Albuquerque residents publicly testified in front of the City Council on June 6th in opposition to several proposed Integrated Development Ordinance Amendments.

 All of these amendments centered around the issue of the rising homeless population in the city and where the homeless are allowed to stay. 

One resident, Peggy Neff, highlighted the issues of the amendment process within the city and called for action to be taken to streamline the amendment process.

Albuquerque, New Mexico | Adobe Stock

“The process is broken," Neff said. "The annual update amendment process does not work as a collaborative public informative process for changing zone codes."

 Neff has been crusading against the city's IDO amendment process for more than three and a half years. In December 2018, she published an op-ed in the Albuquerque Journal titled: "City’s development ordinance is a losing deal for our neighborhoods."                  

 In her op-ed, Neff expressed the same discontent with the city council and the development ordinance that she did during her June 6 testimony.

"Three issues are worthy of note: stifling community voice, losing neighborhood commercial zoning and legalizing carpetbaggers under Planned Development zones," she wrote. "Community voice is now  basically limited to a presentation at the Development Review Board."

During the city council meeting, those who testified were limited to a minute and a half to present their issues. Some pieces of evidence used during testimonies were not considered due to not being submitted earlier.