Bureau of Business and Economic Research at UNM Staff Credentials

Staff Credentials

Adelamar N. Alcantara, Director, Geospatial and Population Studies

B.A. (Philosophy/Psychology), University of the Philippines, 1968
M.A., Ph.D. (Sociology/Demography), University of Hawaii/East-West Center, 1977, 1990

Dely is a senior demographer and supervises the UNM Geospatial and Population Studies (formerly BBER's Population Estimates and Projections Program). She has extensive training and experience in applied demographic research, survey research program evaluation, and gender studies. Her research covers the following areas: population estimation and projections, fertility, mortality, migration, Indian education, poverty, welfare reform, health insurance access and gender studies. In the last 20 years, Dely has conducted research for a number of state, local, and private agencies which include the NM Dept. of Health, Dept. of Vocational Rehabilitation, Human Services Dept., Public Education Dept. Indian Education Division, Dept. of Transportation, the Legislative Services Council, the Interstate Stream Commission, the City of Albuquerque, the Northwest Council of Governments, the Health Policy Commission, the Pueblo of Zuni, the Public School Facilities Authority, the University of New Mexico Office of Vice President for Student Affairs, and Taschek Environmental Agency, LLC.

For 18 years, Dely represented New Mexico in the Federal State Cooperative on Population Estimates (FSCPE) and the Federal State Cooperative on Population Projections (FSCPP) and for a number of years she was on the steering committees of both programs. In 2004, she was the chairperson of the FSCPP. She also served on a number of FSCPE research methodology committees.

Dely is an adjunct faculty in the School of Architecture and Planning Community and Regional Program at the University of New Mexico. She teaches graduate level courses in applied statistics for planners, applied demography, quantitative analysis for planners, survey research, field research methods and organizational theory. She has served in graduate student thesis committees in public administration, community and regional planning, political science and sociology.

Dely is very involved in the Albuquerque community. She serves on a number of non-profit boards, most notable of which are the Bernalillo County Arts Commission, Albuquerque Heritage Council, the Bataan Corregidor Memorial Foundation, the Filipino American Historical Society, (Rio Grande Chapter), and the Asian American Association of New Mexico. She is on the National Board of Trustees of the Filipino American National Historical Society and the National Federation of Filipino American Associations National Board of Directors. She founded the New Mexico Asian Family Center, which serves Asian immigrants and Asian Americans in the areas of immigration, domestic violence and sexual assault, tobacco smoking cessation and prevention, parenting, and after school programs. She was instrumental in the construction of the Bataan-Corregidor Memorial located at the Bataan Memorial Park in honor of the NM 200th and 515th Coast Artillery Units who fought in the Philippines during WWII and were on the Bataan Death March. For her community service, she was one of 20 NM women who received the NM Commission on the Status of Women's 2004 Governor's Award for Outstanding NM Women and the Lifetime Achievement Award from the Filipino American National Historical Society-Rio Grande.

Jack Baker, Sr. Research Scientist I, Geospatial & Population Studies

B.A. (Anthropology), University of North Dakota, 2000
M.S. (Anthropology, Human Evolutionary Ecology), University of New Mexico, 2002
Ph.D. (Anthropology, Physiological Ecology and Biodemography), University of New Mexico, 2007

Jack came to BBER in 2005 is now part of the UNM Geospatial and Population Studies (formerly BBER's Population Estimates and Projections Program). He was promoted to Senior Research Scientist in 2010. Jack's research experience spans the areas of small area population estimation, geospatial demographic methods, the ecology of human growth, the epidemiology of obesity, paleo and historical demography, anthropological variants of decision analysis, and geospatial aspects of US Census operations.

Most of Jack's research since 2007 has focused on small area population estimation using geocoded data, supporting an expanding scope of population estimates for New Mexico that will include Census tracts in the post-2010 intercensal period. Since 2006, Jack has represented the state of New Mexico in the Federal/State Cooperative Program on Population Estimates (FSCPE), serving as Vice-Chair (2008-2009) of this group as well as on numerous research sub-committees including the Housing Unit-Based Estimates Research Team (2007) and the 2010 Postcensal Estimtes Team (2009-Present). In 2008, Jack served as Chair of the Federal/State Cooperative Program on Population Projections (FSCPP) as well. From 2008-2010, Jack chaired the 2010 Count Review Program sub-committee of the FSCPE, serving as an independent consultant to the US Census Bureau to help them redesign this program to be address-based and GIS-enabled. This effort included writing a technical manual and training 50 other State Demographers on applications of GIS to demographic modeling. This highly-successful program won the Census Bureau's Director's Award for Innovation in 2010. In 2009, Jack was selected as one only 13 persons nationwide to serve as a member of the National Academies of Science's Panel to Review the 2010 Census. In 2010, Jack was appointed to the Population Association of America's Committee on Applied Demography. Jack also remains active in research in biodemography, continuing to publish research on the ecology and evolution of human growth and development. His research has been featured in journals such as The American Journal of Human Biology and the Journal of Economic and Social Measurement and in unique edited volumes such as Evolutionary Medicine and Health (2008) and Medicine and Evolution (2008).

Doleswar Bhandari, Research Scientist III

B.Sc. (Agriculture), Tribhuwan University, Nepal, 1992
M.M. (Agribusiness Management), University of Philippines, 1997
M.S. (Agricultural Economics), Louisiana State University, 2003
Ph.D. (Agricultural Economics), University of Missouri, 2008

Doleswar has been working at the University of New Mexico's (UNM) Bureau of Business and Economic Research (BBER) since July 2008. His research focus has been economic impact analysis, economic modeling, statistical analysis, and health related studies. At BBER he has been involved in various projects related to economic and fiscal impact analyses, econometric and statistical analyses, conducting surveys and analyzing survey data. After joining BBER, Doleswar has conducted research for a number of federal, state, local and private agencies including New Mexico Office of Recovery and Reinvestment, Los Alamos National Lab, Air Force Research Lab, New Mexico Mortgage Finance Authority, University of New Mexico, Albuquerque Public Schools, Bernalillo County, the City of Albuquerque, City of Las Cruces, Santa Fe County, New Mexico Loan Fund, Buckman Direct Diversion Project, New Mexico Highlands University, and Federal Highway Administration.

Doleswar has a unique mix of expertise in economics, business analysis, statistics, and community development. He has expertise in statistical and econometric tool kits including economic forecasting, spatial econometrics, simultaneous equation modeling, factor analysis, qualitative and limited dependent variable technique, multivariate analysis, linear mixed modeling, non-linear modeling, analysis of variance (ANOVA), and panel data and time series analysis. He has 8 years of experience working with SAS programming to manipulate, summarize, and produce reports from multiple, large, complex data sets and conducting econometric analysis. He is also familiar with other econometric and statistical package including R, STATA, Geoda and SPSS.

Doleswar has over 7 years of experience working on a wide range of economic issues including local economic modeling, participatory community development, and contingent valuation. He has demonstrated experience in the design and implementation of social surveys. He has worked in multidisciplinary research teams, and coordinated research and development program as a team leader. He presented research papers to various audiences in and outside of the university setting. Before joining BBER, Mr. Bhandari earned his Ph.D. in Agricultural Economics at the University of Missouri, Columbia. His dissertation research analyzed the impact of spatial interactions between Missouri counties on the local labor, housing and public goods markets. Mr. Bhandari obtained a master's degree in Agricultural Economics from Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge in 2003. Before joining the master's program, he worked for nine years in various community development programs in Nepal.

Jessica Bloom, Research Scientist I

B.A. (Chinese Studies), Wellesley College, 1998
M.A. (Geology), University of Massachusetts-Amherst, 2005

Jessica has been with BBER since 2010. Her work includes data analysis, SAS programming, database management, report editing, and GIS. At BBER, Jessica has been involved in several economic impact studies. She often performs the all-important task of "checking the numbers" before reports go out. Jessica also works for the UNM Division of Government Research where she focuses on SAS programming and statistical analysis of traffic crash data for New Mexico's Traffic Safety Bureau. Jessica's software knowledge includes SAS, Access, Word report formatting, advanced Excel, ArcGIS, InDesign, SurveyMonkey, and Illustrator. She is a Microsoft Certified Application Specialist in Access and holds a GIS Analyst Certificate from UNM Continuing Education. Prior to working for BBER and DGR, Jessica worked in environmental litigation doing document research and database management.

Larry Compton, Library Information Specialist III

B.S. (Education), Northern Arizona University, 1981
Master of Library Science, University of Arizona, 1984
M.Ed. (Foreign Language Education), University of Georgia, 1990

Larry has over 20 years of work experience in library and information services. He has been at the BBER Data Bank since 2003, answering data requests from students, faculty, and the general public; assisting with BBER research projects; maintaining the library collection; creating metadata and indexing and abstracting BBER reports submitted to the LoboVault digital archive; and automating the library, adding materials into the LIBROS online catalog.

Prior to coming to BBER, Larry worked as a librarian at the University of Arizona, the University of Georgia, and Lovelace Respiratory Research Institute; helped create the National Environmental Respiratory Center Internet web site; managed a nuclear engineering library at Sandia National Laboratories; and ran an information consulting home business.

Nathaniel Crouse, Analyst Programmer II, Geospatial & Population Studies

B.S. (Statistics), University of New Mexico, 2006
B.S. (Mathematics), University of New Mexico, 2009

Nathan has been involved with the UNM Geospatial and Population Studies (formerly BBER's Population Estimates and Projections Program) since 2007. He has provided programming support for the estimates/projection program, including involvement in the Local Update of Census Addresses (LUCA) Program. He has also been heavily involved in address-database as well as geo-database formulation and maintenance for BBER.

Kevin Kargacin, Senior Program Manager

B.A. (Economics and Political Science), University of New Mexico, 1976
M.A. (Economics), University of New Mexico, 1982

Kevin has been with BBER since 1983, starting as a staff economist in the Bureau's Data Bank and becoming the Data Bank manager and head of information services in 1984. Kevin continues in this position to the present. Before joining BBER Kevin was an executive budget analyst with the New Mexico Dept. of Finance and Administration in FY 1982-1983.

Kevin answers information requests from data users, makes presentations to UNM classes and data user groups on sources and uses of socioeconomic data, edits and writes articles for the BBER monthly newsletter, New Mexico Business-Current Economic Report, manages contracts that involve the compilation of socioeconomic data for private or government sector entities, and oversees the Data Bank's reference collection. Kevin also manages aspects of two state-funded Research and Public Service Projects-the Resource Geographic Information System (RGIS) and Census Dissemination and Demographic Analysis programs. The RGIS Program, led by UNM's Earth Data Analysis Center, promotes the use of GIS technology and makes available a variety of geographic-based information through its Clearinghouse. The Census Dissemination and Demographic Analysis program aims to improve the usefulness of U.S. Census Bureau data, ensure widespread dissemination and understanding of the data, and expand the core socioeconomic and demographic research at BBER. Since 1988, Kevin has also served as a principal point of contact with the Census Bureau in the New Mexico State Data Center/Business and Industry Data Center (SDC/BIDC) Program.

Gail Mercer, Unit Administrator II

A.A. (Applied Sciences; Business Administration), University of New Mexico, 2010

Gail has been at UNM since February 1999 beginning in the Office of the Medical Investigator. She has since been at Career Services, the Department of Internal Medicine Gastroenterology, and most recently at Mathematics & Statistics. She came to the BBER in July 2010 as the Unit Administrator.

Gail has experience working with the Contracts & Grants and the Pre-Awards office preparing paperwork for input into the Universities' Cayuse system. She graduated from the UNM Management Academy in the Spring 2008 and is currently in the UNM Research Academy with a pending graduation. Along with completing the monthly salary distributions, she is the main HR contact for the Bureau.

Jeffrey Mitchell, Senior Research Scientist II

B.A. (Economics & Political Science), University of Pennsylvania, 1982
M.A., Ph.D. (Economic Geography), Clark University, 1996

Jeff has been with BBER since 2003. In 2010, he assumed responsibility as Director of BBER's New Mexico economic forecasting service (FOR-UNM). His responsibilities at FOR-UNM include oversight of data collection, model development, forecast preparation, written publication of results, and presentations of the forecast to professional and lay audiences.

Additionally, Jeff is engaged in research on a wide range of issues, generally focusing on problems of community and regional economic development in New Mexico. His work typically involves an integration of economic and institutional analyses, with the purpose of developing a framework and strategies for community economic planning. Jeff has been Principal Investigator on projects including the impact of arts and cultural industries in Albuquerque, Santa Fe and smaller communities across the state; economic assessments for 21 New Mexico MainStreet communities; socioeconomic assessments of New Mexico's five national forests; the economic impact of nonprofit organizations in New Mexico; analyses of housing markets in Santa Fe and Taos; an analysis of tax increment financing in Las Cruces; strategic and institutional assessments of the economy of San Miguel County; regional demand for higher education programs; and programmatic initiatives for United Way of Central New Mexico. Jeff's current projects include an analysis of broadband adoption and usage throughout New Mexico, and the development of New Mexico InfoCommons, a web-based portal for New Mexico residents, grantmakers, nonprofit organizations and social service providers.

Before joining BBER, Jeff taught in the geography departments of Clark University, NMSU and UNM. He has published in various scholarly journals, including Economic Geography, Urban Geography and Applied Geography. He was a Fulbright Scholar in Venezuela, an international economist with Chase Econometrics (an early form of Global Insight); and a project manager for a nonprofit organization promoting alternative energy development.

Michael O'Donnell, Research Scientist II

B.S. (Business Economics), University of Arizona, 2002
J.D. University of Arizona, 2006
M.S. (Agricultural and Resource Economics), University of Arizona, 2010

Michael has been with BBER since 2010, where he has conducted a variety of socioeconomic analyses related to national, state and local economies. His research includes tax policy analysis, legal analysis, demographic analysis, housing policy and revenue forecasting. In addition, he regularly conducts analysis of employment and income dynamics as he is responsible for maintaining BBER's quarterly FOR-UNM state and regional econometric forecasting model, which is detailed economic forecasting model of the New Mexico economy. In that capacity, he is responsible for data collection, model development, forecast preparation and final forecast report compilation. He is also responsible for writing select portions of the report, assisting in the writing of the FOR-UNM Bulletin, which is a summary of the New Mexico and U.S. economies, and writing a quarterly article summarizing the state of the New Mexico economy in New Mexico Business, Current Economic Report.

Prior to joining BBER, Michael was a graduate research assistant in the department of Agricultural and Resource Economics at the University of Arizona, where his research focused on the development of innovative water trading arrangements for the purpose of improving water supply reliability. In that capacity, he worked on a multidisciplinary project sponsored by the United States Bureau of Reclamation for the express purpose of bringing together disparate academic disciplines with the goal of improving water management in the southwest United States.

Prior to his graduate education, Michael began his legal studies at the University of Texas at Austin and completed his training at the University of Arizona. He is a member of the Arizona State Bar.

Lee Reynis, Director (BBER)

B.A. (Economics), Mount Holyoke College, 1970
M.A., Ph.D. (Economics), University of Michigan, 1973, 1976

Lee joined BBER early in 1998 as the Associate Director. She became Acting Director in May 1999 and was chosen Director in August of the same year. In July 2001, she assumed the additional responsibility of being Director of the Institute for Applied Research Services, the administrative umbrella at that time for BBER, the Division of Government Research, and the Technical Assistance Office, which no longer exists.

Since coming to BBER, Lee has been actively involved in producing, with Larry Waldman, quarterly economic forecasts for New Mexico and for the Albuquerque, Santa Fe and Las Cruces MSAs using the FOR-UNM model. She has been the principal investigator on a number of major research projects, including: a study of the feasibility of South Valley incorporation (forthcoming); three studies of the Santa Fe Living Wage (2007, 2005, 2004), the research report for the New Mexico First Town Hall on the Management and Future of Federal Investment in New Mexico (2005); an analysis of the financial costs and benefits of the proposed City-County Consolidation (2004); various regional studies, including a community audit for Raton (with Tony Sylvester, 2004) and a study of the changing economy and demographics in Lea County and the larger region (with Dely Alcantara, 2007); several studies on New Mexico health care, including a study of the economic impacts of alternative models for achieving universal coverage (2007), a household survey that explored health care coverage and access (2000), and a study that produced estimates of NM health care expenditures (1998); and, various economic and fiscal impact analyses, including estimating the fiscal impacts of Industrial Revenue Bond proposals to the City of Albuquerque (continuing) and a study of the economic importance of the arts and cultural industries in Santa Fe (with Jeff Mitchell, 2004).

Lee has been a close observer of the New Mexico economy for almost 25 years. Before joining the BBER, she was the City Economist for the City of Albuquerque for 12 years, where she prepared the City's revenue estimates, worked on capital financings, and analyzed financial policy issues and as well as issues related to the costs and benefits of growth. Prior to joining the City, she worked as an economic analyst and then as the Chief Economist for the New Mexico Department of Finance and Administration in Santa Fe. Lee has taught a number of courses over the years at the University of New Mexico and was formerly on the faculty at the University of Utah.

Xiaomin Ruan, Research Scientist III, Geospatial & Population Studies

B.E. (Manufacturing of Polymer Materials), Chengdu University of Science & Technology, 1993
M.A. (Economics, Macroeconomics), Sichuan University, 1999
M.A. & Ph.D. (ABD) (Economics, Econometrics), University of New Mexico, 2008

Xiaomin Ruan has been with the UNM Geospatial and Population Studies (formerly BBER's Population Estimates and Projections Program) since 2005. His current focus includes county and sub-county area population projections, geospatial integrated population projection and forecasting, and community economic development. Xiaomin has also served as a state representative to the Federal/State Cooperative Population Projection Program (FSCPP) since 2006.

Xiaomin was a chief researcher on the recent Local Update of Census Addresses (LUCA) Program, and is now a chief researcher on the Update of New Mexico County Population Projection Program in 2008. He also serves as a data and network security manager within the Population Estimation Program (PEP). His other research interests include local health care, schooling, and water resource reservation issues and he has completed work on several reports on these topics.

Daren Ruiz, Research Scientist II

B.S. (Statistics), University of New Mexico, 2004
M.A. (Economics), University of New Mexico, 2006

Daren has been with BBER since 2005, where he has conducted economic impact and fiscal analyses. For the Lea County Community Improvement Corporation project, he provided the economic impact analysis of the proposed construction and operation of the National Enrichment Facility / Louisiana Energy Services and a 550 Mega Watt Power Plant. He also provided the economic impact analysis of changes in medical expenditures in rural and urban areas that would be caused by various health insurance proposals for the Health Coverage for New Mexicans projects. He provided fiscal analysis to the South Valley Incorporation Feasibility study by estimating gross receipt and property tax revenues that would accrue to the South Valley. Daren also was the principal investigator on the Status of Nurses in New Mexico study and on the Recent Population Dynamics of Nurses in New Mexico study.

Karma Shore, Economist

A.A. (Liberal Arts), Northern New Mexico College, 1983

Karma Shore has been with BBER since 1988. She works in the Bureau's Data Bank where she assists with contractual research projects, maintains databases both internally and on BBER's web site, answers information requests from the public and University community, makes presentations about Census Bureau and other data sources, and organizes the annual SDC/BIDC Affiliates Meeting and New Mexico Data Users Conference. She also works on BBER's monthly publication New Mexico Business, Current Economic Report, and is the organization's web site technician. Karma has been the Business and Industry Data Center (BIDC) program coordinator in New Mexico since 1997.