New Mexico Secretary of State says Bosque Farms mayor doesn’t have to run for election

BOSQUE FARMS — The 2025 local election season is off to an interesting start, with the question of whether a mayoral seat should have been included on the ballot being raised in one municipality.

The Valencia County News-Bulletin took the question to the New Mexico Secretary of State for an answer.

The issue at hand was whether the position of mayor of the village of Bosque Farms should have been included in the election proclamation approved by the council in light of a recent change to state election law.

The short answer to the question is “no.”

When asked via email about the situation, BC Nguyen, SOS elections outreach coordinator, responded that after consulting with Peter Auh, SOS general counsel, his analysis showed since the statute changed on July 1 of this year, it cannot be applied retroactively, “so, this mayoral position will appear on the 2027 (Regular Local Election).”

On a related topic, the News-Bulletin also asked if a council has the authority to place “any elected position on a proclamation and, in essence, force a race to occur for a position.”

The answer from Nguyen and Auh was again “no,” because a council cannot alter the term of any elected position by placing it on a proclamation.

“ ... terms are set by statute and, in some cases, the constitution, and if a person is serving out a term, a council cannot arbitrarily shorten it,” Nguyen wrote in her response to the newspaper’s inquiry.

At the June 30 village council meeting, when the proposed election proclamation for the November 2025 Local Election was presented to the council it was for two at-large council positions, currently held by Councilors Michael Cheromiah and Tim Baughman.

Councilor Erica De Smet said she wanted the council to include the mayor’s position on the proclamation in order to put it on the November ballot, since Mayor Chris Gillespie was appointed to the position and not elected.

“There is a new state law and in this scenario if a mayor vacates the position, (the position) goes on the ballot,” De Smet said. “My suggestion would be to give the vote back to the people.”

When Gillespie was appointed, state statute specified appointees for mayoral vacancies would serve until the end of the term, which in this case would be until the end of 2027.

During this year’s legislative session, the law was amended as part of House Bill 298 to limit appointed mayors to serve until the next local election — as is the case for the majority of other vacancy appointments to governing bodies — which would be November of this year.

Gillespie was appointed as mayor in March 2024 by the council after Mayor Wayne Ake stepped down due to health issues. Ake was elected as mayor in November 2023.

The vote to appoint Gillespie was 2-0, with Baughman and Councilor Ronita Wood voting in favor. De Smet did not cast a vote. Cheromiah recused himself from the vote because he was interested in filling the position.