-level meeting of

some sort or other.

And according to sources who have reported this waste...The policy is to not leave any

money on the books! When this suspected waste was brought to the attention of upper

echelon executives in the BLM and Interior Department, they were told to stay out of it.

It is considered free money...money they (the bureaucrats) are compelled to spend. This

sounds to me like waste...on top of waste! The fancy words are Fiscal Management...but

I call it legalized theft.

Here in New Mexico, the Mustang Training Program, a joint venture between the BLM

and the New Mexico Department of Corrections between 1988 and 1992, was an

overwhelming success as it related to rehabilitation of inmates and the training and

welfare of the mustangs. But when a BLM supervisor in charge of the project repeatedly

asked his supervisor to help him account for over one million dollars in payments the

BLM had made to the state, which apparently could not be satisfactorily accounted for

by the state, he was told to shut up, forget it, and not mention it again.

This all brings up a very important question. Why isn't something done to deal with

these excesses? What is the General Accounting Office doing? A thief is a thief is a

thief! I don't care who the bureaucrat may be, anyone that misappropriates, or

otherwise misuses public money under any guise, is stealing from us. His or her

buddy-buddy co-bureaucrats may have approved the spending but whose money are

they spending? I call it theft! If a bureaucrat siphons money for his own personal use in

any manner...that is theft! Rape by a bureaucrat is still rape! Sexual harassment by

public servants is still sexual harassment. None of these matters should exist, and when

it involves public servants regardless of position, it should be dealt with promptly and

efficiently.

In every government building, in various places, one can see a hardboard poster entitled

"Code of Ethics for Government Service".

The first of the ten items, which references PL 96-013, says, "Put loyalty to the Highest

Moral Principles and to Country above loyalty to persons, party or government

department."

Another says, "Expose corruption where ever discovered."

Maybe the cartoon character Andy Capp has the answer to the lack of prompt action

and the government excess of governmental agencies. Andy Capp said, "I'm all for

equality but not in a man's own home." Maybe their rationale is to jump on a taxpayer

if they break the law...but don't mess with the good ole boys? After all they are part of

our federal bureaucracy. They're good ole boys!

The Archeological Resources Act, with amendments, has been on the books a goodly

while. There are already numerous instances where private citizens have been arrested,

jailed, fined, and had property confiscated by federal officers, including BLM law

enforcement personnel, relating to violation of that Act.

Why then, have there been no arrests of BLM employees or volunteers for violating the

very same Act?

Digging up, and taking buttons, coins and other items from the remains of U.S. Cavalry

troopers who died during the Indian Wars has certainly got to be as blatant a violation

of that Act as there is possible.

And when an Arizona BLM supervisor is caught red handed with Amerindian funerary

artifacts, and also associated with a retail store that in part, deals in such artifacts,

nothing is done, even after the in-house investigation, there is something seriously

flawed in the system.

And here is a dandy... A BLM departmental psychologist found that a particular BLM

Ranger applicant was too unstable to be trusted with firearms around other people.

The psychologist was overruled by bureaucratic means wherein a top echelon BLM

supervisor, who was a friend of the applicant, interceded on behalf of the applicant.

Reportedly, the psychologist challenged the action as a violation of professional ethics,

and consequently, according to him, was terminated after fifteen years service.

That BLM Ranger is now a full-time BLM law enforcement officer packing three

weapons in his government issued 4X4.

And I have been asked by many citizens why there seem to be so many BLM Rangers

running around in their 4X4's these days.

Certainly, there seems to be very little for them to do, except burn gasoline. But I am

told there is another answer. And if that answer is correct, then the intent of Congress

has been contravened and so has the public welfare.

The Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) has a tough job to do. Although that agency has

made it share of mistakes, their overall duties, in combating illegal drugs is a nasty one

at best.

I can speak with some knowledge of the subject because of working with the DEA and

CIA while assigned to the Special Operations Section of my Special Forces Unit in

Southeast Asia, Central and South America.

I am told that the DEA was, at some point not too long ago, short of funds for field

agents and the BLM did have extra funds (from where I do not know) so the BLM hired

additional Rangers but the duties of those Rangers were primarily drug interdiction

under the auspices of the DEA.

I suggest that the DEA is far more capable of handling drug interdiction and that agency

should be funded to the level they require so that they can have the necessary personnel

to do the job and those extra Rangers be hired by the DEA or else their jobs be

eliminated. They certainly are not needed by the BLM by any stretch of the

imagination.

But what the hell, it's just money...your tax money. Obviously there are those in the

federal bureaucracy, especially in the BLM, who could care less.

And one interesting side note to this series. This newspaper and myself personally, have

now been contacted by other federal employees, not just people associated with the

BLM, who ask what they can do to help clean house. My response was fairly simple, do

what any good American Citizen would do, go through the system. If that doesn't work

promptly, then go to your elected officials; if they are not responsible, just let us know.

Then we can tell their story as well.

In December of 1994 I received a Christmas card from Eugene Tafoya that read, in part:

Virginia:

Received the McCullough news letter and thank you for remembering me. I haven't

been writing much lately because of surgery and now, I have cancer. Another Agent

Orange victim. Have been undergoing chemotherapy and will be undergoing radiation

therapy soon.

Sometimes it is all I can do just to keep going to school and finish. I should graduate

this coming May. Well, guess I'll stick around, if for nothing else...to see what else can

happen (smile).

There is some stuff in the works and when it happens I will make sure you are among

the first to know.

Best of everything to you and the family.............Gene

White wine and blue cheese! YES!

Copyright 2000 by Virginia McCullough