Alamogordo Daily News - Local News -
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Published on: 4/23/2006
Last Visited: 4/23/2006
Stephanie DuBois has run for office in Otero County in various races since 1996.
She has twice served as chairperson and vice chair of the Otero Democratic Party, and is currently serving as state Democratic regional vice chair for Congressional District 2.
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Today, DuBois is running for the Public Regulation Commission.
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"It's an experiment to level the playing field for somebody who has the yearning to hold office, but no contacts," DuBois said."I wanted to run for Public Regulation Commission and I wanted to accept the public funding."
DuBois had to get signatures from 182 people in PRC District 2, which encompasses six New Mexico counties, and precincts in eight more.
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DuBois got all her signatures, turning in 207 of the 182 needed for qualifier certificates.
On April 4, she got a call from the PRC public funding department telling her she did not qualify.
"'You had a number of people who did not qualify in the district and a number of names misspelled,' I was told," she said.
DuBois said Public Funding Coordinator Martina C'de'Baca had asked her to provide a spreadsheet of names, even though the law says C'de'Baca officially had to go by the qualifier certificates.C'de'Baca said the spreadsheet makes the names easier to go through.
The friend who typed out the requested spreadsheet for DuBois ran into some problems.Some of the names were too long to fit in a spreadsheet field, and some of them got misspelled, thus resulting in DuBois' disqualification.
"If I didn't appeal this, what kind of a PRC commissioner would I be?"DuBois asked.
With 72 hours to appeal the disqualification, DuBois had to battle bureaucracy and prove that the names on the petitions, some from distant counties, were real.
C'de'Baca faxed DuBois a list of 47 disqualified names.
"On the list, some were friends of mine, or friends of my dad's who have been here forever," DuBois said.
So she typed up a letter and faxed it to the secretary of state.
"I was going to appeal this," she said.
DuBois got a fax back, setting a time and date for a hearing she was going to have to participate in by teleconference.Not feeling she could demonstrate what she needed to, DuBois requested that she be allowed to present in person.
By the time DuBois got to Santa Fe for the hearing, which took place April 1, the list of disqualified names had grown to 50, so there were several she hadn't known about which she couldn't verify at the hearing.
"She disqualified Mario Torres because he didn't sign his name Mariano," she said.
After an hour an a half in the hearing, DuBois came home.
Thursday, around 11 a.m., C'de'Baca called and said DuBois now qualifies for the public money.
"But I still haven't seen any money," DuBois said."This has been going on since the 21st of March.It's a terrible way to do public funding.It was really frustrating, and now not to have money."
Those receiving money for their PRC campaigns will get a little over $16,000, DuBois said.If her opponent, Joseph D. Calderon of Hobbs, raises more than $16,000 privately, DuBois gets double the amount, $34,000.
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Candidates were allowed to raise $5,000 in seed money to gather signatures and pay travel expenses, but the seed money has to be gone by the time the public application is submitted, DuBois said.
Another rule is candidates can't mix money from a previous campaign account with the public funding, DuBois said.
If DuBois wins the seat, she will have to spend most of her time in Santa Fe, she said.She will also be making $90,000 a year for serving on the PRC.
"It's a very, very important commission in the state," DuBois said."More so than the Legislature or any other deal."
DuBois has rented an office next to the grocery store in Tularosa and is ready to run.
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