Regent Appointments Will Be Based On "Constitution"

Governor Martinez

LAS CRUCES – Governor Susana Martinez announced today that she has rescinded the executive order establishing a convoluted regent selection process for New Mexico’s public universities. Executive Order 2010-049 established an advisory committee process for the state’s universities, providing additional and unnecessary requirements not specified in the New Mexico Constitution. The Governor issued an executive order overturning those requirements, returning the regent selection process to the one enumerated by the State Constitution. “The New Mexico Constitution provides a sufficient process for selecting regents at our public universities and I will abide by it,” said Governor Martinez. “The advisory committee is just another symbol of big-government excesses that serve little purpose. I believe in the need for a fair regent selection process that is free of politics, but I do not find it necessary to add another layer to an already bloated bureaucracy.” Last summer, the Albuquerque Journal editorialized against the regent selection process as “one more quasi-governmental bureaucracy” that would “water down accountability. Last week, the University of New Mexico Faculty Senate approved a proposal that would water down that accountability by creating a committee that would recommend three names to the governor whenever a regent's position opens at UNM, New Mexico State University or New Mexico Institute of Mining and Technology…There's no question faculty and community input is a good thing...But the process should not be institutionalized by creating one more quasi-governmental bureaucracy.” (“Leave Regent Decision Up to Next Governor,” Albuquerque Journal Editorial, 8/29/10).

Regent Appointments Will Be Based On "Constitution"