WNMU Regents receive comprehensive Open Meetings Act training

By Lynn Janes

On November 20, 2025, the board of regents held a virtual regular meeting at Western New Mexico University. The board consisted of Steven Neville, chair, Joseph "Dean" Reed, John Wertheim, Gregory Trujillo and WNMU student Keana Huerta. Dr. Chris Maples, interim president, also attended.

The board had a closed session before this meeting started and said they had only discussed the pending litigation concerning Dr. Shephard and no action had taken place.

The board approved the agenda and minutes.

Presidents report

Maples had just returned from the Hispanic Association for Colleges and Universities Conference. He had met people that had been associated with Western before and heard a vision of what it could be again.

Carlos Carranza, student government president, has been working at starting another center for student success and felt it would be a real benefit to the students. He has been working with the students to hear some of their input.

Gregory Robinson Guerra, faculty senate president, has passed four major changes to the faculty handbook and he went over each one.

Bartholomew Brown, staff president senate, said that the senate had been working on finalizing the staff handbook changes, and they will mostly be to clarify procedure that's already in place. They will have it to present at the next board meeting. He thanked the staff that maintains the grounds and always keeps the campus looking exceptional and creates a welcoming environment. Brown also wanted to acknowledge the marketing media and how they have been promoting the university. He referred to a story about two students that have waited ten years to graduate.

Maples said that would be the perfect segue into a couple of comments he had. The Albuquerque Journal had an editorial opinion that related to graduation rates. The current way of looking at student progress and graduation rates has become antiquated. It had been designed at a time when students lived on campus and attended the same classes and had not been designed for open enrollment. The article insinuates that if you don't graduate in six years you would be a failure. In that context Maples said he would be a failure. "I have such an appreciation and admiration for an open enrollment university. That is how you change lives."

Saying that, he added that they do always have room to improve. Some external audits had been done and provided ways for them to improve, and they would see it coming soon. He went over some of those improvements, one being moving to more electronic records, which will not be newsworthy but will help things moving forward and will be a long project, approximately three years and $4 million. It has been a weakness that needs to be fixed so they can be on equal footing with other education institutions. "This university is way behind in this regard." It will help everyone do their jobs better and help the students better.

Reed said he and Huerta had met with Maples and Kelly Riddle, vice president of business and finance. Reed has been involved in the medical system and saw a phenomenon occur in 2007 to 2010 in which every physician had been mandated to abandon paper charts and go electronic. It will be a process to scan and transfer the files. In spite of that he commented that this would save Riddle and her staff many hours. He agreed with Maples, "We are very archaic."

Trujillo said this will be an important infrastructure even if people don't see it. He spoke to the cyber-attack. It will be critical to move forward and said if he can do anything to help, he would be happy to.

Neville asked about those students that come in thinking they will be doing a four-year degree and if the university has come in to help and maybe they could still have an associates degree. He asked if that would help with the statistics. It could also help them with credentials they can take to the job market.

Maples said it doesn't help because the statistics have been measured on four- and six-year bachelor's degrees. They do have other opportunities they offer students.

Betsy Miller, vice president of student affairs, said currently they offer associates degrees automatically to students that meet 31 general education hours and additional hours to total 60. Neville asked about the percentage of students doing trades education like welding or truck repair. Miller responded they have a high percentage taking welding and electrical construction, and they have been very successful completing their degrees. Neville wanted that on the record because this university has operated a little bit like a community college. "It is important people know we are serving a different need." They meet the needs of the community but not necessarily the obtaining of a bachelor's degree.

Maples said that would be an excellent point, "I would say that being an open admission university is a critical component of being able to provide that broad range of degree achieved, whatever the degree is. That said, for students who are going forward with a bachelor's degree and think they're going to go forward even more, we're actually not being helped by recent changes in the New Mexico public education requirements."

Jack Crocker, executive vice president of academic affairs, said, as open access,  all that will be needed would be a high school diploma or the equivalent to be admitted into a bachelor's program. What has been learned through the public education department (PED) and the College of Education one area what has been most problematic is math. Many entering students (49 percent) test into remedial math or remedial English. Those courses will be developmental and will not count towards a degree. It has been an obstacle especially for those working full time, part time or have children. He cited some of the problems being the high schools allowing alternative math classes to count towards their math requirement and therefore maybe resulting in them not taking algebra courses that then must be picked up at the university. He referred back to the associates degrees and what the students want. They have been meeting what the students want and that would be a better measure. Neville shared his thoughts on the matter. They have the same situation at San Juan College, where he has been associated . "We have people learning great trades." A friend of his hires every welder he can from the school because they need them. Auto dealers need mechanics. Many times, they can make better money than most bachelor's degrees.

Crocker wanted to make one other point. They have been expanding the trade areas because that has been where they see the need. The university will also be setting the programs up as stackable with others, so they can come back and add on and obtain that bachelors.

New business

Riddle had a midyear budget adjustment request for the board. She had met with Reed and Huerta and presented the adjustments. The request must be turned into the higher education department by December 5, 2025. They had a reduction in student tuition fees of $620,000 and an increase of $240,000 for the child development center. Another decrease had been $16,000 in athletics due to fewer student fees that directly comes from loss in tuition. She continued to explain the rest in detail.

Reed pointed out the $4.7 million balance will be 9.3 percent of the expenditure budget, and the state only requires 3 percent. That will be very healthy in spite of the expenditures and unexpected costs.

The board approved the budget adjustments. They also discussed how to fund the cost of moving to everything being electronic at a cost of about $4 million and will be contacting the legislators.

Riddle went over asset disposal and said they didn't have much. The state requires board approval for anything over $5,000. Items will be a truck and computer equipment. She had included all items on the list for the board even the ones under the $5,000. Neville asked if they would be auctioned. Riddle said typically but some of the items on the list cannot be found and sometimes the quality of an item does not meet something that can be auctioned so it will be taken to the dump. She hoped they could have another auction next year. The board approved the asset disposal.

The board approved the fiscal year 2026 first quarter certification. This certification is also required by the higher education department. It shows any significant changes in the budget and if they have had any cash flow problems. They didn't not have anything to report. Trujillo wanted to know if that had not been met in the past, and Riddle went over the cyber incident that had caused them to be one day behind on pay but that had been the only time.

Riddle wanted to point out that in a meeting about the special audit the auditor requested a little more oversight from the board on presidential expenditures. She had developed a report that could be passed on to them to provide that and had already started. It will include everything from the president's office specifically, such as activity promotion support, membership dues, legal fees and items pertaining to the president's residence.

Reed said one of the things included will be the expenditure on legal services. They had hired Ortiz and Zamora and have paid approximately $18,500 up to October 27, 2025.

The board approved the travel, procurement and reimbursement policy. Riddle had provided the board with the updates on each one and some had come from the finalization of the special audit.

One significant change will be to the travel policy, and it has been made to be more specific on approval requirements. In state will not need approval but all out of state and neighboring countries will need chair approval. International will have to come to the full board.

Wertheim asked what it had been before. Riddle said before it just needed approval by supervisors. They had not always been documented.

The board approved the resolution for signature authorization of officers. Although this had been covered in the board manual they wanted to have an actual signed resolution. This had also come from the special audit regarding business continuity. Riddle explained the reason more in depth and why it would be important and create more oversight.

Riddle had also contacted other universities to see how they handled some situations. Other institutions required a wet signature on any disbursement over $1 million but they had decided to make it $750,000 for WNMU.

Reed explained how they had come to the $750,000 and gave some reasons. Huerta, Riddle and Maples had all supported it. It will be important for them to tighten the belt because of optics and the state auditor's report. It will show another step in the right direction and careful control. Wertheim had some questions on policy and Trujillo wanted to know how many disbursements would be over $750,000. Riddle didn't have the exact information but answered with what she knew.

Miller presented the student handbook to the board for approval. It contained a new message from Maples and Carranza. They had also updated the accreditation information and some other information. In addition, it updated the student health services that included the telehealth platform for medical and mental health. It addresses TitleIX and how to report incidents. This had come from changes in legislation. The board approved the changes to the handbook.

The next item on the agenda would be a board training on transparency and effective governance. Gino Zamora had attended to provide a very comprehensive training to the board and said it would also be useful to the staff. Zamora would be going over new legislation. State statues require each board member to have ten hours of training within the first six months of their appointment. He would cover transparency and ethics obligations. The presentation went on for two hours. He started with the New Mexico Open Meetings Act and how it applied to the university. He would also touch on the New Mexico Inspection and Public Records Act (IPRA). He had a power point presentation for the board to view. "We've got to learn what these restrictions are so that we can interact. It's the same with the Inspection of Public Records Act and same with Governmental Conduct Act. There may be times that if we were just talking to our friend or talking to a cousin, these conversations would be fine. When we have an official title, an official duty, or we represent or work for a governmental entity, all of those relationships change."

Zamora delved into each part of the Open Meetings Act for the board. This covered when and how meetings can be conducted whether regular or special. He went over executive sessions and what could be discussed and not discussed. The meetings must be published in a certain amount of time and an agenda available within 72 hours of the meeting. Zamora addressed quorums and what constituted that and the need to publish that possible gathering. He warned about rolling quorums that could result from emails or texts.

Zamora encouraged questions throughout his presentation, in which the board did ask many questions.

Zamora addressed all the things that would be violations throughout the presentation and how to avoid those.

Zamora addressed public comment and how that would need to be handled. He recommended they allow three minutes or less for each person. People should be able to express their thoughts in that time. If they have a controversial subject come up, they may have 40 people show up and it will be at the discretion of the board to shrink that time. He recommended they have an introductory script to help set a tone.

The public has the right to inspect public records except for limited exclusions. Zamora went over what that would and would not be and how to avoid problems. He went over what would be exclude by IPRA. The records custodian must know all the legalities. This language had appeared in the higher education code in 1897 but had been articulated in the '80s. The deadlines will be important to adhere to because of penalties and fines and the timelines for these requests will be very short. The attorney general has brought actions when timelines had not been met, and lawsuits filed. The fines can be $100 a day and that would be $36,500 in a year. That will not include attorney fees. Some booster clubs and foundations associated with the university could be subjected to IPRA.

Zamora cautioned that personal phones and emails could also be subject to IPRA. He explained how that could be avoided.

To wrap it up Zamora went over ethics. Board members may not have contracts with the university. There could be exception through a competitive RFP (request for proposal) process. He suggested they consult legal counsel and went over many examples.

He went over the Governmental Conduct Act and what that entailed. Essentially, they could not profit from any action taken by the university. Conflicts of interest must be disclosed and said it also included the employees. He had many real life examples for the board.

Public comments none currently. This will be moved to the beginning of the meeting in the future as recommended by Zamora.

Board closing statements

Wertheim thanked Zamora for an excellent presentation and everyone's participation and questions.

Reed wanted to provide a quick update. Anthem had approximately 22 candidates ready to interview for the president's position. They will be starting the process in January 2026.

Neville said he would not be available the week of March 16, 2026, and wanted Anthem to know not to schedule that week.

Meeting adjourned.