Opinion: Chancellor search at ENMU remains loaded with secrets

It’s been 30 months since Jeff Elwell officially and mysteriously resigned as chancellor at Eastern New Mexico University.

The search for his long-term successor has been just as mysterious with allegations of impropriety coming from a regent early in the process.

And last week it became stranger still. Five “finalists” for the job were selected by a search committee, but taxpayers still don’t know who they are.

Secret keeping at ENMU in 1988 helped lead to a new state law requiring colleges be more transparent in hiring key personnel. Regents and administrators have changed in the past 34 years, but apparently none of them have learned much from the Portales college’s disappointing history.

University officials said last week they will announce the finalists for the chancellor’s job in a newspaper advertisement this week. They should have announced those finalists publicly the day they selected them. Taxpayers are going to pay the new university boss’ salary; shouldn’t they know who’s being considered for the job as soon as possible?

Many would argue taxpayers have a right to know the names and see the resumes of all 96 supposed applicants for this job, which will pay around $250,000 per year.

University regents disagree.

“I'm sure you are sensitive to the nature of such a high level search and how candidates would not want their names revealed until the finalists are determined,” Regent Phillip Bustos wrote in September, responding to a request from The News after regents said they’d selected semifinalists. “We will let you know who the finalists are as the search progresses …”

It's interesting that the regents feel a greater responsibility to people they haven’t hired than they do toward their bosses, the taxpayers, who might like to know more about the field being considered. There are no laws preventing the university from releasing names and resumes of the chancellor job applicants.

State law requires regents release the names of five finalists, though the regents say they can keep the names secret for a few more days.

The Portales News-Tribune, and its former Managing Editor Scot Stinnett, are largely responsible for forcing the regents to be that transparent. The PNT sued the university after it failed to reveal candidates for the head basketball coach’s job when Earl Diddle was hired in 1988.

That PNT lawsuit required the university pay the newspaper’s legal fees and led to today’s requirement that requires the university tell us who they have selected as five “finalists.”

Regents President Lance Pyle said the university is not violating any laws this time.

It’s just taking its sweet time before complying.

The greater question is why ENMU wants to continue dragging this out 30 months after naming an interim chancellor in Patrice Caldwell, who was planning to retire after 40 years as a faculty member and vice president.

Transparency at ENMU has been a problem since regents agreed to pay their 10th president, Elwell, almost $100,000 when he resigned. We don’t know why they paid him to quit, we just know everybody agreed they would not “make any disparaging statements or representations” regarding that mutual parting.

Then earlier this year, Regent Trish Ruiz stated she was concerned the new chancellor had been selected before applicants were sought. She claimed she had been left out of the decision-making process.

Other regents assured Ruiz that her concerns were untrue, but the suggestion alone should have been enough to inspire more transparency in this process.

Nope. Secret keeping is still a priority at ENMU.

-- David Stevens

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