By Rob Nikolewski │ New Mexico Watchdog

SANTA FE – As the controversy continues over allegations of $36 million in potential misuse of funds, a former Green Party candidate for statewide and national office said she has a sense of déjà vu.

“I haven’t read the audit” of the providers in question, “but I do have concerns about the … allegations because it wouldn’t surprise me,” said , a longtime critic of the way behavioral health is carried out in New Mexico. “Patients and beneficiaries are often the low priorities.”

Earlier this summer, the state’s suspended payments to more than a dozen providers after an independent auditing firm from Boston confirmed what the department said was warning signs of potential misuse of dollars.

HSD has since entered into contracts with five Arizona firms to pick up the slack. But the department, part of the administration of , has been criticized for spending up to $17.85 million to fund the Arizona firms.

Last Wednesday, lawmakers from both political parties complained about the amount, saying they haven’t received enough information about the allegations surrounding the providers who had their funding cut off. HSD, the and the have released only an , saying providing details of the audit will jeopardize the investigation.

“These are like reruns for me,” Miller told by telephone from her home in Ojo Sarco. The behavioral health system in New Mexico has “never done a very good job,” she said.

“It’s gotten bounced around a lot … especially in rural areas … We had the same thing happen when (then-Gov. brought in ValueOptions. Providers were having a difficult time then too.”

is a health care company that used to administer Medicaid for behavioral health providers in the state the current overseer, , took over the contract. Optum, which through an enhanced software system, is

Miller said patients are “stuck with whatever middleman or middle corporation the state puts in place.”

The 66-year-old Miller has unsuccessfully run for a number of statewide offices in the past 20 years and received a large amount of the vote (at least by third-party standards) in 1997, when she picked up in a special election for Congress.

Like so many in the Green Party, she’s a harsh critic of corporation involvement in health care (“we haven’t gained anything by this corporate model,” she said) but insisted to New Mexico Watchdog that she’s not a tax and spend liberal.

“I’m really a fiscal conservative,” she said. “We need to spend every penny wisely. That’s why I’ve always questioned why the corporate system works best.”

Miller described herself as a public health activist and works on the and its task force and said she has no current plans to run for office again.

“I do have some concerns about the allegations (of fraud),” Miller said. “Not to defend the Martinez administration but we had a lot of these same problems before … Patients and beneficiaries get used as political footballs no matter who’s running the system.”

Update 8/24: Miller e-mailed us to say, “I am an Independent, not a Green. My last run for Congress in 2008 garnered twice as many votes (nearly 40,000) than as a Green in 1997.”

Contact Rob Nikolewski at and follow him on Twitter @robnikolewski