The replacement for Steve Sviggum on the University of Minnesota’s Board of Regents will be chosen next Wednesday.

During the floor session Friday, Rep. Bud Nornes, chair of the House’s Higher Education Committee, named three candidates: Tom Devine, Kelly Smith and Bob Vogel.

The joint higher education commission is scheduled to meet Tuesday to make a recommendation to the full House and Senate, which will convene to make a decision 6 p.m., Wednesday.

The Regent Candidate Advisory Council named all three candidates as potential regents in December 2010, among 15 others. Sviggum, Laura Brod, David McMillan and incumbent David Larson were eventually named to the board.

Devine is an insurance executive at David Insurance Agency Inc., Smith is the superintendent for the Belle Plaine public school district, and Vogel is the president of New Market Bank. All three were candidates last year for the board seat representing the Second Congressional District.

Sviggum resigned from the board March 8 after an ad hoc regent committee determined that his dual roles as regent and with the Senate Republican Caucus were a conflict of interest.

The new regent will serve the rest of Sviggum’s term, Nornes previously told the Minnesota Daily.