Good evening, everyone.

It's October 20th, 2025, the 40th meeting of the 26th Council will come to order.

All councillors will be present at some point.

Councillor Baca is going to be here a little bit late.

We're going to begin with a moment of silence, followed by the Pledge of Allegiance in English and then in Spanish.

Civic Plaza parking passes are provided for members of the public.

You can obtain a parking pass from council staff at the table near the chamber's entrance.

Members of the public, city staff, and the media have the ability to view this meeting in person and on live streams through four different platforms.

Also, this meeting is closed captioned, and you may enable the closed captioning services on your television or device at this time.

The video recording of this and all past council meetings will remain available for viewing at any time on the City Council's website.

Council staff is available via telephone if members of the public need assistance finding the videos online.

Please call 505 768 3100 for assistance during business hours Monday through Friday, 8 a.m.

to 5 p.m.

The council will take a break at approximately 7 p.m.

this evening if needed.

With regard to decorum in the chambers, we want tonight's proceedings to be as civil and respectful as possible.

Please do not make any personal attacks and please no applause, snapping or other outbursts during the meeting.

Thank you, Madam President.

We're going to start with a proclamation recognizing domestic violence awareness month.

And I'm going to invite Teresa Garcia, Chair of the Domestic Violence and Sexual Assault Commission, Sheree Alapat, co-chair of the Domestic Violence and Sexual Assault Commission, and Mary Ellen Garcia, Executive Director of the New Mexico Coalition Against Domestic Violence, to come down to the podium as we all do our lines from the proclamation and ask Councillor Sanchez to get us going.

Thank you so much, Councilor Feblecorn.

Whereas in 2022, the Albuquerque City Council unanimously passed the domestic violence and sexual assault DVSA Commission ordinance, creating a permanent survivor-centered body to strengthen prevention, intervention, and accountability in response to domestic and sexual violence.

And whereas now in its third year, the DVSA Commission continues to bring together survivors, advocates, service providers, law enforcement, the courts, health care providers, and community partners to identify gaps, recommend solutions, and ensure the city's response is trauma-informed and effective.

And whereas since the adoption of the ordinance, the DVSA Commission has advanced key initiatives, including the implementation of new restraining order packet to make filing more accessible, the unanimous vote to implement a lethality assessment program to identify and respond to high-risk situations, ongoing training for Albuquerque community safety responders, and the expansion of hotelling options to provide safe shelter for survivors in crisis.

And whereas the D VSA Commission has also accomplished incorporating their new mission and vision statement with the support of City Council unanimously approving the funding request to hire a coach and support the foundational documentation and whereas these achievements reflect the ordinance's purpose of building a coordinated survivor-centered response that reduces barriers, amplifies his community voices, and promotes safety, dignity, and healing for those impacted by violence.

And whereas there is an urgent need for co-sheltering options that keep survivors and their companion animals together, understanding that many individuals delay or forego seeking safety out of a concern for the well-being of their animal family members and whereas during domestic violence awareness month, we honor the resilience of survivors, recognize the dedication of advocates and partners, and reaffirm our commitment to ending domestic violence and sexual violence in Albuquerque.

Be it proclaimed that the council, the governing body of the city of Albuquerque, hereby proclaims October 2025 as domestic violence awareness month in Albuquerque.

And calls on all residents to stand with survivors, support prevention and intervention efforts, and work together towards a safer, more just community.

Be it proclaimed that this council, the governing body of the city of Albuquerque hereby proclaims October 2025 as domestic violence awareness month.

Um, I'm sorry, that's already been said.

So thank you all for being here, Madam President.

If um, I announced three of you, but I would love for you to all introduce yourselves and then if anybody would like to make a quick statement.

Thank you so much for that, Council President, Vice President, Council members.

It's an honor to be in front of you all.

Um we just finished our commission meeting upstairs with also a change on our commission.

And so, as you all know, with the email that I send, um, this is my last time.

My I am termed out along with my co-chair Cheche Ali Pat from the New Mexico Asian Family Center.

And so it's been an honor to present in front of you all.

All of your support has really been a huge support for us and our in our community across the board.

Thank you for the funding in the 2,250,000.

Thank you for the support with the lethality assessment.

We have the restraining order that's brand new that's being implemented.

None of this work would have been possible without you all and your support and just being our advocates as well and making room for us, even last minute with your policy analysts.

It's been an honor to serve with you all, so thank you, and I'll um call on my co-chair.

Thank you so much.

Maraming Maramin Salamat.

October is very important to all the survivors and the advocates that are sitting here, but are also the commitment that you also have and have given us in support of culturally specific care, community care, and survivor justice, because we know survivors deserve better.

Survivors deserve all that they can for justice and for safety, however, they do define that.

And we are here as nonprofit organizations, as advocates, as community-based organizations, and the collaboration that we've had done, not to say it was ever easy, but remembering how you also acknowledged how much we worked very, very hard to make that happen.

And we are just grateful for the ongoing support that no matter what elections or not, that you're continuing to have that commitment for all of us.

So thank you so much.

Let me just briefly introduce the new chair and co-chair, Amy Um McKendrick from Safe House, New Mexico, and also Tiffany Hiron from the Coalition to Staff Violence Against Land Movement.

We look forward to working with you and continuing the work of the DBSA Commission.

Madam President, Madam Vice President, uh members of the City Council, my name's Mary Alan Garcia, I'm the chief executive officer of the New Mexico Coalition Against Domestic Violence.

Um, I would like to thank the City of Albuquerque and the City Council for always getting it right when it comes to our most vulnerable populations here in Albuquerque and Berleo County.

We know that survivors of intimate partner violence and sexual violence are some of our most vulnerable populations, and the city of Albuquerque always puts survivors first.

And we here at the coalition on behalf of all of our members are working very diligently in the entire state to ensure that there's adequate funding and adequate resources, which we know that there are not.

And so we are going to continue to call on you as leaders in our communities to ensure that our providers are meaningfully and adequately funded so that they can continue to do the great work that they are doing.

And I just want to echo that it is October and it is domestic violence awareness month, but I want us to not forget that domestic violence does not end October 31st.

It doesn't start October 1st, it doesn't end October 31st.

It is a day-to-day year, uh year-to-year, hour to hour, mid-to-minute crisis in our communities, and we call on you all as leaders to continue to ensure that the folks here who are doing the incredibly powerful work are able to continue to do so.

So thank you for your support.

Thank you, Madam President.

Makuam Hina Memki Maharemba.

Good afternoon, everyone.

My name is Tiffany Harone.

I am from the Pueblo of Isleta.

Um, I serve as the executive director for the coalition to stop violence against native women.

We are uh just housed here in Albuquerque, right across the um Loveless Women's Hospital.

Been doing this work for over 11 years now, um, been with the coalition for about five years.

Um very honored to be nominated as co-chair along with Amy Kendrick and looking forward to working with you all.

Thank you so much for supporting the domestic violence and sexual assault commission as a survivor of both.

Um, I just appreciate the compassion that you have for this work.

Thank you.

Hi, my name is Jodi Haramio.

I'm the director of crisis services for Rape Crisis Center of Central New Mexico, and I would like to echo just everybody's support here on City Council for helping survivors and being survivor-centered.

Um thank you so much for just all of your work with us.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Okay.

I'm gonna make a few cards for you all.

So I'll just write your name down and then pass them around.

So thank you all so much for your support.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

I just wanted to say thank you for all of the folks that came out tonight.

Um, I when we talked about doing this, I said, Oh, I want to have somebody from every group in the city that's working on domestic violence, but this room would have been full and there would have been no place for anyone else to sit.

And I've been privileged for the last 20 some years to be working on a board that works to reduce family violence, and so I've gotten the privilege to work with many of the folks up here tonight.

Uh and I just want to thank them all for what they do to keep women in our in our community safe.

It is vital work, and we are very thankful to you.

And if you want to come up and shake hands, you're more than welcome to come around this way.

And then I'll give you your cards after you might figure out this.

Okay, thank you so much.

All right, moving on.

We're having our first presentation tonight from Dr.

Shelle Sanchez, Director of Arts and Culture, who will provide an update on the Route 66 centennial celebration.

Okay.

Okay, super deeper.

Thank you, Madam President.

All right.

I'm ready.

There it is.

All right, looks like we're going.

Um so Route 66 Centennial.

Uh apparently I looked at the calendar, and it is just about two and a half months away until the beginning of 2026.

Maybe I'm the only one that was surprised, but um here we go.

So today I just want to um highlight our primary engagement project, which is called Route 66 Remixed.

Um, we launched it on uh Thursday of last week.

Um, and we got some really nice press in the Albuquerque Journal, and just a real quick recap of what that is.

So, Route 66 Remixed is we're calling it an art-fueled road trip.

Um, we have 18 stops designed by a team of 20 artists.

Half of these stops are new artworks along Route 66, Central Avenue in Albuquerque.

Um, and the other half, more or less are augmented reality stops.

So you can see the new works of art, but you have to know where to look, and you have to have your phone with you to see the augmented reality stops.

So, this officially launches in January.

We have 15 of the 18 stops are complete, um, and three more will be making their way into public view over the next month.

We're really proud of this project.

When we set out to do a centennial engagement project, we had a few goals.

One was really to respond to the entire 18 miles of Route 66.

I think it's important to remember that other cities maybe have a mile or maybe two miles.

We have 18 miles, which is amazing, but it's also a lot of miles.

So we have our furthest east stop is singing arrow, and the furthest west stop is the top of Nine Mile Hill.

So we're proud of being able to create opportunities along the way.

It's really inspired by a road trip.

So the little moments that you can kind of pull off and do something interesting, have a little fun moment, maybe discover something new, maybe a business, maybe a city resource, all kinds of things.

There's a website that will guide people through it.

There's narration that really brings it to life by our inaugural poet, Hakeem Bellamy.

And you can engage in all of it, or you could just do one stop at a time, spend a whole day, or maybe just five or ten minutes.

So we're proud of it.

The other thing that sets us apart, and we've gotten some really good national press about this, is you can do it any day of the year.

So some cities are going all in on a weekend festival or maybe one big party, but if you come to Albuquerque, we have something special for you every single day of 2026.

So we're real proud of that.

Oops.

Again, 18 miles, 18 stops.

This particular image highlights the mural that we celebrated last week, and it was I think it's the biggest, or it was the biggest blank wall along Central.

UNM came in as a partner.

We're very happy to have that partnership, and you get a nice aerial view of that there.

And then we've tried some new things.

That's kind of the printed guide to the experience, but also it's a beautiful coloring map of Route 66 in Albuquerque, an artist rendition.

And they're going to not only pay for the printing of all of these maps, but they're gonna help us distribute them actually across the state and all of their locations.

So yay to Blake's, and you don't have to make a purchase to pick one up, you can just go to their stores and take one home.

Presbyterian came in as a partner, and our initiative with them we think is very fun and very cute.

So every baby born at Presbyterian on Central in 2026 is gonna go home with a onesie that says born on Route 66.

And if you're sad because you were born on Route 66 and you didn't get a onesie, that's okay.

They're working on a t-shirt.

So if you or someone in your family or your kids were born on Route 66, we can still take care of you.

So Presbyterian is we've all done a research.

Um we believe pretty confidently they're the oldest hospital anywhere on Route 66 in the country.

So we're gonna build on that and really make that super fun.

And new also Frontier has recently come on as a partner, Duran's a lot of these businesses are redoing their logos, um, gonna have wearing t-shirts all their employees are gonna wear Route 66 t-shirts just to really hype it up during the 2026, and there'll be an IBQ trolley tour of the Route 66 remix.

So we're proud of the partnerships.

We think that's what's gonna make it powerful for visitors every single day.

And then just real quick other Route 66 endeavors, the signpark at the Route 66 Visitor Center is very much under construction now.

We're working on the signs going in in the next month, so that should be ready for visitors in January, and then we have a pop-up event there this weekend.

And I went over, but not too much, and I think you'll forgive me because I also brought you our newest swag.

Have I shared stickers with you?

No.

No.

Okay, so this are going to be distributed through our partners throughout the year.

So again, um just trying to work with our whole community to have fun things that really make people want to visit lots of different locations in our city.

So I'm gonna pass up.

Don't worry, there's enough for everybody at the table.

There's two, a set of two.

And I stand for questions.

Counselor Lewis.

Madam President, thank you.

Do you all have more opportunities for sponsorships and partnerships?

And what would someone do if they wanted to?

How would they contact you or who should they contact?

Madam President, Counselor Lewis, always.

We have we um we have several conversations going on, and if people want to sponsor, we'll have some special events throughout the year, and we're also like Presbyterian, we're trying to work with businesses and other corporate sponsors on things that make sense and really resonate for what they're doing.

So they can reach out to me directly or you know, really anybody on my leadership team.

Okay, thank you.

Any other questions, counselors?

Thank you, Director.

Oh, you have one?

I'm sorry, Madam Vice President.

I just want to thank you and all your staff and uh visit Albuquerque.

I think you guys have done just such an outstanding job.

The artists that have participated in this, I mean, um, it takes a village, somebody was saying that today, and it really took a village to make all this happen.

I'm really excited, as you all know.

I'm always blah blah blah about the Route 66, but we have the longest urban stretch in the nation, the only place where the route crosses itself, and really creating a space and a place where people can don't have to actually pay a ticket to go somewhere, but just can drive down central and see all the wonderful amenities, some of the things you mentioned, plus we're getting fest and lightings, we're getting banners.

Um, Councilor Grout's getting a large sign at the end, the gateway into the city.

So there's just a lot of lot of things happening and coming next year.

So excited about that.

Thank you again.

Madam President, um, thank you, Counselor.

Uh, just a quick, we do have a very long update, which I um I should be in all of your inboxes, and also it's posted on um Arts and Culture's web page, so for the public, they can see all of the things that all the departments are doing.

Um, I'm here, so I just talked about what we're doing, but all of the departments have contributed some major um made some major investments into Route 66.

So if you want the full report, um, it's available online.

Thank you.

Any other questions?

No, thank you.

We have another presentation tonight from Miss Valerie Martinez, chair of the Metropolitan Parks and Recreation Advisory Board or MPRAB, who will provide us an update on the 2025 MPRAB annual report.

Good evening.

Good evening.

Okay.

Madam President, City Councillors, I guess I'm Valerie Martinez, and I'm the chair of the MPRAB Parks and Recreation Advisory Board, and I'm here with two additional members of the board, Julie Rodolf Radoslavich, District 2, representing District 2, and Larry Light, uh, representing District 6.

Thank you so much for having us.

And we submitted the report to you in August, and we're here in this very short three minutes to give you just a highlight of that report and focus on one really priority that we have.

You see here our overall purpose as a board that is to keep ourselves informed of city parks and recreation needs, to serve as a forum for public discussion, which we do in our monthly meetings, and to encourage the greatest use of parks and parks and recreation programs.

I'm happy to say that we are a very active board fulfilling the responsibilities required by the ordinance which created us and more, including preparing and delivering our annual report.

And you see that there.

I won't read through all of them.

At the end of this presentation for the general public, there'll be the link to the report so everybody can dive a little bit deeper.

Again, we are an active board, that's why this slide is so detailed.

Um, you see here the activities of the board over the past fiscal year.

I hope these demonstrate our commitment as a volunteer board to our responsibilities and our standing to make a range of policy recommendations to you and to the mayor's office.

The last two slides detail our recommendations.

Because my time is short, I will focus on park activation, though you and the general public can access the full report online again for a deeper dive.

The board is particularly dedicated to park activation programming, especially in underutilized parks for several reasons for several reasons.

Research shows that one activated parks, those with programs, activities, and community events are safer parks.

They have fewer incidences of drag drug activity and other crimes, as well as violence and vandalism.

Activated parks have fewer incidents of encampments.

Family and youth activities, especially discourage camping.

And three activated parks promote physical activity, health and well-being, social connections, and social cohesion.

Underutilized parks, on the other hand, here and nationwide suffer from the opposite of these benefits.

Councillors currently, the park and recreation department receives zero dollars in sitting funding for park activation.

Yes, the City of Albuquerque does well with creating and renovating city parks.

We have robust funding for this.

Yes, there are wonderful sports leagues in some of our parks.

These are funded privately by membership fees, nonprofit grants, and private funding.

However, many of our parks, especially in needier areas of the city, do not benefit from these sports leagues.

For these reasons, for the second year in a row, we have asked the mayor's office for stopgap funding in the amount of $80,000.

This year, we also asked each of you to devote some of your discretionary funding to park activation.

You could, for example, provide small grants to neighborhood associations and community groups to host park events.

You could, for example, prioritize underutilized parks in your districts for these small grants.

Finally, we would like to thank both the parks and recreation department and you, council members, for various improvements that you have made in the past year based on our recommendations in last year's report.

These are in the areas of public relations in terms of PRD and board appointments.

And I want to thank you.

You have done some streamlining of the process for appointing our board members, and so we want to congratulate with you.

But we really, really would love for the city to commit to our parks, especially underutilized parks to activate them for the benefit of all and to actually address some of the other larger issues that the city of Albuquerque is dealing with.

Thank you.

And I'll take any questions.

Councillor Lewis.

Thank you to your board and all the work that you all do.

I know we all have representatives, and I know you all uh work hard and do great research and really advocate for our parks, so thank you so much.

And uh a large portion, I know I know that a large portion of my set asides uh at times uh sometimes in years uh have gone entirely, you know, to our our parks and you know, or at least large parts of it, and some sometimes my set aside is is paid for an entire new park, and of course, in my district, we have a great need for a lot of new parks, neighborhood parks, and um, and then uh of course a lot of rehabbing and things like that.

But I think ultimately um uh we're gonna really need to look at this next year's budget uh and make sure both our capital budget that we're um we're allocating a good amount, not only to activate parks and look at underused parks, um, but you know, some of the new ones that need to be built and and rehabbed.

So just that combination of our capital program as well as our budget, making sure that our budget this next year uh puts a priority because these are essentials.

I mean, these are these are basic essentials that you know the taxpayers in Albuquerque have said, you know, we we want a good service provided uh when it comes to this.

And so I guess my only comment would be as we move into this next budget year that uh that we make sure that we get that there is uh you know not only good research and data and justification for it, but um a big priority on ensuring that uh we're we're taking care of our parks, we're building the ones that we need to and uh and that this is high priority again in our budget, our capital program.

Uh I know counselors uh very generous when it comes to our set asides uh when it comes to uh parks.

So thank you.

Thank you.

Counselors, any other questions or comments?

Thank you very much.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Moving on to the journal.

I move approval of the October 6th journal.

There is a second from Madam Vice President.

All those in favor, raise your hand and say yes.

Anyone opposed?

That passes on an 8-0 vote.

Communications and introductions.

Are there any changes to the letter of introduction?

Counselor Grout.

Thank you, Madam President.

Let's see.

I move that the rules be suspended for the purpose of placing OC 53 on tonight's agenda for action.

OC 53 is the technical correction to the Albuquerque City Council legislative program for the second session of the 57th session of the New Mexico State Legislature.

There's a motion and a second by Councilor February.

All those in favor of the rule suspension, raise your hand and say yes.

Anyone opposed?

That passes on an 8-0 vote.

Any other changes to the letter of introduction?

I move approval of the letter of introduction.

There's a second by Councillor Grout.

All those in favor of approving the letter of introduction, raise your hand and say yes.

Anyone opposed?

That passes on an 8-0 vote.

Reports of committees, Council Febalcorn.

Madam President, the land use planning and zoning committee met on Wednesday, October 15th and reports out the following items.

In the matter of EC 479, that it be withdrawn by the administration.

And in the matter of O 98 and R196, that they do pass is amended and be acted upon at the meeting at which they are reported.

I move uh make a motion to accept the committee report.

There's a motion and a second by Councillor Grout.

All those in favor of the approval, raise your hand and say yes.

Anyone opposed?

That passes on an 80 vote.

There are no deferrals and withdrawals at this time unless somebody wants to add one in now.

Moving on to the consent agenda.

Are there any changes to the consent agenda?

For those individuals on tonight's consent agenda who are being appointed to serve on a board or a commission.

Thank you for your willingness to serve.

I move approval of the consent agenda.

There's a second from Madam Vice President.

All those in favor, raise your hand and say yes.

Yes.

Anyone opposed?

That passes eight zero.

Council Champagne announcements.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

There will be a finance and government operations committee on Monday, October 27th at 5 p.m.

in these chambers, the Vincent E.

Griango chambers, basement level of the Albuquerque Government Center.

This will be a hybrid meeting.

There are no financial instrument or appeals.

We're going to move on to general public comment.

Members of the public can provide live public comments to the council in person or virtually if they have signed up for public comment per the introductions published on the agenda and on our website Friday.

Here are the public comment ground rules.

Each participant will have two months two minutes to present.

Comments are to be addressed to the counselors only through the council president.

Any disruptive conduct will result in removal from the meeting.

And if you are on deck, please make your way down as the first speaker ahead of you is is presenting.

Thank you, Madam President.

Our first speaker is Francesco Artist, followed by Miguel Alvarez.

Excuse me.

The tip of the spear of the Board of Ethics and Campaign Practices is the right hand of Mayor Keller in willful known violation of sunshine laws and transparency in government while in the performance of his duties for the city of Albuquerque as city clerk willfully broke the law in malicious unethical sabotage of multiple IPRA violations, covering up that laws were broken, including but not limited to misconduct and property rights violations.

While demanding speech to be erased from the permanent record in the form of strike in horrific civil rights freedom of speech violation, while wrongfully claiming they and other King Keller royalty are above the law.

Silence.

Silence while turning a blind eye when working for this city is conspiracy.

You hold in your hands the cover-up to the cover-up to the cover-up.

No one is above the law.

No kings.

Thank you.

Our next speaker.

Thank you, Madam Vice President.

Miguel Elvarez, followed by Cesar Marquez.

I'm here to talk to everybody that listens to our comments, whether you're in-house or out-house.

It's about time that we get new people to do things for us and not what goes into their pocket.

I'm tired of being in this town and everything's going downhill.

I know that a lot of people work hard to do things, but it only takes a few people to knock down what you guys are trying to do.

I used to come here all the time to talk to the city councilors and people that would listen.

But city counselors don't listen to us.

It goes in one year and out the other.

I've given a lot of few advices to a lot of people how you can get bus drivers and mechanics and a lot of other uh situations to get rid of the problems that we got, but nobody cares.

Only what goes into your pocket is all you guys look about.

You know, Keller wants to run for mayor again.

Look at how we're living.

Look at our cities without no bus drivers, no police officers, no paramedics, no firefighters.

What's gonna happen next?

Are we gonna let uh criminals walk in and take over?

This is about time for us to take the chance of turning things around.

Let's get some new people into office.

I I was around when you people that are up there now got elected, but I didn't come here to see what you guys do or what you listen to, like I used to, because I got tired of talking and nobody listens.

And it's about time that people start opening your ears and listening to us.

We're the ones that put you up there.

We're the ones that make sure you guys get paid.

Our tax pay uh money goes into your pocket.

You guys do the things that needs to be done for us little people can get around to live.

Thank you, Mr.

Alvarez.

Our next speaker.

Cesar Marquez, followed by Anne Ahlander.

Okay.

Good evening, Madam Chair and members of the council.

Uh, my name is Cesar Marquez, and I serve as a senior organizer with Common Cause New Mexico.

Uh, thank you for the opportunity to speak tonight.

Uh, I'm here to voice my support for ranked choice voting or recent uh runoffs in Albuquerque, because it's time our elections reflected the majority of voters in just one trip to the vault polls.

Right now, if no candidate gets 50%, we have to hold another runoff election.

That process is fair in theory, but uh but in practice it caused the city more money, and a lot of voters simply don't come back.

We usually lose about 10% of voters, and in one of the uh runoff elections that we had, it costs 500,000 up to a million dollars, and I'm sure that money could be used for better purposes.

And rank choose voting is simple.

Voters rank candidates in order of they prefer.

If your first choice doesn't win, your vote moves on to your next choice.

That means that everyone's voice continues to count until there's a true majority winner.

We've already seen this work in Santa Fe in Las Cruces, where people say it's easy, it saves money, and it rewards candidates who reach out to more communities instead of just their base.

Uh, and if you actually have any questions about its implementation, uh, I just ran into the Santa Fe County Clerk, uh, so she's out here.

So if you have any questions about how easy it is for them and their staff because they don't have to work a whole other month into the election, I'm sure the staff here would also appreciate that as well.

Um, this reform is about fairness and efficiency, but more important, it's about trust.

Trust that our voters matter and that our system represents us.

Thank you for your time for considering a reform that will strengthen democracy right here in Albuquerque's.

I want to especially thank uh Councillor February, uh Tammy February and Nicole Rogers uh for the leadership on this effort.

Thank you.

Anne Ahlander, followed by James Hernandez.

Good evening.

I am speaking on the same subject.

As a canvaser knocking on doors, making get out the vote calls on election day, trying to encourage people to exercise their constitutional right to select their own leaders with their vote.

It is amazing how much apathy, resistance, and defeatism I have encountered through the years, especially in the last presidential election.

The common mantra seems to be my vote doesn't count.

These people do not speak for me.

With all the dark money in politics and a winner takes all loser gets nothing mentality toward local, state, and national elections, in a sense, these people are right.

So what will bring democracy back to the election process?

What will inspire people to cast that ballot?

What will make them feel that they are finally being heard and taken seriously?

I think that ranked choice voting is a viable pathway.

Through the process of elimination, perhaps your number one choice will not win the election, but number two or number three, by public consensus just might.

Fringe extremes tend to drop out, leaving a more moderate percentage for the voting population for the voting populace.

I support ranked choice voting.

I hope that you will too.

Thank you.

James Hernandez, followed by Dr.

Lisa Christofferson, uh good evening, Madam President and counselors.

Uh thank you, counselors, so much for this opportunity to speak.

My name is James, and I am a youth advocate here for ranked choice voting in Albuquerque.

Council members, we're here today to show and demonstrate our support for ranked choice voting here in Albuquerque.

We need an electoral process which represents all of us here in Albuquerque, regardless of whether you are a Democrat, a Republican, an independent, or a decline to state voter.

In Albuquerque, runoff elections are very costly, very costly.

In City Council District 6 alone in December 2023, it costs approximately $581,000.

In addition, there is an estimated 10% drop-off in turnout for runoff elections in this city.

We want to create an electoral process that brings in everybody.

And it starts by ranked choice voting here in this city.

And if we really do want to create a government that represents all of us, then I think that we should look to cities like Los Cruces, like Santa Fe, who have implemented this system to great success.

Now, for all those here today in support of ranked choice voting, I would just like to ask you to quickly raise your hands.

Just a quick show of hands.

I think I see many people in the audience that are in wildly supportive of this policy.

Thank you, Counselor, so much for this opportunity to speak.

I really, really encourage you all to really push for an electoral process that works for all of us.

I understand that we may be divided on partisan lines, but truly creating a democracy and an electoral process that works for everybody is something that I think we should be proud of, and it is something that we should push for.

Thank you.

Dr.

Lisa Christofferson, followed by Janet Sayers.

Thank you, President Bassan and City Councillors.

My name is Dr.

Lisa Christofferson.

I stand here today for public comment, asking again, and I will continually ask again to please please add protections for us in the city of Albuquerque.

Protections this Albuquerque City Council could give to Burkños to ensure that our U.S.

and our New Mexico constitutional rights are being protected.

They are afforded to all who are on American soil.

And you all could strengthen and ensure that we are protected in the city of Albuquerque.

As I stand here today, those ice goons are not following the laws.

As we witnessed in Chicago last week, they iced tear gas police officers at a peaceful protest, doing nothing.

And police officers were tear gassed.

What protections do we have?

I don't have a badge.

I don't have any sort of federal anything.

A van comes by, somebody's masked up, takes me away, my family may or may not know where I am for two or three days, and then I'm let go in the middle of the night, no charges.

What protections do we have?

I implore and ask this body to do just as the Burnleo County Commissioners did, protect us from assaults, protect us from beatings, protect us from kidnapping by unmasked thugs who have zero warrants, zero identification, and they're masked.

It is terrifying.

And then to know that we have a weak mayor and a weak governor that brought in the National Guard, and those people at any moment can be used to be, they could be federalized like military.

So, yes, we think, oh, we're in charge, we brought them in before Trump could, but they are at the back and call of those that they serve in.

I mean, those that they get their um whatever you call it, their little tells them what to do, that stuff.

So you all need to keep us safe, and that includes those who are unhoused and the unsheltered.

Please do not continue to criminalize poverty.

We are asking for you all, please to please uphold our constitutional rights as you can.

Thank you.

Janet Sayers, followed by Althea Atherton.

Uh good evening, President Bassan, members of the council and city staff.

I'm Janet Sayers, a resident of District 9, and I am here tonight on behalf of the Library Advisory Board as chairperson.

Um but before I uh mention that, I just wanted to call to your attention that a person who was a city employee from 1978 till 2001, who deeply loved city government and spent hundreds of hours sitting right in these chambers at environmental planning commission meetings and city council.

His name was Joe David Montano, and I uh read with sadness his obituary in yesterday's newspaper and saw that he was younger than I.

I'd lost touch with him, but but I just wanted to mention that Joe David was committed to the transportation planning for city government.

So a quick update on our quest to the two million dollars uh to for uh the HVAC system at uh the downtown Maine.

Um we are at 550,000.

Uh state rep Marion Matthews, Debbie Saraniana have made a commitment along with County Commissioner Eric O'Livis and also City Councilor Renee Grout to go along with uh Councilor Baca, who's not in his chair tonight.

But so thank you again.

We're we're on our way.

And in conclusion, I had the wonderful opportunity to be at the Alamosa Library reopening this morning.

And thank you, Councillor Pinya, for your set aside.

I took a trip down memory lane going up to Westgate.

It had been 30 years since I'd been in Westgate.

Sounds terrible.

But I got to see the Westgate Library and the amazing Westgate Community Center.

Oh my gosh.

That's just beyond belief.

So thank you again for your service to our community and um thank you.

Alphea Atherton, followed by Adrian Carver.

President Basan.

I call this my civic duty hat, but I come to you with my most important hats on today.

My role as a member of the public and my role as a mother.

Albuquerque should adopt a ranked choice instant runoff voting system.

I'm sure many of us, myself included, have a second or third contingency plan in our own heads if we're worried one of our candidates won't make the runoff in any municipal election.

But what if we could put those preferences on our first piece of paper ballot, reducing the name to return?

It makes sense, as we've heard from our colleagues over here from a civic engagement standpoint and from an economic standpoint.

But another big advantage of instant runoffs is it encourages candidates who are according their opponent supporters to rank them in spots number two and three to be a little nicer to each other.

Instead of cheap shots in the minutia between candidates who have more to agree on than not, candidates can speak to their policy and their values.

In a time when mudslinging has become so commonplace that it is a barely a blip on the news radar when politicians post disgusting AI videos depicting a biological attack on their political adversaries.

We could all use a little more kindness, especially here, when we all have to work together as neighbors if we want to make our city a safer and better place to live.

That is the kind of place that I want to raise my two young children.

One where politicians debate policies, not personality.

Ranked choice voting is a great step in that direction.

Please consider taking up the issue of ranked choice voting one once more so the next time we have a municipal election, we can avoid a costly runoff, still honor the will of the people, and facilitate kinder candidate conversations.

Thank you.

Adrian Carver, followed by Adoni Ruthane.

Uh Madam President and Counselors, my name is Adrian Carver.

I'm the executive director of the Revitalized San Pedro Partnership.

We're the main street organization working between uh Central and I-40 on San Pedro.

Uh and this past weekend, uh, or this past week, we went to the Main Street New Mexico um uh summit in Alamogordo, and uh the New Mexico Main Street is celebrating their 40th anniversary.

Uh and Councillor February was given an award of excellence uh uh for all of her work with uh the Revitalized San Pedro Partnership.

And so uh myself and a couple of the board members who might be standing behind me are here to present this award to counselor, and I'll just briefly read uh the the statement that they made at the uh 40th awards dinner.

Um Councilor Feblecorn has been an unwavering champion for San Pedro's Main Street District in June 2023.

She hosted San Pedro the San Pedro teams to celebrate their graduation to Main Street Accelerator status, which we have graduated and recently were uh given full accreditation as a as a main street organization.

Um she pledged city funding to support our work.

Her support was proactive, generous, and rooted in the deep belief in the corridor's potential.

Her consistent presence, advocacy, and willingness to go above and beyond have been instrumental in helping the revitalized San Pedro partnership gain credibility, secure resources, and build momentum.

Her engagement has been hands-on and results driven, helping to lay the groundwork for long-term revitalization and economic growth in the corridor.

Uh, counselor, we couldn't do it without your support.

Other counselor, we couldn't do it without your support.

Hopefully, we'll get you an award next year.

Um just wanted to present this to you publicly to say thank you.

Adoni Rutheni, followed by Carlos Michelin.

That is Adoni Rothini, my brother.

But I'm not gonna hold that against you.

Greetings, salutations, and yo, what it do.

Typically, folks come to this podium to complain.

But today I like to focus on different C words collaboration, commemoration, celebration, community, consideration, and centennial.

How do we keep moving forward on Central Avenue past the 100 years of Route 66?

Will we shift gears and guide the momentum, or will we let the wills stay still?

My name is Adoni Rothini, and I am the executive director of Juneteenth Renaissance Institute, a local nonprofit building economic pathways and parity for those most vulnerable.

I am also a realtor, neighborhood association member, and someone who once slept for two years on these Albuquerque streets.

This past May, our nonprofit hosted the heart of ABQ 6.6K, the 99-year celebration for Route 66 in the international district.

We honored our roads, our roots with community speedwalk, a well-being fair of the expo, all while celebrating the diversity of that part of Ruth City Six, promoting health and economic revitalization.

And the 75th anniversary of Highland High School and a tribute to a 101-year-old military combat veteran.

Though it's only just the beginning, this is more than just an annual event.

It's a community investment towards economic recovery, a civic, cultural and health centered push to bring back life to the area that is still called the war zone, based on what it looks like, not on what it could be.

Oh no, my brother, you got to give me more time.

Look, I'm just here to ask for 90 grand, 90,000 and support for this district.

Also, Louis Sanchez.

May I have more time?

Mr.

Cornelius, go ahead.

Thank you, Madam President.

Carlos Michelin, followed by Brick Jonasi.

Council President, Counselors.

First off, thank you for the reappointment to the Transit Advisory Board.

I'm happy to serve on that board.

But I'm speaking for myself.

I want to bring up an issue that was actually raised earlier by another commenter.

Um in the transit uh department, we're still operating at less than funded levels and still blaming the pandemic four years ago.

Umservice at 60 to 80 percent has been and still is the norm.

Um, and we know the issues.

The issue is that we need to pay more to our drivers and our mechanics.

Being a driver or a mechanic for the transit department, it's a more challenging job than say for the fire department or solid waste.

And the department keeps losing drivers and mechanics to other departments and to the private industry like Amazon.

Um, we need to pay them more.

Um there's a lot of issues with the bureaucracy, of course.

Um, the main one being unions, and no one likes touching the union issue with even a 10-yard stick.

Uh but while everybody does nothing, people are actually struggling.

People who depend on the bus to get to work and have missed service because we are operating at 60%, or people who have to pay more on cars, um, just because the administration doesn't want to fix the problem when we know what the solution is.

Um the reason I bring this today, even though I've been asking for answers on this for over a year, is because we have this amazing new EBQ right forward uh plan.

Um Houston had their new plan, they implemented overnight.

They spent some time educating people and then make the switch overnight.

We just got presented with a four-year 16-step plan to switch from the current network to the new network.

And the in-between those four years is needed, it's the worst of both networks.

People are gonna struggle even more during those four years.

And the reason we don't do it overnight is because we don't have drivers and mechanics.

We need to pay them more, and I don't know what you can do, but I'm asking you to look into it because the administration is doing nothing.

Thank you.

Brick Jonasi, followed by Let's Otvo.

Madam President, counselors, good to see you.

Uh I just wanted to bring to you today a reminder of our first amendment.

The Constitution is the supreme law of the land.

Uh, there is no higher law uh here for the people to be under, and as it is with this country, uh, the government is of the people.

What this means is that the government is too subject to and under the Constitution.

You are all subject in your positions to the Constitution and thus the Bill of Rights.

More specifically.

Our first amendment is the cornerstone of protection for the people to freely choose what they believe, what they say, where they go, what they will publish, and what they will ask for in reference to any changes.

These five fundamental freedoms laid out in the First Amendment, are guaranteed by contract as to be protected and defended by you.

We, we the people, have paid for this in blood and sweat and tears and sacrifice, and we will continue to do so because civic duty requires this.

Our heads are on the line.

All of our heads are on the line, including yours.

Freedom comes with a price, and it isn't cheap.

Thomas Jefferson said of this that when the people fear government, there is tyranny.

But when the government fears the people, there is liberty, liberty.

Another fundamental freedom of the outlined in the founding documents is a social agreement and is the is only of value upon the other freedoms afforded to the people, like religion, speech, press, assembly, and petition.

All these rights listed in the First Amendment are in conjunction with any and all rights expressed in the Constitution.

They must be, or there would be no contract.

No our rights, and respect our rights.

Or you yourselves will have none.

Let's Otva, followed by Tad Nemiski.

Madam President, Council Members.

I kind of feel a need to somewhat apologize because I do rec uh respect the council and I do respect some of the counselors here.

So I would like to apologize to Ms.

Bassan for my last comments when I didn't properly address the council when I asked for the overhead.

Maybe I had other things on my mind in regards to exactly what transpired at the last council meeting.

It seems a shame that the anyone in the council would think that they had a right to that they had a right to simply ask someone to divulge what comments they would be making at a council meeting beforehand.

And when an excuse is given that, well, we need not to have foul language.

Well, I choose not to give foul language, but I am a sailor, I swear.

And it shouldn't be held against anybody to hear such language.

This is an adult room.

Children, I don't think, are running the city.

And I'd also like to state that I've mentioned it before.

You have this excellent system here, this gov TV.

This appears that there's a lot of money that's been spent so the viewers here can actually see what's happening.

But there's a great large uh population out there that can't get here, that can't see things.

And they'd like to be able to give their comments, but they're not getting on a computer.

They're not getting one of that mouse.

They're not pushing buttons.

Allow their comments to be heard.

Allow the comments to be turned on the YouTube channel.

It's not that hard.

YouTube does all the censoring.

Thank you.

Tad Nemiski, followed by Janice Herrera.

Can I get overhead?

Just as a second.

Let's go to history of New Mexico.

When New Mexico decided, joined the union became United became one of the union.

So became United State of New Mexico.

Now same time.

New Mexico when you decide to join the union.

When became you know, became excuse me.

Must accept it.

So the New Mexico have New Mexico Constitution almost exactly.

Now when it comes to immigration.

Well, why are constitutional protection only to legal?

Otherwise, they got out.

They have no rise.

Well, here is I don't have time.

You can hide it, and I will found it.

Janice Herrera, followed by Adale Rose Bennett Herrick.

Good evening, Council President Bassana, members of the council.

Last time I came and spoke, I mentioned a woman who is unhoused in my neighborhood and was looking at several misdemeanor charges.

I found out that she was cited on different occasions under ordinance 2024-49 or the public camping ordinance, which was voted in support by Basson Champagne, Grout as sponsor, Luis Ann Sanchez.

So she has been cited for unlawful storage of personal property, which she let me know was one shopping basket, as well as unlawful camping.

And I think she also has a trespassing charge.

She said, Quote, we carry our most needed belongings on our cart.

I cannot carry blankets around to keep me warm at night.

Blankets, water, clothes, I don't have much more than that.

She currently has uh a serious kidney stone that has caused one of her kidneys to become obstructed.

Her kidney is in effect non-functioning, and she'll need surgery to have it removed.

She has frequently complained to me about not having access to a restroom and having to hold the bathroom as long as she possibly can, which is a contributing factor to uh kidney disease.

So, quoting to you from kidney medicine volume 4, April 2022, people experiencing unstable housing may have greater exposure to heat related stress, lower water availability, which have been linked to acute kidney injury.

Among those, people experiencing unstable housing are more likely to progress to kidney failure or die than people who have chronic kidney disease and stable housing.

ER visits and hospitalizations was nine and five for homeless adults compared with one in one for those who are housed.

Permanent supportive housing should be considered for individuals with kidney disease, particularly those with kidney failure.

So she's worried about going to jail.

She doesn't have a place to go.

We're trying for gateway respite.

Um we really could use bathrooms and water fountains.

It would help.

Thanks.

Adale Rose Bennett Herrick, followed by David Soher Hadwidger.

Good evening, Albuquerque City Council.

Um I want to echo so uh deeply and vividly what uh my friends earlier have said.

Thank you, Mr.

Cornelius.

Um we need protections against masked ice officers.

We need protections for um homeless people on the west side.

Um we've got disturbing reports from the homeless union that people in parks are getting run over.

And people on sidewalks are getting run over at night in very fancy cars, like it's some kind of game.

And I love what we're going for here.

I love our city on a hill with a vision of zero uh pedestrian um zero uh um zero deaths.

Um the homeless people got to be a part of that too.

Ranked choice voting is great.

Y'all have done it.

Um at least once.

I was I was here for that.

Um when you do one, two, and three, um, and like more points are assigned to uh the least score uh wins.

That's also a form of ranked choice voting.

We can do this, we understand it.

Um let's get it done.

Um the National Guard defund APD's PR free free free Palestine.

David Sower Hadwidger, followed by Miguel Tittman.

Madam President, members of the council, my name is David Hadwiger.

First off, thank you very much for letting me talk this evening.

I'm here to advocate for ranked choice voting just from a slightly different angle.

I'm doing a study, trying to ask the question how does ranked choice voting affect voter participation in local elections in New Mexico?

I've had a chance to look at the Santa Fe elections, uh using data from the city uh clerk up there.

And one of the things that I found is that in the three elections prior to adopting ranked choice voting in Santa Fe, the turnout never exceeded 30% in the mayoral races.

After ranked choice voting, it bumped up to 38%.

Or basically went up by about a quarter or thousands of votes.

I'm a researcher, so I'm not gonna screen causality, but that's kind of cool.

Um I've tried to look at Las Cruces when they adopted ranked choice voting in 2021.

Um the challenge was their first election was the first election they ever had without Mayor Ken.

I'm gonna pronounce his name wrong.

Miyugoshima.

And so they kind of had a whole generation of voting for one mayor, and then they had ranked choice voting and an open election.

Kind of hard to make an argument for causality, impacting turnout.

Um, I'm gonna try to keep looking at this, not just in New Mexico, but broadly.

Hopefully, I can bring back some insights as we move ahead.

Uh again, thank you for taking the time tonight.

Very much respect your work.

Miguel Tittman, followed by James Freeman.

James Freeman, followed by Ian Gates.

Good evening, Madam President.

Thank you, Garrett.

Good evening, Madam President.

Uh, I am still James Freeman from District 4.

First of all, I have some really good news.

Uh y'all, y'all approved the budget or the the funding for community bridges who's gonna operate the men's side of the gateway, actual gateway east.

Um they've started moving people in.

One of my buddies was on, was one of the first people moved in.

They moved 10 people in last week.

Either way, I believe Wednesday was the first day, so they're doing a staggered, staggered opening.

So they're gonna fill those 92 beds up, uh, 10 at a time, I suppose.

I I'm hearing some chatter that it's it's only for people over the age of 55.

I've heard different things.

I haven't got a straight answer yet.

I um I'm uh so don't quote me on that, but but my friend is definitely almost 70.

So that is consistent.

He said everybody else that was moved in was elderly as well, which I still think we do need a shelter for people over the age of 55.

It's a very specific population.

They need very specific needs.

And so he says James is the most incredible uh homeless shelter I've ever seen.

He's been in and out, you know, for a couple of decades.

He's had a hard life, and he's just in awe of how how incredible the space is.

He feels the community bridges staff is really good, and he feels really taken care of over there.

He says it's just absolutely amazing.

So I want to thank you all for that funding.

I'm glad it worked out.

Second, I've been doing this for a couple of years now, three or four years.

I was I was here for the Ike Benton Ike uh period, then the Pat Davis, then the Dan Lewis, and now the Brook Basson presidency.

I spoke for the first time at a county commissioner meeting last week, and it really kind of blew me away.

It just feels so much warmer and so much more inviting.

Everybody just seems so much happier.

You know, they didn't have to take turns, you know, yelling at the administration or you know, really taking shots at different people.

And they put all of public comment, you only get public comment, it's right up front, even before the consent agenda.

And I asked them why before the consent agenda.

Oh, so if people want to pull something off, they can actually mention that and have a counselor pull something from the consent agenda.

Oh my god.

So it was a great experience.

Thank you.

Ian Gates, followed by Barbara Mills.

Good evening, uh, Madam President, members of the council.

Uh please vote yes on O 2598 and R25196.

I think this is an incredible step in the right direction to make our street safer for everyone.

But I also want to see us go further.

Changing the rules will help, but really changing the street designs will get us there.

So hopefully in the next city budget, we can see more funding allocated to projects uh that'll make our road crossing safer for pedestrian cyclists and people with disabilities, especially on busy corridors with six lanes or more and near busy bus stops.

Additionally, I want to address the murder of Jayvon Gibbon.

Um we we deserve transparency, we deserve accountability, and we deserve action.

And when young black men are found murdered in our city, these cases should not be swept under the under the rug.

They should not be dismissed, and they should be fully investigated because every victim deserves a full investigation no matter the color of their skin.

Families should also be notified and kept up to date with such cases because unfortunately it seems like Javan's family was left in the dark for a year.

Additionally, we should not be waiting for the results of the autopsy to do something.

We need both an expansion of mental health services for young men of color and action to address the real anti-black racism that we experience in the city every single day.

Um I want to see expanded behavioral and mental health programs.

I want to see more mentoring opportunities, especially from one man of color to another.

And then also and I mean if the city set up a program, I would be first in line to sign up to volunteer.

And then additionally, we need to make sure that racism in our public spaces, businesses that racially profile us, and hate crimes can be reported and even addressed in their minor forms by the city before they escalate into violence.

Thank you.

Barbara Mills, followed by Marcelin Costner on Zoom.

Hi, my name is Barbara Mills.

I'm a resident in District 6, and I won't need the two minutes.

I'm an advocate for ranked choice voting, and I think the argument's very simple the saving money argument.

We need money for much more important things than running a process that we're used to.

You might argue that we won't save money immediately because we have to retool our processes, train people in how to use it, but we don't have to invent it.

We already have resources in Santa Fe and Las Cruces who can help us.

So I would argue that this is an easy thing to pick to choose money from now forward for the city.

It's hard for me to understand the resistance to changing.

Thank you.

Marcelin Cosiner, followed by Peggy Norton.

Hi.

Well, addressing the council tonight, I look to speak to this beloved city and its wonderful people.

We have elections in about two weeks.

Many of our city officials are up for re-election, including many of the counselors in front of you today and are ineffective.

Mayor, there's questions we have to ask ourselves.

Does a mayor who's failed on promise after promise really deserve a third term?

Does a mayor who can't control his corrupt police force deserve re-election by the same population that suffers on good boot?

Does a mayor who spends taxpayer dollars for his own publicity campaigns deserve a third term?

Do counselors deserve re-election when they vote down giving basic decency to the nearly 40% of us renters in the city.

Do we re-elect counselors who spend their time fear mongering and criminalizing our most vulnerable populations?

Do we re-elect counselors who are more concerned with making golf more affordable for the haves than basic rights to live for the have nots?

We re reward counselors who spend the entirety of public comment and much of these meetings on their phones.

Do we reward a mayor and counselors who have spent the past four years blocking every attempt at real tangible change in exchange for subsidies for their largest donors?

We deserve affordable living.

We deserve faster bus service, we deserve better infrastructures, and we deserve to see our brothers and sisters housed and taken care of, not left to die on the streets or in a cycle of shelters and hoop jump in.

We deserve better.

We shouldn't reward bad behavior, not now, not ever.

Please vote on November 4th because it matters.

Vote because if we continue to let these absolute goofballs run our city, we're destined to continue down the same cycles of ineffective band-aids, poverty, pain, and corruption.

Side note, we should re-elect the wonderful counselor who got AC requirements in rentals and tried her damnedest to pass the Rent Act.

Shout out Tammy.

Peggy Norton, followed by Nicole Finch.

Uh good evening, counselor, council president Bassan and Council members.

Um I am here to speak about transparency and relationship to legislation which is connected to neighborhoods.

I'm I'm speaking this using the Minal Corridor designation as an example, but it relates to the R25182 legislation, which is being heard tonight.

And I don't feel like I understand the consequences of that to Santa Barbara Martinez Town.

So with the Minal Corridor, all four adjacent neighborhoods and our city council are opposed it, and yet it still passed.

We knew it was not because of the comp plan.

We knew it wasn't to provide public transportation.

We everybody agreed that Minol is very different on the west of I-25 to east of I-25.

And so now we find out that maybe the real reason to do this was there's a new IDO amendment re-upzoning uh all major transit corridors.

So now that the west of I-25 Minol has been redesignated to be a major transit corridor, now it has been up zone, it will be up zoned if the amendment passes.

And I feel like we've been misled about the simplicity of the amendment, that it was really only to comply with the comp plan, repeatedly stated.

And so I just feel as a neighborhood association, I know there's others, but ours are particular in the valley, that we've been steamrolled by counselors and administration.

And I would just like to really understand our 25192 and how it impacts Santa Barbara Martinez town.

So thank you for the time.

And I didn't know I'm not sure where the rank choice voting issue came from, but I would support it.

Thank you.

Nicole Finch, followed by Nikhil Ananda.

Madam President, Counselors, my name is Nicole Finch.

I'm a member of the Library Advisory Board.

Um today I wanted to highlight this very lovely event guide that you can get at every library branch.

It's many pages of every event.

It's happening at all library branches through the end of the year through December 31st.

Um the library budget does not have enough money to print something like this.

So this is printed by the Albuquerque Public Library Foundation, and we thank them for that.

Um and I just wanted to highlight one event uh from my library, Lomus Tramway in District 9.

They have a monthly after school STEAM Club, and that stands for Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts, and Mathematics.

And they have a meeting the fourth Wednesday of every month for ages eight to 17.

So that is this Wednesday, October 22nd.

Um, and this week there's going to be a program on how a bike stays upright.

And Esperanza Bicycle Safety will be there presenting that program.

Um, so I just think that's a wonderful example of community involvement and how the library helps bring us all together.

Thank you.

Nikhil Amanda, followed by Sarah Azebo.

Uh hi, uh my name's Nick Hill.

Uh I'm the co-chair of the Albuquerque Democratic Socialist chapter.

Uh yeah, I'm here.

Uh I I originally uh wanted to speak in favor of the ranked choice voting efforts that uh others mentioned, uh, but I also wanted to uh come in here to speak about uh some of the uh experiences our members had uh visiting the West Side Gateway shelter and trying to distribute aid to uh folks in need there.

Uh I think some of the uh stories we heard from residents there were pretty uh disturbing to hear.

Uh it seems overall that the location of this shelter and the uh and and the lack of mobility being afforded to uh residents there is part of the bill of burnt effort to move uh those uh who are homeless uh out of the streets and away from a lot of accessible services into a location that that's literally being placed next to the city's compost facilities.

Uh we heard uh reports from people who were blind who were not being permitted to uh believe the premises or to uh apply for services such as food stamps.

Uh we heard reports of people regularly getting kicked off of buses uh despite not carrying out any kind of disruptive behavior, uh just general intimidation from staff and uh a lot of the the forces there.

So I think that you know, when we try and uh superficially remove people from the streets, uh it's important that we actually try to provide people an alternative.

Uh it's not surprising at all in my mind that even though we have some of these spaces available, uh many people would prefer even the conditions on the street uh to where it's basically being kept uh out in the desert in what's effectively a prison out there.

So uh I I just found that a very disturbing experience when members of my organization were trying to help folks out there uh and yeah, thank you.

Sarah Azebo.

Good evening, Council President and members of the council.

Um I am happy to say that I received a response from parks and recreation regarding the treatment being applied to Robinson Park.

Um I am disappointed that the park continues to be roped off Sunday through Friday.

It is accessible on Saturdays for the growers market.

Um, but the parks and recreation department is not happy with the results of their reseeding and narration, so they will now continue work into the fall.

I am curious as to why this is only roped on six days a week and open for high traffic, but I'm even more curious and concerned that the grass was protected by 12 National Guard members on Tuesday.

They came to protect the grass, and um there is not an APD officer with them.

They were just on their own watching the grass grow and making sure nobody was on it.

And that's concerning to me.

I don't think that's the purpose or the intention behind having the National Guard in the city.

Um I'm also concerned that after the ropes went up on Sunday, a mobile surveillance unit was installed.

Um along I forgot what street that is, maybe to Harris or Copper, I don't remember.

But the other side of the park, not central, the other side.

There's a mobile surveillance unit.

And um, from all perceptions, it shows that there is some discrimination against people who need to use the park for public use.

And though Councillor Lewis is bringing forth a grow the grass and protect the turf um resolution tonight.

I would just like to have these parks and public spaces available and accessible to everybody.

Okay, thank you for your time.

Madam President, that concludes general public comment.

Thank you.

We are going to move on with our agenda.

There are no approvals currently, Councillor Rogers is excused for now.

Moving on to final actions, Councillor Baca, R182.

Thank you, Madam President.

R182 approving the adoption of the downtown management redevelopment area plan.

Downtown 2050 and repealing the downtown 2025 metropolitan redevelopment area plan for the downtown metropolitan redevelopment area.

Move due pass.

There's a motion and a second by Councillor Feeplecorn.

Counselor Baco to open.

Thank you, Madam President.

This is an update to the 2025 plan.

Uh, essentially um required under the state TIFF rules.

Um quite a bit of work and quite a bit of public uh involvement went into this plan.

Um essentially, all of our TIFFs that we'll be creating for our MR zones will be requiring one of these.

So this is the first one in that in that series.

Um yeah.

Let's go ahead and move on to public comment and then we'll go to questions from the council.

Thank you, madam president.

Our first speaker is Loretta Naranjo Lopez, followed by Dr.

Lisa Christofferson.

Good evening.

Um President Bassan and Councillors.

My name is Doretta Naranjo Lopis.

I'm the president of Santa Barbara Martuse Town Neighborhood Association.

I'm here to represent the association and the historic neighborhood alliance.

The association, SBM, TNA and HNA recommends denial of resolution 25182, the downtown redevelopment plan.

The City of Albuquerque Metropolitan Redevelopment Office and City Councillor Walking Bocket did not provide a participatory method for the adjacent neighborhoods leadership to have real input into the downtown redevelopment 2050 plan.

The um in 2024, the downtown MRA advisory committee was set up, and the neighbor the nearby neighborhood leadership was not included on this committee, nor they were nor were they asked to participate.

City of Albuquerque Metropolitan Redevelopment Office Director Terry Bruner was not transparent throughout the process on March 2025.

The Albuquerque Development Commission did not include 101 Lomus Boulevard and 220 Broadway Northeast in the recommended decision to LUPS to update the downtown MRA boundary.

Councillor Joaquin Bacca did not ask his staff or the MRA office to discuss with its constituents about amending the ADC recommendation to include 101 Lomus Boulevard and 229 Broadway.

The neighborhood leadership was unaware the city council was to amend the R25123 LUPS report to include Martinez Town Santa Barbara boundary.

Um just like to say that the MRA director and city councilor Joaquim Baca did not make equitable in Martinez Town Santa Barbara neighborhood to ensure that planning and engagement incurred in Martinistown Santa Barbara neighborhood.

Also we recommend denial and request the city of Albuquerque to go back to the neighborhood's leadership to provide the neighborhood level engagement, which will empower the Martinez Town Santa Barbara residents and the historic neighborhood residents to provide input on the downtown MRA plan.

So I just would like to refer to the other documents, and that I hope that you read all of them before you make a decision.

Thank you for the time.

Dr.

Lisa Christofferson, followed by Carlos Michelin.

City Council.

There's language in this ordinance that says downtown Metropolitan Redevelopment Plan will aid in the elimination or prevention of slum or blight or the conditions that lead to the development of slum or blight.

I fear with our current mayor and the current majority, slummer blight, could really mean a human being with no place to live.

The Westside Shelter is an overcrowded prison.

Many of us are going out and visiting, and this is what we're hearing way out by where I live on the southwest edge of District 3.

We have people, we're busing people out to the Westside shelter without ability for them to get even back to the services that we have.

We have no sidewalks, et cetera.

The buses, I mean, anyways, you can go out and see it for yourself.

It is really not safe.

And so the gateway is also not open to the public.

You have to be part of a program to get that.

So how what is the plan?

Um, and can somebody please explain what a blight is that please give us confidence that is not a human being.

I have zero trust that this city will do what is stated in this resolution.

And number three, given the track record of previous removal of people from substandard motels where humans have been placed on city vouchers, moving humans for profit is a real fear that we have in this city, specifically three.

It says a feasible method is included in the plan to provide individuals and families who occupy residential dwellings in the metropolitan redevelopment area, which could be a motel, and who may be displaced by the proposed activities with decent, safe and sanitary dwelling accommodations within their means and without undue hardship.

Can somebody please explain what that means is what the feasible method is?

I could not find it in the documentation or any of the what is that gonna happen later.

We're gonna make that a what's happening.

Carlos Michelin, followed by Janice Herrera.

Um again, Madam President and uh counselors.

Um keep this one brief.

I'm just here to support passing this plan.

Um it's a vision plan, uh purposely vague.

We heard a lot of um opposition to not being a detailed plan at the LAPS uh meeting, but that's not the point of it.

Um and the original supporters because a downtown resident, I know that um downtown has a lot of issues, and I see it first uh firsthand.

And I'm really excited about the proposed TIFF and bid and having a plan, an updated plan, is a requirement from this council in order to form a TIFF.

Um I'm extremely excited about the uh the funding and opportunities that the TIFF will unlock uh for our for our downtown.

Every city that has implemented them, it's been transformational.

Um again, this is just the first step.

Um, once we pass this plan, the city will still have uh much many many more hurles to go through to get the state and the county um in into the TEF.

Um, but this is our very first step, and we need to have a plan in place to be able to move forward.

So I urge you to pass it.

Thank you.

Janice Herrera, followed by Tad Numinsky.

Um, I just wanted to remark on some aspects of this ordinance uh that I appreciated, uh, which includes the engagement of the public in uh contributing to themes.

Some of the themes that were identified, including diversity, uh, and I really appreciate uh the uh note about equity and accessibility within the public realm, including public restrooms and ADA compliance.

These are things that I talk about often and are really important.

And then in placemaking, uh, there was mention of planting shade trees and designing public spaces for comfort.

Uh and so some of the cooling strategies I saw noted, uh, which are really critical to combat the urban heat island effect, uh, included shade, such as pocket parks, green surfaces, permeability, uh, and evaporative cooling, including uh cooling mist systems, which I know other cities like Phoenix are utilizing in the summer months, and I think are fantastic.

And so, you know, these things have the potential to make our downtown area uh more enjoyable for everyone.

Uh, and they also uh will reduce heat-related illness and other things that we're dealing with in the summer months uh by making the overall heat profile in Albuquerque more tolerable.

And so um, you know, of what I saw in this particular strategy.

Uh, I think those are all really great ideas, and I hope to see similar strategies implemented all across Albuquerque in that regard.

Thank you.

Tad Numisky, followed by Peggy Norton on Zoom.

What you give me again, how about that my name is right here?

What we have it's final.

Uh that's what I'm speaking right now.

Uh I signed up.

R 2582.

Okay.

Here is a larger version.

Uh our 2582.

That's what is it?

If that's not enough, let's go to consensus agenda.

Uh, just right here.

Right away.

Same thing to support that 94 right here.

And that's it, hiding up.

There are three at consent agenda was hired right of the genius.

This time, no sponsor, but um uh A, C, and D.

So you can hide it.

I will find it, and I will do what is appropriate.

When it comes to illegal integration, it's I came legally, we almost have an incentives who came legally.

So if you hear the illegal, you have no constitutional rights.

Thank you.

Peggy Norton on Zoom.

It says my videos disabled.

Okay.

Um, good evening, counselor, President Basan and Counselors.

I um wanted to support the concerns of Loretta Naranjo Lopez.

She is president of a neighborhood association historic that has been around for 35 years.

They are a member of the North Valley Coalition.

I can't talk to the details of the plan, but I am concerned about the two properties on Lomas and Broadway that are part of this plan and what the ramifications of that are.

It seems like they are being taken away from Santa Barbara Martinez town, taken away from them are their MRA, and being put into a different one.

And I'm not sure what the consequences are there.

Uh it seems like uh we have a uh CPO 7 amendment coming in uh in next week in the amendment process, and it seems like changing the CPO changes Santa Barbara Martinez town's boundaries.

And if that's the case, we have great concern about that about council uh being able to do that.

And um and other neighborhoods should be concerned also.

The submission of their petition to detailed letters and research that Loretta did and the involvement in this.

I think these issues should be addressed, and those two properties should be withdrawn from approval of this plan.

And you could go ahead and approve the plan and move it forward and come back to those two properties later.

So thank you for considering that.

Thank you.

Madam President, that concludes comment.

Thank you.

All right, we're back on the bill.

R182.

Councillors, any questions or comments?

Councilor Backa.

Thank you, Madam President.

I'd like to move uh amendment number one in our iPads.

This is a technical amendment.

It's simply uh it's formatting strike throughs.

It fits our it allows the um the bill to fit our formatting here at council.

So strike throughs um underlines.

Uh it does not change the bill in any substantive way.

And Miss Uh Don, if you have anything to mention about that's a motion for amendment number one.

There's a second from Councilor Feblecorn.

Counselors, any questions or comments on the amendment?

Councilor Backa to close.

Uh Council Champagne.

Madam President, I believe the attorney, uh, Ms.

Kudodan had an explanation.

Ms.

Kluadon Madam President, Councillor Champagne.

Um, just what Councillor Backa said.

This is a technical cleanup, just to make sure that the bill follows our formatting requirements for making amendments to the code.

Thank you, Madam President.

Heard your support on the amendment.

All those in favor of amendment number one to R 182, raise your hand and say yes.

Yes.

Anyone opposed that passes on an 8-0 vote.

We're back on the bill as amended.

R8 182.

Any questions or comments?

No.

Councilor Backer to close.

Cool.

Thank you, Madam President.

Just uh I'll just address a couple quick uh concerns.

A this is a this is a high-level strategic document.

It is not a comprehensive plan, it doesn't really dig into the details.

That's not its purpose.

Um in terms of blank and slums.

Uh that this is a development plan, it's for the TIFF.

Um, so when it's referring to that, it's referring to all the empty buildings.

Um properties that have been empty for literally 40 years uh downtown.

Um we did just talk to uh we've had some public restrooms planned for a while, just a quick note.

The first one should break ground now in December.

I just got that news, so very happy about that at the ATC Alvarado Transit Center.

Um there was there was a ton of engagement on this, multiple public town halls, notice went out to all associations.

Um I received notice in my mailbox simply because I live downtown.

Um a whole lot of work went into this.

So kudos to uh director Turner.

I'm sorry, Director Bruner and his team.

Um, if he has anything to say and would like to add to this, uh more than welcome.

But other than that, I urge your support.

The motion is for a due pass of R 182 as amended.

All those in favor, raise your hand and say yes.

Anyone opposed?

That passes on an 8-0 vote.

We're moving on to R 183.

Counselor Lewis.

Madam President, our R 183 is established in emergency parks, grass and turf replacement funding source to address the dying turf grass and parks citywide.

I move it past.

There's a motion and a second by Councilor Champagne.

Counselor Lewis.

Then Madam President, um, my my intention tonight is to you know move a deferral, but I would like the uh director, parks and rector Simons to come and just uh talk about um the plan uh that they have over the next few months um to address uh the uh the parks just give him an opportunity to be able to uh to do that.

So director Simons.

Good evening, director.

Good evening, Madam President, Counselor Lewis.

Thank you.

Uh if I'm not mistaken, I hope counselors received uh copy in your your emails this afternoon of this uh uh plan for the remaining uh portion of the fiscal year.

So everyone got that.

Okay, good.

So where we are obviously at the uh kind of the transition point between the summer fall, you know, moving now into fall and winter, you know, most of our efforts to grow grass are sort of uh decreasing.

Um what we do as the temperatures cool, obviously.

Um so what we do now is prepare um over the winter for the spring and next summer.

So the plan uh as I've uh outlined it in in bullet form for you is to kind of maintain a higher level of of staffing, mostly when we rely on temp staff to do a lot of this um work in the parks uh of this nature.

We we want to retain a higher level of staffing as we move uh into the late fall and winter, and then uh we will begin to uh winterize our irrigation systems as the growing season um um kind of comes to a close.

But I think based on learning from last winter, we're we're going to do that with the expectation that we're going to be doing more winter watering.

Particularly if we kind of see a winter again with that was as dry as as last winter's and with the uh lack of precipitation we saw last winter, we are going to do need to do more winter watering.

Um so we're gonna have to stay active and watch those uh metrics and signals through the winter uh to keep water uh on the parks.

And then the other key things I think that we'll pursue over the winter will be fall and winter will be um stocking up on the inputs that we will need for the spring is once uh once we can start to uh get back into the parks for the the spring growing season, we want to be ready with adequate stockpiles.

And then uh this year I I really am going to try to uh increase the amount of equipment we have to do this work.

I think we we need an adequate uh shall we just say fleet uh of the right equipment that we can deploy to the parks, you know, simultaneously so we can get work done all across the city at the same time.

So I think we've identified the need for some additional uh turf-related equipment that we bring it in, get it ready, uh, and we have the staff to use it.

Uh we'll kind of be uh much more prepared uh for the growing season in spring.

And then I think you're you're all very familiar with sort of that notion of the spring startup.

We've talked about that before, and that means you know, being ready to turn systems back on, irrigation systems back on, triage, and correct any problems that may have appeared over the winter, uh, fix those uh and then be ready to apply all the materials that will hopefully have stockpiled and take advantage of the uh growing conditions uh from the start this year.

And I think uh we're prepared to accomplish that and I'm optimistic it's gonna produce good results.

But I'm happy to try to answer any questions that I can.

Counselor Lewis.

Thank you, Madam President.

And director, thank you.

Uh you know, we we've had some good discussions about um uh just a good plan to ensure that our parks are in the condition that they need to be uh in the next two months, um, you know, like now where they should be at this time of year, you know, and certainly they weren't in the last few months.

Um, I talked about a binder I have of parks around my district and around the city that there was some there there were and are some you know serious problems to the point where um if we didn't do something about it pretty quickly, uh we would um you know many of those parks would need to be completely you know um you know redone you know in the springtime.

And so I think what you're you're saying by this plan is that we can get them up to a uh the condition that they need to be, you know, before the winter, uh, so that we don't have to have you know mass you know wide um just completely redoing a lot of these parks, um, and that you have the resources to be able to do that.

Um and that and that has been the primary goal.

I mean, if it's if it's money that's needed, then you know a tool that we have is you know, money that's often reverted, you know, during a budget year that we can capture some of that and really you know um kind of put a put dubs on it and say let's put some priority on money that's reverted and make sure it's going to an immediate need, essential, you know, uh parts of um you know our parks in that regard.

And so you know, certainly that was the intention, that's the intention of this.

I'd I'd like and Madam President, I'd like to move a deferral and um and with the the reason that um you know I just want to you know I want to I want to keep this this money on the table and certainly you know we we don't know how much would be reverted yet.

So I I do agree that there's some there's some time that we have at the same time um I don't want to take it off the table because I think that um you know I think over the next few months we could see you know if um uh if we're making some real progress here.

And so I'd like to kind of keep that on the table as well.

So uh Madam President, I move it after all.

Counselor Counselor Lewis, before we move the deferral, if it's all right with you, we'll go to public comment.

Just okay.

Don't go for our director, just in case there's other questions, please.

And Mr.

Cornelius.

Thank you, Madam President.

Our first speaker is Dr.

Lisa Christofferson, followed by Adale Rose Bennett Herrick.

Thank you, thank you, thank you very much.

I can't believe I'm actually supporting something that uh had I'm sorry, President of the Sun.

One of the counselors to know I need to address, I'm sorry, but I really do appreciate.

Thank you very, very much.

Um I do have a question on Robison Park, but I do support uh this bill.

Is there any way that we could maybe engage the community if it's pot if 12 it take and we have I don't know if you saw it was all over because people are taking pictures, it was all over face literally 12 people around a space of of grass uh guarding grass.

So could possibly the the community be involved, so whatever it is that they need to guard, maybe we could help with that and maybe use the wise those people elsewhere in the community doing the crime, whatever uh they were doing.

But uh I very much Mr.

Lewis, I wanted to or sorry, wanted to take the opportunity to thank uh uh one of our council members for bringing this forward.

I absolutely support it.

Thank you so very much.

Adale Rose Bennett Herrick, followed by Tad Nimitzki.

Thanks, y'all.

Um good evening.

Um Albuquerque City Council's um I really want to uh reiterate um uh our thanks.

Um uh and uh the things uh the comments from earlier.

Um again, the parks have to be uh safe for uh homeless people, and uh I think we need to uh uh rethink uh public camping because I don't I don't believe that public camping is indigenous to Tiwa Land.

Um I don't believe it's indigenous to the Sandia Pueblo.

I don't believe it's indigenous to the Islet of Pueblo.

And I really love our parks.

Um I love the water trees, they're very fancy.

Um I think that uh the more public restrooms that we got, the better.

Um we've got two in Old Town and one coming up at the ATC and one coming and one at the uh um Uptown Transit Center.

Um I'm really uh seeing good things.

Um what do the parks look like in the kingdom of heaven?

Um again, it's uh been a really nice night.

Thank you for uh listening to all of us.

Um have a wonderful night.

Thank you for your time.

Ted Numinsky, followed by Marcelin Kostener on Zoom.

Now let me begin from everybody knows where is Roosevelt Park.

Probably one of the if not the oldest one in Abigorky.

There is a beautiful old trees.

How nice.

Now Keller, step in, spend a million dollars into Fuchshakon Park.

Turn it down the old three trees.

Almost all great is gone.

And millions of dollars being spent.

Tens of millions.

Now let's go further to third park.

Everybody knows so called trade park.

Yes, killer destroyed, all three is gone.

Except you on the side.

And that's the manager city of Korki on the Mayor Keller.

Here it's a plus to him.

Thank you.

Marcelyn Costner.

Hi.

Um happy bill is getting moved forward.

Um I wanted to mention and highlight that I'm looking at the governor's uh declaration that we're in a drought emergency.

So it's just part of that.

I want to highlight the words more winter watering, uh keeping a crop that's native to Europe alive in the southwest climate during a again a drought.

Um we could replace some of that grass uh with more landscapes that soak in water and are better for soil.

I'm also would be curious what uh chemicals the city needs to use to keep again this native European crop and water intensive crop alive in Albuquerque, New Mexico in a southwest climate.

Um and that's just a few of the things I wanted to mention on this grass emergency.

Um I think we should let desert be desert, and especially during a drought crisis, we probably shouldn't be pumping a European plant in our region.

Thank you.

Madam President, that concludes comment.

Thank you.

Counselor Lewis, Councilor Champagne.

Thank you, Madam President.

I just have one kind of curiosity.

Uh what prevents us?

What is the criteria for winter watering?

Uh Madam President, Councilor Champagne, I think that usually we like to see some moisture on the parks um one or two times a month in the winter uh for for dormant turf, you know.

So, you know, we we watch obviously what nature provides from the sky there, whether it's in the form of rain or snow.

And if we get good winter storms, you know, we we uh we're usually okay, I think.

We so the criteria will be to you know temperature and precipitation.

And if temps or overnight temps are remaining high, like in the 40s, you know, and things like that, we will that'll be a sign, I think that we're gonna need to look.

Uh and then if we're not getting winter storms, you know, couple uh once a month or something like that, we're we're gonna look to uh to supplement a little bit.

I will say that of course we're always focused on conservation.

So uh our our goal has been to get more uh output from the water that we do use.

So I'm very, very committed to uh improving the efficiency of our system so that uh we can distribute the water better, and if we can save more water in the summer, we'll be able to apply it in the winter a little bit without a net uh increase in use.

That that would be the goal.

So uh this does not mean winter watering does not mean you know uh regular cycles uh of the irrigation systems going off, you know, every day, certainly not.

It would be in very infrequent in the winter, but I think we're gonna we're we're entering some new kind of times, right?

So we'd have to learn to adapt to some warmer winter temperatures.

And Madam President, uh director, does that mean changing to daytime instead of nighttime waterings?

Uh madam chair and councilor, I think that would be generally smarter to do that because of course I think you're you're right on the money.

We don't want to interrupt park uses in the in the winter during the day, but at the same time uh we need to have hands-on our system, hands-on our systems in the winter because of the threat of freezing of these systems.

We do not want to do damage to these uh irrigation systems, so you don't want to water when they're potentially at freezing conditions, and we need our technicians to be uh actively monitoring the watering that's going on.

Madam President, one last question.

Just how uh with winterizing the the sprinkler systems, uh how does that affect with winter waterings if you're if you're winterizing the system?

The winterizing, you know, generally madam chair and and counselor, you know, generally make sure that um we dr we try to drain portions of the systems that don't, you know, we don't have water retained in the pipes, and then to make sure we have heat tape wrapped around the key elements of the systems so that you know again we don't freeze and suffer uh catastrophic break to a main lines and things like that.

So uh heat's important just to maintain a low above freezing uh condition in some of our valve boxes.

Perfect, thank you, Director, Madam President.

Council Grout.

Thank you, Madam President.

Um thank you for this plan.

Um this outlining your plan for this year for all of our parks.

Um I think we can all appreciate this, and I look forward to the improvements that will will happen with it.

I do have a question about Robinson Park.

Why were there lots of people surrounding it?

Why what is the I need to understand?

Madam President, Counselor Grout, I I believe, and I heard this secondhand.

The issue concerned the presence of some National Guardsmen and women, perhaps around Robinson.

I I don't have personal familiarity with that occasion.

Certainly, we're not using National Guard as part of our park operation, nor would were they I think guarding uh the park from our perspective.

So I I'm just not sure the full details.

Thank you, Director.

Madam CAO, can you do you have an answer?

Madam President, Councillor Grout.

Um, when the information was shared, we checked in with uh uh Albuquerque Police Department related to this tip or this this piece of information.

Um our understanding there's no deployment um over you know they weren't being deployed to that location, so we don't have an answer of our request for them to be there.

Um we continue to we can continue to ask around other questions, but it was not a you know watch the park um uh request or anything along those lines.

Somebody has to know, right?

So can you can you let us know?

I would I'm very curious.

Madam President, Councilor Grout, I will get you gal a an answer uh that's clearer than that.

I just know that it was not a request for us by for us to have them watch the park.

Thank you.

Thank you, sir.

Counselors, any other questions or comments?

Counselor Lewis?

I move uh one month deferral, so like a second week of November.

There's a motion and a second by Councilor Champagne.

All those in favor of a one-month deferral to R 183, raise your hand and say yes.

Yes.

Anyone opposed?

That passes on an eight zero vote.

We are going to take a 30 minute dinner break and come back.

Well, a little bit less than 30 minutes for those of you that don't pay attention to me very clearly.

We're gonna do 730, please.

We are back from our break, and we are on final actions, Councilor Baca, you are up with R 1940, R 194.

Thank you, Madam President.

Establishing priority of residential solar permits until the start of 2026 due to expiration of residential solar tax credits upon January 1st, 2026.

Um, if you may not know, well, I move do pass.

There's a there's a motion and a second by Councilor Grout, Counselor Backa.

Thank you, Madam President.

So we were several uh community groups reached out to us.

The solar panel tax credits are going to be or have been phased out by the current administration, so those will all in on January 1st.

And in order for someone to qualify for those tax credits, all the folks who got solar panels this past year, um, you have to have your panels installed.

And so right now, one of the bottlenecks is city permitting, and so we just want to make sure that all those folks who who put in the who put in solar panels with the with the expectation that they were gonna be getting federal tax credits.

The we do everything we can to make sure that they are taken care of.

Counselors, any questions or comments?

Counselor Grout, thank you.

I have four questions.

I um I'm I'm glad you're doing this, Counselor, but I do have some questions that I just like to get out there.

Um does the planning department have enough staff to push these permits through and keep up with the other permit applications without creating a backlog, Madam President, Councillor Grout, um Director Varela can speak to the program and and what we're doing.

Thank you.

And uh Council President and Councillor, uh the answer is yes, and big part of that is the new technology.

We just implemented what we call the solar express permitting system last week.

Uh these permits up to 50 megawatts, if they're roof mounted, are actually issued instantly now.

Okay.

Perfect, thank you.

Sure.

Um, when this passes tonight, will it go into a when will it go into effect?

I believe uh council president.

That's probably a question for uh city council, but as I said, the solar express permitting system is already up and running.

Uh we are happy to start prioritizing, and we have been if anybody calls us, but I think it depends on when it gets published, etc.

Pursuant to the you know, to the to the publication rules for the council action.

Councilor Grout, do you want Ms.

Coolidon to give you the answer to that?

Sure.

Thank you, Madam President, Councillor Grout.

So the effective date of the resolution uh depends.

Um it is either effective the moment that it's signed by the mayor, or if the mayor chooses not to sign it, it will go into effect after the 10-day um window for the mayor to choose what to do with the bill lapses, or if it's vetoed, then it sort of gets kicked out a little bit more.

Thank you for that explanation.

Hopefully, it will get routed to upstairs quickly, so he can sign it quickly.

Um does um I have two more questions.

Do you have a sense of how many residential solar permits you expect to review before the end of the year?

And uh Council President, I want to introduce Angelo Metzger, he's a new associate director at planning and he's overseeing that program for us.

Thank you.

Thank you, Madam President, Councillor Grout.

Uh it's really hard to say, it's just gonna depend on what comes in.

I could definitely look and see what's in our queue and what we what we've done in the past and get you an answer.

Thank you.

And then one final question, Counselor, Madam President.

Um is there a backlog for these permits right now?

Uh Madam President, uh, Councillor Grout, there we we are, I would say about five to ten days of getting them issued.

So there is a little bit of one, but not too bad.

Okay, so hopefully, when this this resolution gets signed quickly, we can get on that right away because um I think it's important that we get it done for these folks.

Yes, madam president counselor grout.

I I agree, and that's why we put the solar express permitting in there, so they're auto-issued.

Very good.

Thank you.

I'm glad you did that.

Thank you.

That's it.

Thank you.

Councilor Champagne.

Yes, Madam President.

Um Director, just out of curiosity, and this is my brain going, but uh is the could this idea if this passes and gets implemented, could it be used as a pilot program for future permits uh being streamlined?

They a category of like I'm just trying to change out the windows in my house or something that you know, simple uh permits or and uh council uh council president and councilor champagne uh give you a big bingo on that.

The other uh express permitting systems are residential re-roofs.

We already have processed over 90 of those automatically, they're issued instantly.

We just added uh window replacements, water heater replacements, uh simple alterations as well, and uh we're looking for any others, and we might even might even be able to do this with a lot of the trade permits, and this is all based on the new uh ABQ plan platform that we have now.

So the answer is uh yes, we're trying to do that.

And the idea here, everybody and council president is every little bit of workload that I can take off of the plan reviewers, freeze them up to spend more time quicker on the complex uh applications that come through.

So if we can reduce their workload through technology by five or ten or fifteen percent, which is the goal uh within the next several months, then we can go that much faster in all of our other permits.

And as you've probably seen and heard, we've been increasing our permit speed by about 30 percent per year for the last two years anyway, and this is just going to uh make that go exponentially faster.

Wonderful to see.

Thank you, madam.

Counselors, any other questions or comments?

Councilor Backer to close.

Thank you, Madam President.

So just you know, yes, thank you.

Uh Director, um I think this is a great example of council and the administration working together as a team in tandem.

Um ideally we would do that with everything.

Um just so folks know uh big shout out to our our staff here, Matthew Cox in particular for for getting this turned around quickly.

Um a lot of folks put in a lot of work, so people should get their credit.

Um, and also this council, right?

We passed last year.

I can't remember the number now, but fast tracking housing permits.

So this is modeled on that as well.

So big kudos to everybody all around, and I urge your support.

The motion is for R 194.

So we'll take a roll call vote.

Madam Clerk.

Councilor Backa.

Yes.

Councilor Champagne.

Yes.

Counselor Peoplecorn?

Yes.

Councilor Group.

Yes.

Councillor Lewis.

Yes.

Vice President Penny.

Yes.

Councilor Rogers.

Yes.

Councillor Sanchez.

Yes.

President Bassan?

Yes.

Passes unanimously.

We are moving on to O 98, Councilor Feblecorn by request.

Thank you, Madam President.

O98 is amending the traffic code and the sidewalk ordinance to improve protections for bicyclists, pedestrians, and other vulnerable users, and amending the automated speed enforcement ordinance to direct revenue to Vision Zero traffic safety initiatives.

And move a do pass for the purposes of discussion.

There's a motion and a second by Councillor Grout.

Counselor Febalcorn.

Thank you, Madam President.

So we were two days off on the um the required notice.

And so we were gonna do an amendment tonight, but we will have to defer this for two weeks to make it all legal.

Um so, madam president, I'm happy to move that amendment before or after we go to public comment whenever you would like.

Let's go ahead and do the amendments first.

Thank you.

All right, so we're only gonna do the B.

Um, and so that's going up on the screen here, and it is uh floor amendment number one, and on page 16, insert the following after line 23, and we are further describing um how you can walk along a um uh roadway.

Um, and the explanation is that this allows for pedestrians to travel on the roadway if a sidewalk is not there, or if it's you know under construction, or if it's just unpassable.

And so I would move that floor amendment number one.

There's a motion and a second by Councillor Grout.

Counselor Peoplecorn.

Urgeport.

Counselors, the motion is for amendment number one to oh ninety eight.

Do you have any questions or comments?

Madam Clerk.

Councilor Backa.

Yes.

Councilor Champagne.

Yes.

Counselor Peoplecorn.

Yes.

Counselor Bruck.

Yes.

Councilor Lewis.

Yes.

Vice President Penny.

Yes.

Councilor Rogers.

Yes.

Counselor Sanchez.

Yes.

President Bassan?

Yes.

Passes unanimously.

That's the only amendment tonight.

We're gonna move on to public comment, and I just want to take just a quick minute because there's a couple of names for both O 98 and R196.

I realize they're different.

I am not telling you you have to.

But if you would like to combine your comments for both, it could be appreciated if they end up being similar in nature.

I know that one is the ordinance for the actual uh pedestrian and vulnerable road user uh for the city of Albuquerque, and the other one is more about the educational campaign that will go along with it.

So for those of you that signed up on both bills, if you want to use your time on both, that's fine.

If you want to combine, that would be fine too.

Mr.

Cornelius.

Thank you, Madam President.

First up, we have Jackie Davis, followed by Ben Garland.

Counselors, I'm happy to be here as we are once again considering bringing the traffic code up into the 21st century.

This ordinance is something that I personally support as a pedestrian, a cyclist, and a driver, because it makes it clear your expectation as each of these road users.

It makes it clear that you must stop for any person in a crosswalk, regardless of if they're on a skateboard, if they're on foot, if they're on a bicycle, it doesn't matter anymore.

You must stop.

Other jurisdictions use this stop language as opposed to yield language.

Um Illinois, Georgia, Texas, and even Oregon use this language.

Number two, it makes what to do at a hock signal clear.

I think many of us were confused when the first talk signals dropped, exactly what you were supposed to do when faced with that situation.

Um, both as a pedestrian, a cyclist, and a driver.

Um, number three, it also ensures accountability as to where speed camera revenues are going.

I've heard a lot of people refer to speed cameras as an absolute cash grab.

And I'm very happy that our city doesn't do that and directs this to hopefully put the speed camera program out of business long term.

It keeps it from being a cash grab.

The state should take notice and also send their half of the money.

Um I urge your support on this bill.

Thank you.

Ben Garland, followed by Althea Atherton.

Good evening, Madam President and members of the council.

Um my name is Ben Garland.

My name is Ben Garland.

I'm with the UNM Center for Pedestrian and Bicycle Safety, but I'm here tonight on my personal time.

I've been advocating for safe streets for over 10 years, and I 100% support this update to the traffic code.

I do want to be clear, these changes are a wonderful start, but this is just the beginning, not the end.

We have a lot more work to do to make our streets safer for everyone of all ages, of all abilities, no matter what form of transportation they choose.

Laws are one small part of making our streets safer.

We also need education and for enforcement, and most importantly, we need infrastructure that protects all road users and make sure that everyone behind the wheel of an automobile is encouraged to drive safely because as we all know, there is a not insignificant number of drivers in our community who treat our streets like racetracks and red lights as a suggestion.

I look forward to continued progress on making our roads safer so that no one has to lose their life on the streets of Albuquerque ever again.

I know it may seem like an impossible goal goal, but if we continue to work together, I know we can get there.

Again, thank you for taking this first step tonight.

Um this is a meaningful change that will help save lives.

I do hope it passes unanimously.

Um and for the educational resolution, um, I I would want to propose that the majority of outreach is by um billboards along the roadways, because that's where drivers are gonna see it.

Thank you.

Althea Atherton, followed by Patrick Martin.

Thank you.

Um President Passan, I urge your support of 02598 for countless reasons, including all the things that Jackie and Ben just said.

Um I appreciate the attention it gives to people with disabilities as vulnerable road users, the inclusion of floor amendment one that just passed, um, and the general uh 21st century updates in this age of micromobility.

I do have one hesitation that I'm hoping can be amended out before the next meeting.

Um it's at 8279, which is page 16 of the blue line version that was online.

Um section B vulnerable road users shall not cross it an unmarked, uncontrolled, unsigned, unsigned crosswalker intersection where one of the next two adjacent crosswalks of the intersection traffic control signals are present.

This is part is a little bit worrisome to me.

Um, as someone who gets around as a vulnerable road user and a bus rider, um, yes, ideally in a perfect world, we should cross at marked signed crosswalks, definitely.

But as someone has put in a lot of my fair share of like 311 requests trying to get uh zebra stripes and for things that are curb cuts but not completely sidewalks.

Um I'm worried that this would codify crossing in those areas as a problem.

And um that uh would include some areas in Knob Hill near my child's school, um the Loma Linda Community Center, and numerous places in the international district.

Usually the site of a tactile curb cut indicates that it's been a deemed a safe place to cross.

Um, but I I realize that um a lot of times uh that's how I do uh you know these things, and um that when we have regulations like this, they can sometimes be enforced um unjustly and unevenly.

And so I want to make sure that we're not accidentally codifying any language that we don't want to stand by.

Um as for 196, um, I encourage uh the marketing plan not just to include billboards, so I love that idea, but also bus stops and on buses as well, um especially for the pieces that affect pedestrians and cyclists.

Thank you.

Patrick Martin, followed by Carlos Michelin.

It appears we have Patrick in Zoom.

Um Patrick, I'll come back to you once we get to Zoom, please.

Thank you.

Carlos Michelin, followed by Melinda Montoya.

Um again.

Um thank you for considering this updates to the traffic code.

Um it's been 50 years, it's overdue.

Um, and also for funding Vision Zero.

Um, so far it's the address that vision zero zero vision has been true.

I hope with this changes, uh, we can start making things happen.

Um in the last couple of years, we've lost too many people, including three CD employees riding their bikes.

Um recently, a young woman uh usually our separated trails.

Um the trail crosses the road, she got killed there.

And just 10 days ago, uh, a UNM and H UNMH nurse, pediatric emergency nurse, while crossing to go to work on Lomas, got killed.

Albuquerque is consistently listed as out of the most dangerous or one of the top three most dangerous cities for pedestrians and cyclists every single year.

Um this should be unacceptable.

I'm glad to see this change is happening.

Um but I echoing what uh Ben uh Ben said, it's not enough to just change the laws one time.

We need to follow through with systemic changes through our built environment.

So we slow cars, we promote transit, and we promote multimodal transportation in the city.

Um I do have one big issue, um, the one that Althea just mentioned.

Um I think it should be legal to cross at a crosswalk.

Um it's in the name, uh, regardless of whether that crosswalk is marked or unmarked, and that's the way that the state uh statute reads.

Um I don't think there's any need for the city of Albuquerque to go beyond the state statute and arbitrarily define some crosswalks, which is illegal to cross.

Uh so I urge you to strike out uh section 8279.

Um and finally, I absolutely love the second uh bill, the education part of it.

Um being cynic, I don't think APD is gonna enforce any of this, and educating drivers is probably the best way you will have to do this.

Um thank you.

Melinda Montoya, followed by Christopher Love.

Hi, uh good afternoon or good evening, Council President Bassan and Council members.

Uh, my name is Melinda Montoya.

I am Kayla Van Landingham's mother.

I would like to first express my gratitude to Councilman People Corn and Um Parks and Rec Manager Dave Simons for taking a meeting with me shortly.

I mean, like I want to say like less than seven days after Kayla's death.

That meeting could have gone a lot of ways, um, but they really held space for a brief mother.

They heard my concerns, especially around the traffic code that did not provide her with the dignity with any dignity.

Uh, there were no repercussions for a driver who was not paying attention, so it really sent a message that there are no rules on our road.

Um, but they have really worked diligently to get us to this point, and now that we know what the problem is, we cannot move backwards, only forward.

Adoption of this amended ordinance will offer dignity to every road user by removing the ambiguity or ambiguousness of what the rules are and will bring us closer to similar peer cities.

Um Kayla was a kind, compassionate woman who was a light in our community, and she used to tell people who personally knew her we can do hard things because good things are often hard, um, but they're always worth it.

So let's do something good for Kayla because everyone who has lost their life on these streets deserves to have something better.

And uh speaking on the resolution, um, it's incredibly important because it stands to change our current culture through education.

Since her passing, I've done policy assessments of peer cities, participated in work groups, and have paid attention to local commentary, and it's obvious that we have gaps in our legal framework and ability to provide education to our citizens, as few seem to actually know what our laws are.

Um, this resolutions offers a radical opportunity to change the driving culture in Albuquerque as it offers to update citywide driver's ed, a comprehensive safety campaign so that everyone knows the rules and how to use safety infrastructure like the Hawklights, and we really have an opportunity to create a safer city for everyone.

So thank you so much.

Christopher Love, followed by Marcelin Costner on Zoom.

Good evening, uh Council President Bassan and fellow counselors.

Um my name is Chris Love.

I'm a uh an advocate for people with disabilities, and um we are very pro this um regulation uh work.

Um sorry, um you know being shy, but uh anyways, um it's about time.

The city brings the traffic code up to date.

Um it's the 21st century.

This is past 50 years ago, 35 years uh post the ABA.

And uh some of the software, such as the definitions of pedestrians and vulnerable road users, um, to include realtors and personal mobility devices, is very much appreciated.

And I'm also signed up to speak on 196, but all I want to say is that yes, um the best way to get this out to just the general population and all forms of users, such as drivers, micromobility, pedestrians, and um people with physical limitations is through education.

So uh please pause this.

Thank you.

Marcelin Cossener, followed by Renee Gallagher.

Hi, um, I just wanted to read off some data here.

Um intersection, Central Louisiana, 25 crashes.

Central and some San Pedro, 17 crashes.

Central and Ubank 16.

Central in Wyoming, 16.

Central and Cores, 14.

Cemateo Montgomery, 10.

I-40 and 40, I-40 and second, eight.

We have a problem.

We have a huge problem.

We have the highest pedestrian uh death rate in the country as a state.

Um a lot of needless deaths as a part of this.

Um as a pedestrian, it is so much more dangerous for us operating out there with no infrastructure than cars having to share the road and have impedements into the road.

I mean, this is this is really basic.

We should be taking care of the most vulnerable in this situation, and me on a bike am so much more vulnerable to so many of these things than someone in a car.

We can't just design these roads and pass small things and decide that like this will fix the problem.

This will fix the problem.

Drivers need to be taught to look for pedestrians.

We need to create our make our roads pedestrian friendly, and we need to light up crossings that are uh heavily trafficked.

We have to ensure people feel safe to bike whenever they need to bike.

We want people to feel safe to walk wherever they need to walk and not fear getting ran down.

It's ridiculous.

This is wonderful legislation though, in the right direction, and I applaud uh Counselor Feeblecorn for putting it forward.

Thank you so much.

Renee Gallagher, followed by Luis Sutherland.

Madam President and Counselors, thank you for taking my comment.

I've been riding my bicycle in Albuquerque for more than 40 years, and during that time I've crossed the Paseo del Nordeste trail at designated bike crossings countless times.

On July 22nd, 2025, just blocks from her home, 19-year-old Kayla Van Landingham was killed at the Carlisle crossing.

In 2018, 12-year-old Justine Almuna lost her life at a designated crossing on Louisiana.

Countless others have also lost their lives.

The pattern in both of these tragedies and others is sadly familiar.

One driver stops to let a pedestrian or cyclist cross, while another driver in the next lane does not.

As someone who uses these crossings regularly, I see it all the time.

One car stops while others race through at 35 to 40 miles an hour, unaware of the danger.

Flashing yellow lights don't solve this.

Drivers are confused about what's expected, and that confusion continues to cost lives.

Any experienced cyclist will tell you that these marked mid-block crossings can actually be more dangerous than unmarked ones.

In New Mexico, drivers often ignore crosswalks altogether.

When a car does stop for me on my bicycle, I usually assume the driver must be from out of state because local drivers rarely do.

It's not our culture.

Cyclists, pedestrians, people in wheelchairs.

For eight consecutive years, New Mexico has had the highest pedestrian death rate in the nation, according to the governor's highway safety association.

We need crossings that are simple, consistent, and predictable so that drivers understand exactly how to respond, and so that no more lives are lost.

Thank you.

Yeah, we can hear you.

Thank you.

I'm very excited to see clear a clear definition of vulnerable road users or VRUs.

I am grateful that all VRUs are explicitly allowed to use a crosswalk.

This will make it clear that crossing uh areas such as Pennsylvania while riding the multi-use path near Wind Rock does not require cyclists to dismount their bike.

Thanks for that clarification.

So I do have a concern regarding uh prohibitive crossings 8-2-7-9.

Please do not include this prohibition.

In 2025 state, Senate Bill 73 in the State Senate and Senate Bill 73 cyclists are allowed to assess when the road is clear.

People who are walking should have the same uh discretion.

Uh let's allow let's allow walking to be safe and convenient uh by removing this burden.

Thank you.

Um as far as uh resolution 196.

Um I also support that, of course.

And um, however, uh I didn't notice any effort in the resolution to educate Albuquerque residents on new state laws um related to uh VRUs.

Um such law, uh, as I mentioned before is Senate Bill 73 signed into law this year.

The law allows site lists to treat stop signs as a yield.

I ask that we educate ABQ the ABQ public on such laws.

Uh and this one in particular, I have been punished passed and yelled at by motorists for following this law.

Uh it appears that they are ignorant to make changes.

Um please include this if it's not.

Thank you.

Mark Baileau, followed by Brandon Co.

Uh, good evening, Madam President.

Counselors.

I'm Mark Bylone, District 2 resident and bike commuter.

I am here today to speak in 99% support of 02598.

I commend LUTS for passing this unanimously and taking street safety seriously.

Vision zero doesn't happen without reactive and proactive effort.

It's unfortunate to see that we have so many pedestrian fatalities and injuries on our streets, but it's equally fortunate to see actions being taken as a result of these things.

Um we must take serious steps to see vision zero come to life, and I think these traffic code changes are a key first step toward that audacious goal.

These changes are welcome, but I'd recommend a change in section 8279B, which makes illegal what is currently legal today.

This section, while well intentioned, penalizes pedestrians for taking the same direct route that a motorist could also take.

Um I'd suggest changing the language to either be less prescriptive and instead encourage pedestrians to use signalized interstations while not penalizing them if they choose to take a direct route.

Um should this pass unmarked crosswalks that are currently in place and indicated will be made illegal to use.

Um please consider an amendment somehow, either striking the language or to instead encourage rather than require these uh steps to be taken.

And then I would just ask that we also um don't stop here and that we keep pushing forward and we start pouring some concrete to make sure that people uh stay safe on our streets.

Uh thank you so much.

Brandon Co., followed by Patrick Martin.

Hi, good evening, uh Madam President and Council members.

My name is Brandon Co.

I'm a district four resident.

And I just wanted to thank you for the opportunity to speak in support of ordinance.

And resolution uh 25196 in solidarity with my friends Belinda and Alec, and in memory of their daughter, Kayla Van Landergam, who was hit and killed by a car while uh biking in a designated crossing area earlier this year.

Um just uh owed 2598 and R25196 uh are really important measures.

I urge you to pass these, and together these measures will uh uh implement changes that uh close dangerous gaps in our laws and make our streets safer for drivers and vulnerable uh users of the streets.

Thank you very much.

Patrick Martin.

Thank you.

Um apologies I had to head home and couldn't do my um comment in person, but I wanted to express my support both personally and also as the president of Bike ABQ, the local bicycle advocacy organization in Albuquerque.

Um, I wanted to express my support for this traffic code update as well as for the resolution.

And also to share the support of our community for the goals of this ordinance.

Yesterday I shared with each of you an open letter signed by over 60 Brocanos and local organizations in support of the efforts of this traffic code update.

Traffic code safety is really best enhanced when you've got four items that are aligned.

Um what is safe to do, what the law says to do, what people know they should do, and what people choose to do.

And so the ordinance and the resolution work to align those first three items.

And in terms of what people choose to do, that's where street design comes in.

And so I really look forward to continued work on the street design front to really further the work that the um this great ordinance and the resolution do.

Um I do share the hesitations about the outline of uh crossings at certain on mark crosswalks from S27 uh S8279B.

Um there's many cases where the built design of sidewalks implies that it's a safe location to cross.

Um and there are roads in the city uh where crossing at minor intersections it is safe, expected, um, and it's even designed for that purpose.

And so I look forward to an amendment um in November that can align the wording of the ordinance with what we want to enforce.

Um, but I do urge your support for uh this ordinance and the resolution.

Thank you.

Madam President, that concludes comment on 098.

Counselors, we're back on 098 as amended.

Any questions or comments.

Council Peoplecorn.

Thank you, Madam President.

Um I I wanted to thank everybody.

There have been so many advocates that have been involved in the development of this, and I just want everybody to hear 8279.

We heard your concerns not until this afternoon, and so give us a little time to find an answer, but we will be working with the administration, and um we will send out something for you guys to look at and make sure that we get exactly what we need to have in this, but do not worry that that is I I heard you loud and clear.

Um and other than that, um, Madam President, I as I said earlier, we we did miss the deadline for immediate action, and so I'm just gonna move a deferral until the um November 5th uh meeting.

There's a motion and a second by Councillor Grout.

All those in favor, and Counselor Rogers for the record is back, so we're not going to do roll call now.

Thank you.

Uh all those in favor of deferring to November 5th, 098 as amended, raise your hand and say yes.

Yes.

And I see no one in opposition that passes on a nine zero vote.

We are on R 196.

Councilor Peoplecorn.

Thank you, Madam President.

R196 is taking measures to improve safety for bicyclists, pedestrians, and other vulnerable road users.

I'll move a do pass.

There's a motion and a second by counselor Rogers.

Uh, let's go ahead and go to public comment.

If you're here or online and you are going to skip speaking again, I'll go back to you for an open.

What's that?

There's an amendment.

There is an amendment.

Okay, stand by.

We're gonna do an amendment first so that you all know what we're changing or not.

Whose amendment?

Councilor Rogers.

Thank you, Madam President.

I'd like to move um amendment number A, it's in your iPads and also being passed around.

And I think we got it together also for the public.

And this is on page one, line 20.

Add a new subsection, amending existing language and re-letters subsequent sections.

The administration shall review trainings provided to APD following the new traffic code to ensure the training adequately addresses the protection of vulnerable users.

The administration shall uh create an updated enforcement plan as to how APD will administer the updated traffic code, and then on item C, we're just adding to what they need to bring back, is including APD APD's enforcement plan to council within 120 days, and pretty self-explanatory just to make sure that in addition to training everyone else, we also train our officers to the point of the public commenter about enforcement.

And then I just would like to know how does APDA enforce these new things and having that in a plan.

Um so I will move a do pass.

Second.

There's a motion and a second by councillor Grout and Feeble Corn.

Counselors, any questions on the amendment.

All right, counselor Rogers to close.

Thank you.

I urge your support.

All those in favor of amendment number one to R96, raise your hand and say yes.

Yes.

Anyone opposed that passes 90.

Now let's any more amendments, counselors.

Let's go ahead and move on to public comment.

If you are, because I know a lot of you seemed like you were going to you spoke on both, and I just don't want to take away the opportunity for you to still speak again if you want.

But if you can just indicate that you want to pass if you're doing it this time, otherwise come up when you're called.

Mr.

Cornelius.

Thank you, Madam President.

Jackie Davis, followed by Ben Garland.

Miss Davis passes.

Ben Garland followed by Althea Atherton.

They both pass.

Thank you.

Patrick Martin, followed by Melinda Montoya.

Uh Patrick Martins on Zoom, correct?

Yeah.

Correct.

Yeah.

Patrick, if you'd like to speak, raise your hand, please.

I do not see a hand.

Melinda Montoya, followed by Adeo Rose Bennett Herrick.

Thank you.

She's gonna Miss Montoya is gonna pass.

Adale Rose Bennett Herrick, followed by James Shanley.

Okay.

So logically.

What do the roads look like in the Kingdom of Heaven?

We have some obvious bicycle related inconsistencies.

I really like the Idaho stop.

One of my favorite things from Idaho.

And basically let's uh bicyclists uh run or pedal past uh red light um if it is safe to do so.

Um you know this uh conserves momentum and uh feels wonderful and um I urge all of our support for uh keeping keeping people safe out here um thanks y'all James Shanley followed by Brandon Co.

Brandon you're in Zoom.

Please raise your hand if you'd like to come in and speak it once more.

Thank you.

Madam President, counselors.

Until fairly recently, I was a very active road cyclist.

I I've ridden thousands of miles on public roads in Sydney, Australia, Tokyo, Japan, Boston, Massachusetts, and here in Albuquerque.

I can state unequivocally that Albuquerque has the best network of bike paths, bike lanes, and trails I've encountered anywhere.

Albuquerque also has the least aware and least respectful motor vehicle drivers, vis-a-vis the cyclists I have ever encountered.

This is tragically monumentalized by an appalling number of white bikes erected throughout our city.

Councilor Feblecorn and this council are to be commended for crafting and enacting ordinance 2598.

But it is vitally important that resolution 25196 designed to educate the motor vehicle driving public to use the roads less selfishly and more safely for the sake of vulnerable pedestrians and cyclists.

Proceed with uh all rapidity.

R25196 requires the administration to report back to council on the scope, measures, and outcomes of their public education campaign by April of next year.

I urge council to request interim reports and submissions from the administration on the design, messaging media, and frequency of the campaign on at least a monthly basis starting early January to ensure this effort proceeds with urgency and commences as soon as possible because as we know it's a matter of life and death.

Thank you, Madam President.

That appears to be it for public comment.

Thank you.

Mr.

Love, you had signed up as well.

Did you want to say or do you want to skip?

Okay, I just didn't want to skip over you.

All right, counselors.

We are back on R 196 as amended.

Any questions or comments?

Councilor February.

Oh, Councillor Grout, do you have a question?

Are we gonna discuss it now?

Uh it's up to you.

If you have questions or comments to discuss now, you're welcome to.

Thank you, Madam President.

I just um this is very important.

I'm glad that we're doing this.

I'm sorry it took the loss of life to make it happen.

But I'm really glad to see community coming around it and um understand and embracing it and knowing the need for it.

This um I said it at the LEPS committee meeting.

This resolution is even more important that we do have that education.

And I also like um one of the speakers' um recommendation to um make sure that we do get maybe monthly update so that we can make sure that we aren't missing anything because it's that important.

There is we recently put a hocke signal in my district on it on a busy street.

Um, and and it's been difficult for people to understand it.

So that education is very important.

And I know that the administration will come up with some great things, but I think that this would be definitely something that the community should be part of to make sure that we are getting that education out there, including the neighborhood coordination, all the neighborhood associations, and then just um just blasting the information out there because we don't want to lose any more lives.

Thank you.

Any other questions or comments?

I will say just real quick that I did ask my kids if driver's ed is teaching them about hock signals, and they are not.

So we're gonna make sure that that changes with this resolution uh because I didn't know what a hockey signal was either until I started this position.

So I definitely concur and can't wait for all the driving schools to learn all our new rules to teach our young people.

Council FIBO Corn to close.

Thank you, Madam President.

Um again, I think this is a really important accompanying piece to the ordinance update.

Um it doesn't make a lot of sense to pass it tonight since the ordinance can't be passed tonight.

So I am going to move for a deferral uh until November 5th for oh for R 196.

There's a motion and a second by Councillor Grout.

All those in favor of a deferral of R196 to November 5th, raise your hand and say yes.

Yes.

Anyone opposed that passes 90?

There is no other final actions.

We're on there's no other business.

We're moving on to administration QA.

Counselors, any questions for the admin?

Councilor Grout.

Thank you, Madam President.

I have just a few.

Um first one is for Madam CAO.

For everyone watching at home, can you briefly tell us the difference between the city's core investment portfolio and the liquidity portfolio and the purpose of each one?

Um Madam President and Councilor Grout, yes, I can.

But uh, before we start answering the questions, I'd like to say uh inform you that we have Deanne Woodring, who's our CFA, she's the president and senior advisor for government portfolio advisors.

She's our third party that we use.

She is on Zoom just in case we need her to answer any questions.

Thank you.

Um back to your question, uh Councilor Grout.

Um, the core investment portfolio consists of funds that the city invests for long period uh to earn higher um returns.

That portfolio is aligned to match the budgeted funding requirements of future years.

Um, the liquidity liquidity portfolio on the other hand holds cash that is ready available to cover daily operating needs such as payroll, uh accounts payable, or the combination of other things, uh operating needs and those kind of things, and the combination of the core investment portfolio and the liquidity portfolio represent the total investments of the city.

Thank you, Madam President.

Um in April, the city left about 98 million of maturing investments in liquidity instead of reinvesting in its core in the core.

Then in July, the city transferred 100 million out of the core and invested it in liquidity.

According to the minutes from the last investment oversight committee meeting, the IOC is recommending pulling another 100 million by the end of the year.

Can you explain why and um what's going on there?

Uh Madam President and Councillor Grout.

Um, well, those decisions are made by the IOC, which is the investment oversight committee on a quarterly basis.

You know, they have to review several underlying factors that they take into consideration as they decide what they're gonna leave in the core account or what's gonna be in the liquidity account.

For instance, they have to look at projected gross receipts tax, uh property tax, bond proceeds grants, and the timing of when we're actually gonna receive those funds.

But they also have to look at projected expenditures, including payroll, uh construction and process, and other capital project expenses that are gonna be coming due within that quarter.

So they have to look a little forward and see what do we think is coming in, when do we think we're gonna get the money and what's gonna be spent because we have to have those funds readily available to us, so we have to be have them in our liquidity account.

And uh, based on these estimates, the IOC determines how much should remain in liquidity, how much so that to ensure that the city can meet its near-term obligations but also its long-term obligations in the core investment portfolio and liquidity portfolio.

Uh they work together to make came to maintain the targeted balances that are set forth for that quarter by the IOC.

Okay.

Thank you.

Madam President, who currently has fiduciary control over cash and investments after uh recent staff departures?

Uh Madam President, Councilor Grout.

Um currently the control is held with the director of uh Finance and Administration Services.

That would be our director, uh Donna Sandoval.

Okay.

Uh she currently is our acting treasurer as well.

And they provide written approval for all investments.

The investment oversight committee provides monthly investment summary reports to them.

And those reports are are come in to stay in compliance with the current investment policy, and the IOC meets quarterly and reviews these investments and considers the performance and any recommendations to the investment strategy, and they must vote on it and get approval to change anything.

Thank you.

Um the city has a third-party investment advisor.

What is their role in the IOC's decisions and portfolio management?

Well, our third party, uh, Madam Chair and Councilor Grout, our third party advisor is really there, and that's what they are.

They're an advisor, they're a non-voting member of the investment oversight committee, and their role is to provide independent analysis and recommendations on the city's investment portfolio.

The advisor, the advisor also presents the current investment status, market outlook, and potential options for the IOC to consider in the upcoming months.

The advisor acts as a non-discretionary basis, which means that all the transactions and investment decisions are maintained by the IOC.

Transactions are made within the authority of the acting treasurer and documented with written approval.

The advisor's primary focus is to help maximize returns within the parameters of the city's investment policy and in alignment with projected cash flow needs for the upcoming quarter.

Thank you.

Um Mr.

Motsko, may I add I have a lot more questions to ask?

And so I'd really like a presentation before the council.

Mr.

Motzko, when is the earliest um you think we could have a presentation from the city's investment advisor?

Sure.

Uh Madam Council President Bassang, uh, Councilor Grout.

In speaking with uh Ms.

Woodring uh at the last meeting, I think we would be comfortable uh early 2026.

We have an IOC meeting coming up here on the 28th.

We'll have some more information then.

Um with the holidays and everything, we would ask that if we could do an early 2026 presentation.

Okay, I think we need to get that on the calendar so we can learn a little bit more.

Thank you.

That's a good idea.

Thank you.

Okay.

I have more questions, but I'll let somebody else.

No, that's okay.

Go ahead and you can and then we'll go to the other counselors when you're done.

Okay, thank you.

Thank you for that.

I appreciate that.

So for Triple H and Acting Director Ellen Braden.

Hello there.

Hi.

Um the city received a little over 12.7 million dollars from the state for affordable housing this year under the agreement that was signed in August.

The city required this uh the state or the city is required to submit operational plans for all funded programs within two weeks.

And you sent me this plan on Friday, and I thank you for that.

But I do have some questions.

I reviewed it over the weekend, and I have a few more questions.

Is this the actual document that was sent to the state, or is it a summary?

Madam President, Councilor Grout, that was the document that was submitted to the state.

Okay.

Even though the state is funding facility improvements for the medical respite, not operational funds.

Shouldn't the operational plan for that area be included?

Madam President, Councilor Grout, we um provided those documents to the state, and they have accepted those.

We are also um so that is what they have accepted.

So they have accepted.

I don't see an operational plan for the young adult housing navigation center.

Are you uh Madam President, Councilor Grout?

I have provided you all the operational plans that were provided to the state.

Okay, the contract with uh Chican Chicano Por la Casa for operating the gateway requires them to enter all data into HMIS, but that isn't reflected in this operational plan.

Will you be doing that?

Madam President, Councilor Grout, in our contracts is where we actually specify that provider agencies will have to enter data into HMIS.

Okay, thank you.

Um EC426 says the women's housing navigation at the gateway will have a hundred beds, but this plan says 90.

Is that just a typo?

Madam President, Councilor Grout.

Um women's has 92 and one, and then the men's has a hundred.

Okay.

I hope I did not flip, but I flipped it.

Women's has a hundred, men's has 92.

Okay.

Um there's also a requirement for accommodations for up to 20 guests.

This isn't referenced either.

Has that changed?

Madam President, Counselor Grout, up to 20 guests in the first responder receiving area is what I think you're addressing.

Okay, all right.

And this operations plan doesn't include a budget overview for the men's housing navigation.

Is that an oversight?

Madam President, Councilor Grout, again, we provided the operational plan that we felt fit the need of the IGA.

Okay.

All right.

And then I just want to follow up.

Um I can talk to CAO Single or to you regarding Juniper Flats.

That is a property that the city is going to be purchasing for senior housing.

Um, and it's in my district, and I uh I think the renovation is coming along nicely.

It's going to provide housing for seniors 55 plus we know our population across the country is aging, living much longer.

Um and there was a um announcement that you're gonna change the name to Gateway Seniors from Juniper Flats.

Um is that really happening?

I don't personally I kind of talked with you about it the other night, but I know that you all are very market market um market minded in what you do, but I think uh changing the name from I think Juniper Juniper Flats is a very um nice name and it's very sophisticated.

Um and it's um I think that's very welcoming and anybody can live there that's 55 or plus, but if you change the name to Gateway Senior, that sounds like a shelter, and it's not a shelter, it's a it's an affordable housing apartment complex where these um residents will be living with a lease.

And so I would um hope that um you would reconsider changing the name to Gateway Senior or any other gateway thing.

I don't think that our gateway system um is a temporary system helping people navigate getting around when they're at Juniper Flats or when they choose to live there, um that is a permanent home for those people, and I don't think it should be called gateway.

That's just my two cents.

So how what can you tell me about that?

Madam President, Councillor Grout.

Um, our intention is to send very clear communication into the community about the pathways that people can um take through our system of support.

Um I think the intentions around um preliminary conversations of gateway senior being the fact that we know many individuals are moving.

Actually, we have evidence that folks are moving already today from Gateway West to the gateway center into our navigation, our housing and treatment navigation pathways right now.

Actually, we're moving folks as we mentioned earlier, uh, with the intent, for example, of 20 men being at men's uh navigate uh housing and treatment navigation center by Monday, and we have already um more than 60 women, I believe, at the women's um and so I think our intention is really to give a clear message that there are pathways and a gateway to the next opportunity.

Um this uh housing for seniors is really uh going to be connected with our gateway system in terms of the fact that we want to ensure that uh the services and support that will be added into that at this at this facility continue to be attached to the services that we have elsewhere um uh in the system, and so that was our intentions related to um to that naming.

I will absolutely take your your thoughts um back for discussion then the thank you.

I I think um I think it's important we um again gateway to me is and I think a lot of people in our community know it's it's a temporary place um and we didn't name Los Altos Lofts Gateway something, it's Los Also Slavs, and a lot of those people were once homeless, and um they're doing quite well, but I don't think they want to be known that they I I just think it's a mistake, and I think that they deserve better.

Um, and I I would I'd also those the signs that are up, they're beautiful, they're brand new, and I think there's no need to spend money on new signs when there's a beautiful sign up there that's um welcoming to the community.

So thank you.

That's it.

Councilor Champai.

Thank you, Madam President.

Uh just a few questions, and I know I didn't submit anything on Friday.

Sure, I can yield my time.

Uh sure, Counselor Baca.

Thank you, Madam President.

Just really quick follow-up on that.

I just happened to drive by Juniper Flats today.

Um looks great.

Sign looks great, and I've been working on some signage myself uh coming up, and you know, that signage product costs like $50,000 to do.

And you know, that signage product costs like $50,000 to do.

Given how much we talk about the cost of gateway and putting that money to good use, I can't imagine something more fiscally responsible than changing a brand new sign for $50,000 for branding.

And I agree with the branding, and I like the thought process, but that just seems uh irresponsible.

So my two cents.

Thank you.

Counselor Champagne.

Thank you, Madam President.

Again, I apologize.

Um, I wasn't able to submit questions on Friday, so if you don't have the answers, that's fine.

But uh if you do, that'd be great.

Um there's a public safety campaign that was brought to my uh attention up in the Northeast Heights.

Uh signs are being put out saying to call APD if you hear gunshots and it's labeled in big words gunshots.

Do you have any details of this program?

And if it's the best practice to announce that if you hear gunshots to with these big words on billboard signs, Madam President, Councilor Champagne.

I am I'm befuddled by it to be honest with you.

I will have to look into it and to better understand exactly uh who the author is of the campaign and if it's uh what it's coming from.

Okay.

And I will follow up, obviously.

Thank you.

Uh Madam President, my uh second question is I was uh heard that there's a new growth program, and I was just and it mentioned a thousand new jobs, and I just was curious about the details of of the mayor's idea of what this growth program is and what those thousand new jobs are.

Uh Madam President, Councillor Champaign, um the the focus is uh coming from our economic development department for us to really um continue to expand and dig in with on the job training Albuquerque program, our small business um small business office, SBO, and the supports that we're providing for growing and uh supporting small businesses in Albuquerque and their ability to add workforce based upon growing the skills needed for them to grow their businesses.

Um we have strong evidence of the economic impacts of the job training Albuquerque program and the fact that uh businesses report significant uh both um revenue growth but also their ability to grow their their ability uh workforce and hire additional staff as well as wages for those individuals.

So through job training Albuquerque in partnership with um Central New Mexico Community College and CNM Ingenuity, we are have been able to, and I'm not gonna be able to get the pull the numbers off the top of my head, but we have been able to support thousands of individuals that are connected to small businesses in Albuquerque that don't qualify for um JTIP.

Uh those businesses uh often are excluded not by uh failure of design, just intended to be a different design for Albuquerque-based small businesses, and when they can identify skills that if they could upskill uh someone within their workforce to give them the ability to grow their business, the outcomes are significant.

I'm happy to um provide you all either with a presentation because it has been in our budget now.

I think we are in year three of JTA, um, and it has significantly grown over each year in terms of our ability to measure that both economic impact, business impact, and individual.

Um we are we pair this with the skills and training um workshops that we uh offer through the small business um development uh uh office that allows us the opportunity to identify needs within small businesses, including nonprofits to provide workshops uh for expanding their capabilities.

We do that also all of this in partnership with multiple um both education and small business and uh um other agencies that support small businesses to ensure that we're maximizing that benefit for Albuquerque-based businesses.

Okay, uh Madam President and CAO, I would I would love a perspective on it.

I'm that can't speak for the other counselors, but something would be awesome about the literature on it.

Uh my next question.

It was in a I've asked this in the past about talking about the movement of parking enforcement from the basement here, um, and it says that it's in an enterprise fund uh and it's going to general services.

Uh what other what other act uh departments fall under general services?

Um Madam President, Counselor Champagne.

I'm I'm afraid I'm gonna miss something, so but I will do my best.

Uh we have um so general services is uh our facility maintenance across the portfolio of city buildings that are not uh designated to uh specific departments.

We have metro security um uh falls within uh uh GSD, and then we also and um and we have fleet um as well, and then now we will have parking.

Um those last three are all under deputy director Will Duran, which is where you see the alignment between thinking about maintenance of facilities, which is you know parking structures in in that space, but also then when you talk about parking, uh metro security and uh fleet, there's some clear alignment in terms of the skills and experiences for that leadership.

Perfect, thank you.

Um and Madam President, one last question are we still doing encampment sweeps?

Um, Madam President, Counselor Champagne.

Um we have a what we call an encampment team that with interaction team.

We have a coordinated focus on ensuring that across the city when we uh receive um both through our complaints that come through 311 with our 311 tickets as well as uh other means of understanding when we have encampments, we do have a uh very coordinated focus of cleaning up our streets and ensuring that we're removing what I mean is uh you know trash that is in the street, cleaning the streets using clean street uh sweepers.

We also uh provide notice to individuals with if they are violating our city ordinances or laws about the fact that they are required to uh either move, you know, pack up and move their what that uh their items that uh do that have those violations, um, and then we have our interaction team then comes back and remind you know will cite people if they remove uh they refuse to remove from areas that uh are violating our city ordinances and policies.

Okay, yeah.

I'm sorry, city ordinances and laws.

One follow-up, I apologize.

This is a standard practice that's been going on for several for a while now, nothing's changed within this program of this team and the in the operations of it.

Uh Madam President, Councillor Champagne, this is a um has been an ongoing operate uh practice across the city.

We you uh we have both policy and city ordinance and laws, um, but it is a coordinated focus in terms of making sure that we're improving our communications.

Um I should mention in every circumstance we are offering support and services and the offer for ACS to come out and connect individuals as well as transportation to a shelter bed.

So in every interaction we we make that offer, and uh that is core to this work that we do we do make those offers.

Um the coordination of our efforts also include of course enforcement um which uh has we have been again working to improve those communications and improve how we give notice and give people as much communication as possible.

But the overall fundamental process has not changed.

Um still going through and cleaning up, you're still offering services, you're still that whole Madam President, Councilor Champagne.

The fundamental um uh methods are still there, starting with offering services, giving notice, um, and then coming back to uh uh work on clean cleaning our streets.

Perfect.

Thank you, Madam President.

Thank you, CEO.

Counselor Rogers.

Thank you, Madam President.

I just wanted to make just a couple of comments on Counselor Grout's questions that she asked about the could we also include in that presentation?

Because I've been asking the same questions about how do we ascertain the financial stability of the city.

So can we include those as well in that presentation so that we we get a good picture of what we should look at as a whole?

Um that would really help.

Um the other thing is we had requested several times the operational budgets and program budgets and revenues of the whole gateway system, um, and so we still have not received that.

So I just wanted to ask when can we expect to have that?

Um Madam President, Counselor Grout, um, we have been working on scheduling uh work study to go through our planning related to the the gateway um network and our sustainability plan.

Um we're pulling together uh ways for us to provide that documentation to you all in a in a uh manage with all inclusive and um we're working towards both scheduling and we can share that information.

We will have a report um from our um state requirements in terms of reporting uh coming at soon, and so my goal is to be able to provide you kind of that whole package at the same time.

Thank you, Madam President.

Thank you.

I appreciate that, but that's not what I asked for sustainability plan.

I think part of our job also in the budget is to make sure it's included in our budget, but I I think for us to wrap around even the sustainability plan.

It we we need the operation, but just a bucket for what does the operations cost, what is the programmatic budget call, like what's the cost, and then our revenues for each of the gateways.

So I don't want to wait until we have a sustainability plan because we've already been waiting since budget season in April to get this information, and I just I am increasingly worried that we can't produce this.

Um, and that scares me.

So um just my my little bit of experience at UNM hospital when we were looking at building the tower.

We could tell people to a T what we needed as far as funding and what we needed to work towards before we even broke ground, and so I'm getting increasingly worried that we can't produce this very you know information we should have at our fingertips, really, if we're running big operations like this.

So I would appreciate if we could get that before your sustainability plan.

Madam President, Counselor Rogers, that's what I meant.

Was with our next re with our report on that what we have in terms of data, my intention is to provide that as well with included with that.

Thank you, Madam President, and then also the um documents that we that Councilor Grout referred to that were sent to the state.

Did was that sent to all counselors or just counselor grout?

Uh Madam President, Counselor Rogers, I believe it was in response to a question on Friday.

The documents that they are referencing.

Um thank you.

I asked that because I know I specifically asked if I could receive all of the documents that we're sending to the state, and I think all the counselors would like to get whatever you're sending to the state on a regular basis, we would like to see as well.

I don't want to speak for everybody, but I think it um a lot of us would like to know what what we're accountable for.

Yeah, Madam President, Councilor Rogers, that was what I was referencing is with our packet, we will send all both these financial questions you have with the packet of information that we're sending to you all related to state reporting.

Thank you, thank you for that.

Last question I just wanted to, and this isn't a really a question, just a statement in regards to the Jayvon Givens case.

I still have not heard back from APD about the last little bit of um information that I requested because there's a call for community members to kind of convene and discuss this case for um leaders in the black community, and I would like to be able to have all the information before we do that, and then also just want to say thank you to Councillor Bacca, who um even though I asked APD several times to help me locate his remains, counselor Bacca did it in five minutes, helped me find where his remains are.

Um, literally five minutes.

Um so I just want to say thank you because that was a huge thing from his family is where his remains, how do we get him home to Kansas City?

And I would really think APD should help us cover that cost to get him home.

Um so that's another follow-up item from APD that I would like help with.

Um, so the family doesn't have to trek all the way down from Kansas City to figure this out.

If we I've talked spoken with the family, they're extremely overwhelmed.

Um, and I think this is something that we could help them with in lieu of um the tragedy that they are dealing with.

Thank you.

Counselors, any other questions?

I um remiss for saying that Miss Keefe wasn't here tonight, so Miss Devin King is sitting in.

Do you have any hard questions for Miss King?

anybody good job.

There being no further business, this meeting's adjourned.