A. The state records administrator shall provide for publication of a New Mexico register at least twice a month. The New Mexico register shall be published in such a way as to minimize the cost to the state. To accomplish this, the state records administrator is authorized to provide for charges for subscriptions and for publication of notice and other items, including advertising, in the register.

B. The New Mexico register shall be the official publication for all notices of rule makings and filings of adopted rules, including emergency rules, by agencies.

(1) The register shall include the full text of any adopted rules, including emergency rules. Proposed rules may be published in full or in part at the discretion of the issuing agency.

(2) Upon request of an issuing agency, the state records administrator may determine that publication in the register of the full text of an adopted rule would be unduly cumbersome, expensive or otherwise inexpedient, and may publish instead a synopsis of the adopted rule and a statement that a copy of the rule is available from the issuing agency.

C. The New Mexico register shall be available by subscription and single copy purchase to any person, including agencies of the executive, judicial and legislative branches of state government and its political subdivisions, at a reasonable charge approved by the state records administrator. The administrator may authorize distribution of a certain number of copies of the register without charge to agencies or political subdivisions as deemed economically feasible and appropriate.

D. The New Mexico register may include a summary or the text of any governor's executive order, a summary, listing or the text of any attorney general's opinion, a calendar listing the date, time and place of all or selected agency rule-making hearings, a list of gubernatorial appointments of state officials and board and commission members or other material related to administrative law and practice.

E. The state records administrator shall adopt and promulgate rules necessary for the implementation and administration of this section.

History: Laws 1989, ch. 38, § 1; 1995, ch. 110, § 5.

The 1995 amendment, effective July 1, 1995, in Subsection A, substituted "for publication" for "if economically feasible, for development and publication" and deleted "after January 1, 1990" following "month"; in Subsection B, redesignated the last two sentences as Paragraph (1) and rewrote the paragraph to make publication of the full text of adopted rules mandatory, and added Paragraph (2); and made minor stylistic changes throughout the section.

Adequate notice under Open Meetings Act. — A notice of proposed rulemaking in the New Mexico register probably would not constitute reasonable notice under the Open Meetings Act, 10-15-1 to 10-15-4 NMSA 1978, because the register is not widely circulated and is not readily available to the general public. 1993 Op. Att'y Gen. No. 93-02.

Notice requirements for legal publication. — A notice published in the New Mexico register would not fulfill the requirements for legal publication under 14-11-1 to 14-11-8 NMSA 1978 because the register is not a newspaper of general paid circulation. 1993 Op. Att'y Gen. No. 93-02.

Publication in human services register. — Publication of a notice, proposed rule, or adopted rule in the New Mexico human services register does not fulfill the human services department's duty to publish materials required by the New Mexico register. 1993 Op. Att'y Gen. No. 93-02.

Publication requirements under the Administrative Procedures Act. — The state rules administrator was not required to publish a separate bulletin under former 12-8-6 NMSA 1978 for agencies subject to the Administrative Procedures Act. Specifically, the provisions of this section superseded the requirements in former 12-8-6 NMSA 1978 for issuing a bimonthly publication, for publishing the full text of rules except under the specified conditions and for providing bulletins free of charge to state agencies and political subdivisions upon request. 1993 Op. Att'y Gen. No. 93-03.

Incorporation by reference. — An agency may not avoid filing and publishing a rule by incorporating by reference any otherwise properly filed and published rule. However, this section grants the state records administrator and the issuing agency discretion to agree on publication of less than a full text of incorporated materials. 1993 Op. Att'y Gen. No. 93-01.