Mesalands board member considering not running

A member of the Mesalands Community College board of trustees said he is considering not running for election in November if students, staff members and faculty are required by the state to be vaccinated against the coronavirus.

College President Gregg Busch said in the board’s Aug. 17 meeting that Mesalands was one of only two or three higher-education institutions in New Mexico that is not requiring vaccinations. Busch said pressure is growing for Mesalands to impose such a requirement and that it seemed likely the state’s Higher Education Department would mandate it.

“I have tremendous respect with people making their own decisions,” Busch said of the college’s hands-off position. “But it seems every hour, we’re getting pushed more and more into a corner.”

Board Chairman Jim Streetman also seemed resigned to such a requirement. Referring to the suspension of the Floyd school board after it voted twice to disregard a state mask mandate, Streetman said the board may have no choice but to accept mandatory vaccines.

“If it comes to the point where we’re going to have to be vaccinated, we’re going to have to look at that,” Streetman said. “We’re a local board, but we still to answer to the state. They can do like the did at Floyd: Come in, remove us and start everything all over. Folks, we don’t have a lot of choice in this matter.”

Board member Tom Sidwell, who spoke little during previous meetings, angrily voiced his stance against such a scenario.

“I do have a choice,” he said. “If the state wants to remove me, they can remove me. I’m going to exercise my freedom. I served in the military; I went to war. I did not come home for a bunch of damned socialists to take away my freedom of choice.”

Sidwell said he was considering not running for election because of the issue.

“It’s important to be on this board. This college is very important,” he said. “But my freedom is more important. Benjamin Franklin said if you trade your liberty for some security, you end up with neither. We’ve lost a lot of liberty, we’ve lot a lot of freedom, and we do not have that security. I will make that choice for myself. It’s my body, my health.”

“I support you and your right to make that decision,” Busch said.

“Tom, I agree with you 100%,” Streetman said.

The board chose Sidwell, co-owner of the JX Ranch south of Tucumcari, in August 2020 to serve in the place of Craig Currell, who died the month before. Currell had won re-election for a six-year term in 2019 after running unopposed. Sidwell would have to win an election this November to fill the final four years of Currell's term. The filing date for all local candidates in the election is Aug. 24.

“I’ve wrestled with this, and still do not know whether I’m going to run for election because I don’t see an end to this,” Sidwell said of COVID-19 regulations. “If it’s required to be masked and be vaccinated to go up to the campus, to attend board meetings, then I can’t do it. I guess I’ve drawn a line in the sand, and that line isn’t backing up at all.”

Busch said with the support of his executive staff, he would “hold back as long as humanly possible from being forced into mandatory vaccinations.”

“I do respect people’s rights to make their own decisions. I don’t want to get into people’s business at that level. But I can’t tell the board with any great certainty they won’t come,” he said.

Busch acknowledged the Mesalands board is not unanimous about vaccinations, though no one else spoke publicly about it during the meeting.

“I’m a smart enough cookie to realize my board doesn’t all agree on this issue,” he said. “I’m trying hard to straddle that fence and represent the board they way they want me to represent them.”

Busch mentioned “a member of the campus community” was exposed to a COVID-positive person and is quarantining at home, less than a week after Mesalands began classes for the fall semester.