Jennifer Mello, a policy director for the state House Democrats is the new Democratic candidate for the University of Colorado Board of Regents seat, replacing incumbent Jim Martin.

Martin won the primary by a 2-1 margin even though he had announced before the election that he wanted to drop out of the race.

Mello, 33, will be facing Republican candidate Steven Bosley, a retired banker and founder of the Bolder Boulder race, and Libertarian candidate Daniel Ong.

A committee of state Democratic leaders selected Mello over the weekend. Chris Gates, chairman of the state Democratic Party, said it was important to have a woman candidate running for regent because of the recent CU football recruiting sex scandal.

"She is brilliant, hard-working, and has a significant amount of experience working on the issues that affect higher education. She will be a strong candidate and will do a superb job in representing the interests of the people of Colorado," Gates said.

"The CU system needs a regent that sees the big picture, knows the legislature, and knows how to get things done," Mello said. "In light of all the terrible news about CU-Boulder this year, reform is a necessity.

"For our state to prosper in coming years, we must address two issues that go hand-in-hand: funding and access," Mello continued. "Currently, just 9 percent of Latino males who graduate from high school go to college. That's not good enough. I will fight to protect the four CU campuses from being a prime victim of the $400 million in budget cuts coming at the State Capitol in 2005."

Martin had said that he didn't want to run for CU regent because of his frustrations over how university officials handled the recruiting scandal. Nevertheless Martin received 66 percent of the Democratic vote in the primary, beating Wallace Stealey, a Pueblo rancher and educator.

Mello, a Denver resident, received her undergraduate degree from the University of Denver and her master's degree in public policy from Georgetown University. Her 17-year-old brother will be a freshman at CU in the fall.

The election is Nov. 2.