By Lynn Janes

On June 25, 2026, the board of regents held a board meeting. The board consisted of Steven Neville, chair, Joseph "Dean" Reed, John Wertheim, Gregory Trujillo and WNMU student regent Keana Huerta. Trujillo attended online and all other attended in person. Dr. Chris Maples, interim president, and Dr. Jose Coll, incoming president also attended.

The board meeting started with their entering into executive session. They would be discussing legal matters subject to attorney client privilege. The cases included state attorney general Torrez vs Shepard, state ethics commission vs Shepard and Shepard vs WNMU.

The board came back into open session.

The board approved the agenda for the meeting and past minutes with a slight change on line 46, Neville had asked for any public input.

Public comment.

Hugh Epping wanted to take the opportunity to thank Maples for what he had done for the university and keeping them on an even keel and keeping the university involved in the community. He felt things would have been very different if it had not been for his skills. He wanted to point out two things that had impressed him. The first time he met Maples he told him to call him Chris. The second had been after last year's homecoming he saw Maples and his wife picking up trash in the parking lot. He welcomed Coll and looked forward to increasing the integration of the community in the university.

Old business

Kelly Riddle, vice president of business affairs, said in the past meeting she had asked the board to table a resolution for the student regent scholarship. They had needed to do some minor revisions to the scholarship that had started in 2021 for the student regents. It will be capped at $5,000 and will not keep the student regent from receiving other aid or scholarships. This had been put in place because student regents have not been allowed to be employed by the university, and it took away employment opportunities. This resolution will formalize it. All board members approved, and Huerta abstained.

New business

The board approved the staff emeritus designation of Tim Perez. Riddle said they have been excited to present this to a great employee within the facilities department ,who has decided to retire after 20 years. She read from a letter highlighting his outstanding professional record. Much of his work has been performed behind the scenes but essential to maintaining campus operations. All on the board congratulated him.

Riddle wanted to follow up and speak to the benefits to having staff emeritus. He will be provided a special email to continue to receive email from the university. Many services such as the library, media, fitness center and dining hall discounts, he will continue to have access to.

The board approved a capital project transmittal. The students in 2024 had lobbied the legislature for funding to do a solar project and received $400,000. It provided solar workstations that would be charging stations around the campus (nine) and one in Deming campus. The project did have a balance of $78.87 that will come out of university funds. Wertheim wanted to address that the students had lobbied for that funding. Riddle said every year student government have attended the legislature and lobbied for projects.

The board approved the five-year capital outlay plan and ICIP (infrastructure capital improvement plan). This will be the document the legislature looks at to see what the project priorities are. Riddle said each year these projects may change. They had worked with Maples on this document because it had to be turned in on July 1, 2026. As soon as Coll comes on board, they will start having conversations with him and see if any changes need to be made as they have until October to make them. Riddle went over some of the items on the list.

Neville pointed out they have a few legislators locally that have a good budget that could range from several hundred thousand to one million to help locally. He asked them to make sure to work with Senator Gabriel Ramos and Representative Luis Terrazas to maybe help with the smaller projects on the list.

Reed had a few questions about Ritch Hall and Centennial Hall and would those improvements include air conditioning. Riddle addressed Ritch Hall and said Aldo Leopold school had been in there and they would be turning it back into student housing. The university student housing capacity has been at close to 100 percent. They do not know how many students they will be housing in Ritch Hall at this time. Centennial Hall will be doing the necessary upgrades and repairs needed. One of the repairs will be the HVAC system.

Trujillo addressed the baseball facility listed on the ICIP and asked if it would be the first step to bringing baseball back. Riddle said yes, they had to have a facility before they could bring it back. Trujillo then asked about the IT improvements and what area they would be concentrating on. Riddle said typically the outdated infrastructure.

Riddle provided updated information on the RFP (request for proposal) for internal audit services. The board had decided in a past meeting to do an RFP as opposed to having someone internally perform audits. They had completed the process of the RFP and Reed and Huerta had assisted in the evaluation of the three proposals they received. The awarded the bid chosen had been Carr Riggs and Ingram (CRI) a CPA firm with offices throughout the United States, two being Albuquerque and El Paso. The first year contract will be $84,000 and they will do a risk assessment and report to the board directly and would also assist in implementation of a reporting tool. The special audit that the Jaramillo Accounting Group had done they recommended the university have a reporting tool on the website that people could report fraud and misuse of funds. They will also help in the monitoring of that information. The first year will not include any audits. After the board hears their risk assessment, they may determine if the audit will be necessary and that will be an additional cost.

Trujillo wanted to know how long the contract would be for. Riddle said it would be renewable annually and may continue for up to ten years.

Wertheim wanted to clarify the audit because it could be confusing to the public and asked Riddle to break down the different audits.

Riddle said the university has been required to do an annual audit and have to use an RFP to find an audit firm to do them and go for up to ten years. This year had been the first year Jaramillo Accounting Group had done the annual audit. Riddle went through their process and that it will be a broad sampling of procurement, hiring, payroll process, etc. They also do a single audit on federal funding and doing broad sampling of those documents.

Riddle had referenced a special audit. Initially the university had called for one followed by a request from the state auditor to have one done. It had been done because of the reporting of misdoings and misuse of funds within the university and finalized last year. They had a list of findings that she and her staff had been addressing to make those improvements. From that audit ,one of the recommendations had been to do internal audits and to use an internal audit service which could be an employee, but they had decided for public perception they would hire an outside contractor. At this time, they had taken care of most of the findings and recommendations that came from the special audit. Riddle said most had been addressed immediately. The only lingering ones had been the special audit and training on procurement for the staff and they are in process.

Dr. Jack Crocker, provost and vice president of academic affairs, wanted Riddle to address one of their concerns, which had been the digitizing of records. Riddle said they had requested in the last legislative session funding to go through the process. It will not be just past documents but future ones. They had not been successful at being awarded the funding but have started moving forward to make changes to enable the whole process with $100,000 they had been able to save for the start of the effort.

The board approved the asset disposal presented by Riddle. She had provided two lists one of items worth $5,000 or less and those that would not be worth over the $5,000. Those over the $5,000 will be disposed of on an online auction. After approval ,the list will be sent to the state auditor for approval, which will take thirty days. They will be publicizing the auction. Some questions from the board came on how the auction would work, and Riddle went over a few scenarios.

Maples had an update on the trademark application for Mariachi Plata. They had become very popular and well known throughout the state and outside of the state. They had filed for a trademark for here and internationally.

Regents' information

Board closing comments

Neville spoke to a constitutional amendment that affects the appointment of the regents and might what to discuss it in a future meeting. The higher education regents coalition has been concerned about its implementation if it passes.

Wertheim and Reed did not have any comments at this time.

Trujillo wanted to thank Riddle and her staff for making progress on the findings and looking forward to having an internal auditor on board.

Neville said they had one last thing to do. This would be Maples last formal meeting. Reed had something to present to Maples. It has been a tradition of the presidents that serve at WNMU to be presented with a WNMU lamp that says it's of great respect and admiration from your many friends at Western New Mexico University presented to Dr. Chris Maples June 30, 2026.

Maples thanked them and said it had been an honor to work with everyone there, serve the university and the community at large. He felt they would all be very happy with the president that would be taking his place and told them they would be trading up. He also said he would continue to watch from a distance because he now is invested in the university.

Neville told him he had done an excellent job, and they all appreciated it. He had kept everything stable and calming the waters to make things better. Maples said it started with the regents. He had worked with many boards, and this had been the best set of regents he had worked with.

Reed said they would be having a reception that day for Coll to welcome him and say farewell to Maples. Coll will be joining the university officially July 1, 2026.

Crocker added his thanks to Maple and said it had been a pleasure.

Meeting adjourned.