Regent Jim Hayes missed more Board of Regents meetings in 2006 than any other member, records show.

According to meeting minutes, Hayes missed four meetings last year, at a time when federal authorities were investigating him. Hayes was indicted in January on federal fraud and money laundering charges.

"My attendance has been pretty good, and all my absences have been called in," Hayes said. "I think I only missed one meeting last year."

But according the university spokeswoman Kate Ripley, Hayes missed four out of nine full board meetings. Since being indicted, Hayes has missed all two of the 2007 regent meetings.

Hayes said while he may have missed some, other regents have missed much more.

"I'm not going to name names, but I've been told that one regent only made one meeting the whole year," Hayes said.

Exactly which regent Hayes was referring to is unclear. According to the minutes, Hayes had the poorest record of attendance in 2006, with four missed meetings. Regents Carl Marrs and Robert Martin each missed two meetings and were late to a third. Regents Frances Rose, Jacob Gondek and Joseph Usibelli missed two.

"[Hayes] was absent for the Aug. 8 audio briefing," Ripley said. "It's a summer audio meeting they have. He wasn't there for that, he wasn't at the Kodiak meeting in June 2006. And he was not at the April 2006 meeting in Nome and Kotzebue, but a number of them weren't at that meeting."

Hayes also missed a Jan. 20-21, 2006 board retreat in Anchorage, according to meeting minutes. The FBI raided his house 10 days earlier.

In 2007, Hayes has missed both meetings, another January retreat in Anchorage and the February full board meeting in Juneau. Hayes attributed missing the February meeting to his wife's health.

"I'd rather be there, but with my wife's illness and doctor's appointments, I'm not always able to make it," Hayes said.

Hayes was arraigned Feb. 9, the day after the Juneau meeting. He and his wife, Chris Hayes, pled not guilty.

Gov. Sarah Palin has asked Hayes to resign from the board. Hayes has said he has no intention of leaving before his term expires in 2011.

Ripley said the reasons Hayes gave for missing meetings are not available in public meeting records or kept in the administrative building. Regents are expected to call in their absence to the chair, she said.

"Generally it means they have a conflict and are attending a meeting elsewhere," said Jeannie Phillips, the board's exectutive director.

Neither current chair Mary Hughes nor former chair Brian Rogers returned calls for comment.

According to meeting records, Hayes has missed more than 30 votes during his absences over the last 14 months.

While Hayes was out, meeting minutes show that he missed a vote to hire a consulting firm to examine executive compensation.

During a June meeting in Kodiak, the regents approved budget requests for fiscal year 2007, without Hayes. He also missed a vote to approve a $2.6 million land acquisition at Bunnell Park in Fairbanks.

The regents also upped the construction budget for the Integrated Sciences Facility at UAA by $12.2 million and approved more than $6 million to address code corrections at the UAF Physical Plant. Hayes missed both votes.

According to meeting records, Hayes also missed votes on creating several new academic programs, such as a Master of Science in applied environmental science and technology at UAA, a Bachelor of Arts in biology at UAS, and an associate degree for applied sciences in construction management at UAF. UAF's certificate of phlebotomy was also deleted.

The minutes show that a number of changes were approved to the governing structure, such as the approval of a regents policy regarding free speech and one about the bylaw regarding unanimous consent, and approval of risk management policy revisions.

The majority of those votes were missed at April's Kotzebue/Nome meeting and June's Kodiak meeting.