Commissioner candidate says he’ll stay in race
School board member says he has ‘matured’ since past arrests, DWI charges
A candidate for the Santa Fe County Commission who also serves on the Santa Fe Board of Education said he does not plan to step down from his seat or give up his campaign for commissioner despite a record that includes several arrests over 10 years and pleading guilty to DWI charges in 2003 and 2007.
Rudy Garcia, 47, acknowledged his past run-ins with the law but said he is determined to continue his public roles.
“I’m committed to the schools and committed to this community,” Garcia told The New Mexican on Wednesday. “I need to own up to this. I made mistakes involving alcohol and I take responsibility for it. In the past 10 years I have definitely matured, and I want to improve myself and those around me.”
A search of online court and police records indicates Garcia was arrested at least six times from 1998 to 2008. Four of those arrests involved DWI charges. He pleaded guilty to two, with two others being dismissed. Following the second DWI charge to which he pleaded guilty, he served an incarceration period of 16 days, from May 2 to May 18, 2008, a Bernalillo County Metropolitan Detention Center spokeswoman said Wednesday.
Asked about the jail time, Garcia replied: “I honestly don’t remember spending two weeks in jail.”
The New Mexican reported Garcia had been convicted twice of DWI in a candidate questionnaire earlier this year. The other arrests were reported Wednesday in the Albuquerque Journal.
Three of those four DWI charges took place in Bernalillo. In Santa Fe, Garcia also was arrested for aggravated assault after he was accused of trying to kick down the door to a woman’s residence after she did not answer. Garcia seemed intoxicated, according to that report.
Of that aggravated assault charge in June 2005, Garcia said it was “just a situation that my exgirlfriend and I had. No charges came of it.” A search of online court records does not indicate Garcia appeared before a judge for that arrest.
Though most school districts, including Santa Fe, require job applicants and volunteers to undergo background checks, school board members — who are volunteers — are not required to do so, said Joe Guillen, executive director of the New Mexico School Boards Association. He added some school board candidates voluntarily agree to undergo background checks.
Leaders of the Santa Fe school board said the board may initiate a policy to vet future candidates who are not elected by the public. The board voted 4-0 to appoint Garcia to succeed former board member Linda Trujillo, who resigned late in 2017.
Board President Steven Carrillo and Vice President Maureen Cashmon said they had no idea Garcia’s background included charges and arrests when they chose him.
“If someone is going to be appointed to the board, we may want to do a background check in the future,” Carrillo said. “We would have to vote to create an approval policy relative to anyone being appointed.”
Cashmon agreed. “We don’t have a vetting process in place. Maybe we should have asked, ‘Is there anything in your past that could cause embarrassment to the board?’ ” she said. “We will probably talk to our board lawyer to see what we should be doing in the future.”
Garcia was one of only two Santa Feans who expressed interest in joining the board once Trujillo announced her plan to resign so she could commit more fully to her role as a member of the state’s House of Representatives. At that time, the five-member board asked community members to submit a letter of interest and agree to a public interview if they wanted to fill her seat.
Garcia and John Salazar, both county employees, responded.
Garcia represents the board’s District 4, which includes a number of south-side schools, including Capital High, Ortiz Middle School and Sweeney Elementary.
He did not attend Tuesday night’s school board meeting, which focused on legislative priorities for the district.
Garcia is the Democratic candidate for the County Commission’s seat in District 3, which cuts a large swath south of Santa Fe’s city limits and includes Cerrillos, Madrid, Stanley and Galisteo. His opponent is Mike Anaya, who served two terms as a commissioner and is running as an independent.
Anaya said he was not aware of the charges against Garcia but did not think it would become an issue in the last month of the campaign before Election Day, Nov. 6.
“I’ll let the voters decide,” he said, adding, “I don’t condone DWI or domestic abuse.”
Asked if Garcia should withdraw from the race, Anaya replied, “That’s up to Rudy. Rudy has always treated me with respect. Him and I have always gotten along. I just don’t condone these things.”
Though Garcia was picked to fulfill the rest of Trujillo’s term into February 2019, the state’s new Local Election Act extends that term until November 2019. If elected as county commissioner, Garcia would begin serving in January.
He has said he plans to maintain both seats until at least the end of his school board term.
“Although these situations are never positive, I believe that they have given me a unique perspective,” Garcia wrote in a news release Wednesday afternoon. “I have been through difficult situations and have the knowledge and experience to make positive changes. It is my goal to impart this upon other people. In addition, these experiences have fueled my drive to give back to my community, which I have done during my career as a public servant for over 25 years and will continue to do so.”
I honestly don’t remember spending two weeks in jail.”
Rudy Garcia, school board member and County Commission candidate