Griego's Land Lease in Default

State Land Office demands $6,000 for stolen rocks

It just hasn’t been a good week for Phil Griego.

SFR has learned that a day after the former state senator was

with fraud, bribery and other violations related to his

, the State Land Office mailed a certified letter officially notifying Griego that they plan to cancel their lease with him in San Miguel County in 30 days unless he pays $6,000 to compensate the agency for tons of sandstone boulders illegally removed from the property last fall.

The March 2 letter from Deputy General Counsel Scott Jaworski shows the lease, which has been in Griego’s family since 1966, is now in default after Griego and his attorney, Robert Stranahan, failed to respond to the agency’s multiple demands, including fencing off the property and hiring a consultant to assess damage they believe was caused by excavation equipment to the culturally rich land.

In January,

two men from Pecos to remove the rocks without getting prior authorization from the land office. While Griego has insisted he wasn’t paid for the rocks,

revealed that compliance officers believed rocks were moved “in order to sell them.”

Stranahan and Griego have been negotiating with the land office for months but have failed to come to terms. Two days after SFR published its investigation on the stolen rocks, Stranahan met with agency officials to hammer out a deal.

obtained by SFR show the agency wants Griego to install barbed wire with metal stakes to protect the leased area from illegal dumping and rock theft. In order to keep the lease, Griego will also have to quickly clean up or remove an abandoned school building on the site, since the agency believes it “detracts from the value of the lease and is a safety hazard,” and pay for damage to the cultural site after an assessment report is completed. Jaworski estimates the assessment will cost between $1,000 and $5,000 and the fencing between $4,850 and $6,200.

Griego did not return SFR’s call to ask him if he intends to fulfill those requirements to keep the lease.

Emily Strickler, the land office’s assistant commissioner for communications, says the agency hasn’t decided what steps it will take against Griego if they are forced to cancel the lease.

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