A group of downtown Albuquerque residents is pressing city officials for help after homeless people set up an encampment next to their homes.

The neighborhood is located off 7th Street near Lomas Boulevard, according to KRQE.

The residents said the problem became an issue over the last few weeks when one person set up camp in an alleyway between Marble Avenue and Granite Avenue. He was joined by others soon after.

“I honestly didn’t know this alley existed until I started seeing them wandering in and out,” resident Damian Montoya told KRQE. “There was one and then there were three, and the last time I counted I think it’s up to nine people that are living back there.”

Montoya said residents were told that they are responsible for keeping the alleyway clear. Many of their calls for help from city officials have not been answered.

“I called 911 and everybody else has been calling 311, 242-COPS, and nothing has happened,” Montoya said. “When any neighbor confronts them about getting out of the alley, they threaten you. A guy brandished a knife when I asked him to leave the premises.”

Montoya said he called the Albuquerque Police Department (APD) about the incident. He was told that they would not send an officer unless it was a life-or-death situation.

“It just seems like the homeless problem gets worse and worse every year,” he said. “It’s a mental health issue, but they need to provide these people with some sort of service to get them out of whatever situation they’re in. But, being in a residential street is not cool.”

New Mexico attorney Pete Dinelli is among those leading the charge for change. There are alternatives to the current government-sanctioned encampments, he said in an opinion piece published by New Mexico Sun.

These alternatives include remodeling the Gateway Center homeless shelter. Dinelli said the facility can house the homeless population by converting offices, operating rooms, and treatment rooms into temporary housing accommodations. He said in his opinion piece that the building’s auditorium and cafeteria could be “utilized for counseling and feeding programs from service providers.”

Dinelli is an Albuquerque native. He is a licensed New Mexico attorney with nearly three decades of municipal and state government service, according to New Mexico Sun. He prosecuted violent crimes as an assistant district attorney. He also worked as assistant attorney general, city of Albuquerque deputy city attorney and chief public safety officer, and Albuquerque city councilor.

“This news story is so very wrong on so many levels,” Dinelli posted as commentary on his website. “It reveals just how feckless the Keller administration has become when dealing with the city’s homeless crisis. It is also a disturbing element that APD’s unwillingness to protect the public. When APD says in situations as described in the news story, ‘Unless the people are trespassing, all they can do is ask them to leave’ is false, and it reveals APD’s unwillingness to do its part in enforcing the existing laws. When a person brandishes a knife as was described, that constitutes a fourth-degree felony. When people living in the encampment are seen dealing drugs in the encampments, it becomes a law enforcement issue. 

“Being homeless is not a crime, but that does not mean they should be allowed to violate the law. APD must not ignore enforcing the city’s anti-camping ordinances, vagrancy laws, civil nuisance abatement laws, and criminal laws, nor pretend they do not exist to accommodate the homeless.”

This discussion occurred after the City Council passed two proposals in May that would change zoning codes to allow government-sanctioned homeless tent encampments throughout the city of Albuquerque, similar to those in Coronado Park. Mayor Tim Keller supported the proposals. 

A measure sponsored by Councilor Brook Bassan proposed what critics call the most radical version of tent encampments – a so-called living lot. In this case, people living in light vehicles, recreational vehicles, or tents would be given a piece of property — mixed-use zones and non-residential zones — to live on, with few regulations.

Another proposal paves the way for up to 45 so-called safe outdoor spaces throughout the city, with at least five tent encampments in every council district.

Dan Lewis, an Albuquerque city councilor, said in a newsletter that he opposed “these unsafe and inhumane encampments.”