I am writing today to announce the closure of the New Mexico Independent. After three and a half years of operation in New Mexico, the board of the American Independent News Network, has decided to shift publication of its news…
While environmental activists played their part yesterday during demonstrations at the capitol building, going so far as to dress up as solar panels and to sing the tune of “You Are My Sunshine,” their counterparts, the anti-cap-and-trade contingency who has…
Roughly one quarter of University of New Mexico students are unimpressed with the state’s flagship public school, according to a survey that questioned college students about their higher education experiences.
State land commissioner Patrick Lyons “really pounded (Robert) Corn” in the Republican primaries for Public Regulation Commission (PRC) District 2, PRC Chairman David King said Tuesday.
“Unless he does something, it’s his to lose,” King, District 2′s Republican incumbent, told The Independent. “Corn was a formidable opponent.”
King cannot run for the reelection because of term limits.
Lyons, one of the most powerful elected officials in the state, is running against Tularosa Democrat Stephanie DuBois, who chuckled when describing herself as a “professional dog groomer.”
DuBois unsuccessfully challenged King for the seat in 2006.
DuBois, whose campaign is publicly financed, expects Lyons to run a “dirty” campaign, she told The Independent. She will use her funding for print and radio ads and to rent a car to campaign throughout the geographically vast District 2, she said.
District 2 covers southeastern New Mexico.
Including District 2, three of the five seats on the powerful Commission will be up for grabs in the November general elections, with no incumbents seeking reelection: King’s District 2; Carol Sloan‘s District 4 seat, representing northwestern New Mexico; and Sandy Jones‘ District 5 seat, which represents southwestern New Mexico.
Jones mounted an unsuccessful democratic primary campaign for land commissioner rather than defending his seat on the PRC. Sloan could not seek reelection because of her recent felony convictions.
Democratic candidate Theresa Becenti-Aguilar of Albuquerque, a Navajo and former PRC Native American liaison, won convincingly in a hotly contested four-way Democratic primary for Sloan’s seat. Becenti-Aguilar will face Republican Gary J. Montoya, who ran unopposed for the Republican nomination, in November’s general elections.
Becenti-Aguilar will likely beat Montoya but the race to replace Jones is “up for grabs,” King said.
Seeking Jones’s seat are Ruidoso Republican and former state legislator Ben Hall, and former Dona Ana County commissioner Bill McCamley, who ran unopposed for the Democratic nomination Tuesday.
PRC elections will shape insurance regulation
District 1 (Albuquerque) Commissioner Jason Marks and District 3 (northern and northeastern New Mexico) Commissioner Jerome Block Jr.‘s seats are not up for election this year.
Both men are angling to exert greater PRC control over health insurance rate hike approvals by the controversial state Insurance Division — an issue likely to figure in all three PRC races this summer.
DuBois said she favors the effort to exert more control over the Insurance Division and close scrutiny of the current PNM rate hike request, she said — one issue on which she and King agree.
