Following is a guest opinion column written by Jaemes Shanley. Mr. Shanley is the President of the Mark Twain Neighborhood Association located in the mid heights and is the Vice President of the District 7 Coalition of Neighborhoods which boasts membership of 14 neighborhood associations. You can read his full bio in the postscript below. Mr. Shanley gave consent to publish his guest column on www.PeteDinelli.com and he was not compensated for it.

COUNCILOR FIEBELKORN’S “OPT IN” ZONING PROPOSAL REFLECTED WILLFUL IGNORANCE OF OUR CITY’S OBVIOUS NEEDS

Sometimes you get to the point where you “just can’t take it anymore”.

I reached my breaking point in June when I read City Council Resolution R-25-167, sponsored by my City Councilor Tammy Fiebelkorn, concluding she was not acting in the best interests of my District 7 nor of the city.  She was using her perceptions of Albuquerque’s housing needs to promote an agenda that would destroy established neighborhoods in the interest of randomly increasing density to benefit developers at the expense of homeowners.

FIEBELKORN’S OPT IN ZONING

The Councilor’s Resolution 25-167 proposed “Opt-in Zoning” whereby anyone owning a single-family home could apply to “upzone” their R-1 zoned home and redevelop to increase density by converting the home to a duplex or townhouse. If you owned a  corner lot on any block of any neighborhood, you could “upzone” and build 3 story multi-family apartments next to single family homes. The most offensive provision of the “Opt-In” zoning is that adjacent homeowners or neighborhood associations would not be given any notice of the opt-in to increase density and essentially not be able to oppose or appeal the resulting development which would then be “permissive use”.  If they did find an avenue for appeal, adjoining property owners or Neighborhood Associations would risk being penalized $1,000 if they lost, thanks to Ordinance O-24-69 for which Councilor Fiebelkorn voted “yes” in January.

Developers or investors, when judgements go against them, face no corresponding risk or penalty.

The ultimate goal of the Opt-in zoning ordinance was to increase “affordable housing”, however, there is no data to support the theory that upzoning properties creates affordable housing.  The Ordinance was based on out-of-date 2022 population and housing data.  It predicated housing needs on reality-defying projections of 2% annual population growth over the next 20 years. This is a city which has lost 4,500 residents since 2020.  It excluded mention of current vacancy rates over 6% in Albuquerque’s multi-family dwellings and the fact there are presently 3,137 apartments or townhouses now under construction and another 9,593 at various stages of proposal.

Simply put, Opt-in zoning would destroy the character of existing neighborhoods and would have favored developers and investors who could care less about the character of existing neighborhoods.  It was far more likely to lead to gentrification and destabilization of property values as lenders were challenged to determine lending limits on properties no longer located in contiguous context.

Fortunately, this measure was voted down by the Land Use Planning and Zoning Committee on August 13^th, with only Councilor Fiebelkorn voting in favor.

BUS ROUTE TO NOWHERE

Undeterred by the failure of R-25-167, Councilor Fiebelkorn pressed forward with another Resolution that was also ultimately about up zoning. This Resolution proposed amending the Comprehensive Plan to change Menaul from Louisiana west to Rio Grande from a Multi-modal to a Major Transit (MT) corridor. At a meeting this summer organized by the Near North Valley NA, the City Transportation Department clearly stated that this shift is unnecessary for increasing bus frequency. Bus service will increase when the driver shortage is solved. Claims about the need to fix a ‘broken corridor’ also rang hollow.

This proposed change is not about transit, it is about increasing density along the corridor without adequate public notification or input from residents. There are several changes to MT corridors proposed in the 2025 IDO Biennial Update, soon to be submitted to the Environmental Planning Commission (EPC). If this package of amendments passes as currently written, MT corridors will have—permissively—higher allowable building heights and shorter distances for height limits protecting Neighborhood Edges.

A request at Council to defer R-25-175 failed after Councilor Fiebelkorn grilled the Staff Planner about the design standard differences between Multi-Modal and Major Transit, pedantically repeating “so, no change?” after each item noted.

She thus very skillfully, and to my mind duplicitously, managed to avert any airing or discussion of the “hidden agenda” of this legislation.  That hidden agenda being Items 32, 33 and 44 on the Pre-EPC Submittal Spreadsheet for the 2025 IDO Biennial Update (available to view here: https://abq-zone.com/ido-update-2025-citywide-ammendments-pre-epc-submittal ) These amendments, when adopted, will make these changes to MT corridors permissive, thus removing public notification. The network of MT corridors thru-out the city, now including Menaul from Louisiana west, creates wide swaths available for increased density. Where this is in keeping with the long-accepted Comprehensive Plan vision of Centers and Corridors; great! Where it runs across historic areas of established R-1 neighborhoods; not so great!

While Councilor Fiebelkorn will point to the Menaul MRA and other de-invested sections of Menaul as the target zone for higher density development, market reality will drive developer interest to locations in closest proximity to established residential neighborhoods able to contribute to the economic potential of the commercial components of mixed-use development.  Residents of Quigley Park, Bel-Air, Santa Barbara-Martineztown, Wells Park, Near North Valley, and even Los Duranes neighborhoods all face the prospect of living, quite literally, in the shadow Resolution 25-175 will be permitted to cast over our community in the name of an ephemeral bus service that cannot be presently delivered.

DEEP DIVE TAKEN TO UNDERSTAND OUR CITY’S PROBLEMS

What makes Councilor Fiebelkorn’s attempted “Opt-in Zoning” and forcefully promoted “Bus Route to Nowhere” resolutions and actions most offensive are their willful ignorance of the very real problems that afflict our city. We can and must do better.

During the past 10 months, I have engaged in a “deep dive” to seek and to understand our city’s problems, which were not here 40 years ago. My efforts have included the following:

• Riding the entire bus route of the Albuquerque Rapid Transit (ART), to experience the nature of the service and the people who use it, and to observe the reality of its Central corridor, compared to the extravagant projections offered by Mayor Berry when he first proposed it 2014. The salient contribution of the ART Bus project was to degrade Central as business after business shut down never to return.
• Participating in 3 survey teams on the annual Point-In-Time count of homeless people living on the street one night in January.
• Attending since December last year, all the monthly Transformative Neighborhood Planning meetings held at the Gateway Center Homeless facility on Gibson.
• Attending every public meeting regarding the proposed redevelopment of the State Fair Grounds and connecting with the appointed consultant Stantec to ensure their community outreach includes the District 7 neighborhoods, like mine, on or adjacent to the Fairground’s northern border.
• Listening to and learning from numerous organizations, coalitions, non-profits, and committed individuals who work tirelessly to make our city a better and safer place to live.

One of the most informative things I did was a property-by-property survey of five of our major commercial corridors from end to end: Central, San Pedro, Menaul, 4^th Street, and San Mateo.  This project involved confirming by visual inspection the nature and status of 3,816 properties of which 2,223 were commercial premises.  21%, or 626 of those premises were closed, for lease, vacant, or abandoned.

Central, San Pedro, Menaul, 4^th, San Mateo Corridors  

Properties                               Count

• Apartment Complex                        69               1.8%
• Town Houses                                 262               6.9%
• Mobile Home Park                             9               0.2%
• Single Home Lot                             295              7.7%
• Motel / Hotel                                     38              1.0%
• Vacant Lot                                       118              3.1%
• Parking Lot                                       39              1.0%
• Construction Site                              13              0.3%
• Self-Storage                                     24              0.6%
• Total Operating Businesses          2,323            60.9%
• Closed Businesses                          626            16.4%

Total Properties                                    3,816           

% businesses closed                             21%

Access to and download of the full surveys and summaries is available to anyone with a Google enabled email address

ADDRESSING THE CITY’S HOUSING NEEDS

When driving the streets of our city with eyes open, it becomes very obvious where remedy is required.  It is NOT the re-zoning of our neighborhoods to increase development and population density as Councilor Fiebelkorn advocates.

To paraphrase James Carville, “It’s the Corridors, Stupid!”. 

We do have housing needs. To address those housing needs, we need to do the following:

First, we need Transitional Housing/Shelter into which the people residing on our streets and sidewalks can be located, with supportive services and case management, as the first essential step to recovery from the horrific conditions in which they are living. There are people in Albuquerque who know how to “curate” communities of these folks. Stability, security, basic utilities and sanitation should be accessible to anyone living in the state with the 38^th largest total GDP in the richest country on earth.

Second, we need more affordable housing, especially for those earning 60% or less of the Area Median Income. Unfortunately, that cannot be “built” given the cost of building housing today.  It can only be subsidized into existence.  Required financial resources are finite and the federal component is less secure today than ever.  That requires surgical precision in the application of the funds available.

Third, we need housing that can be priced to permit people to get a foot on the ladder of home ownership and equity accumulation as early as possible.  That is crucial to resuscitation of the American middle class dream of upward mobility and it requires higher density residential development, which has been going on all over Albuquerque, and needs to continue.  There are 12,730 units in apartment or townhouse developments at various stages of construction or proposal in Albuquerque right now.  The City is spacious enough to realize them without “blotting out” views of the Sandias or horizons which are such a signature feature and pleasure of living in our Albuquerque.

Fourth, we need to acknowledge that there is an overflowing abundance of available unused property and vacant lots on our major corridors dying for transition from an increasingly obsolete commercial/strip mall model to the kind of mixed-use higher density walkable communities with proximity to bus services and bike lanes for which organizations like StrongTownsABQ and BikeABQ are advocating.  Our neighborhoods also desperately need this, to restore the perimeter corridor connectivity and vitality that was once an integral part of neighborhood character.

Fifth, we need to do whatever we can to promote, support and nurture small locally owned business formation and growth.  We cannot reverse the trends of online shopping and the lower prices allure of national big box retail chain stores, but we can put more priority on and be more engaged in making heroes of locally owned business operations that create jobs at all levels of their organizations including mid-level and executive and, unlike their big national competitors, do not export out of New Mexico’s economy all of their profits, executive salaries, and headquarters investments.

WHAT THE CITY DOES NOT NEED AND NEEDS

In the corporate world where I lived my professional career, the lifespan of failed strategies is measured in quarters, not in years.

Albuquerque does not need an “unhoused industrial/building complex” with a price tag to date of over $300 million and no visible impact observable on the street.

The city does not need a “prison industrial/building complex” that can only result in trauma and distrust that impedes people, brutalized by a lifestyle unimaginable to most of us, from taking an offered hand to assist that first step toward a better life.

Albuquerque does not need to assign the Albuquerque Police Department (APD) the mission impossible task of responding to a criminal element that is able to embed and hide among its victims in a nomadic population numbering in the thousands.  Nor does it need to be perpetually diverted from its core mission by petty criminality, trespass, theft and vandalism that is driven fundamentally by the desperation and behavioral maladies induced by intolerable unsheltered living conditions.

What the city does need is a practical, high priority program, fully measured and accountable, to transition people from the streets into shelter as  quickly as it can be done. That program must be informed, advised, and assisted by the people in Albuquerque who have the experience and insights gained by having done it.

I believe Albuquerque can succeed in ending the crisis of street homelessness. The city can do so by taking a disadvantage and turning into an advantage. Albuquerque has more empty standalone buildings than there are people living on our streets.  That can be the seed for a real solution.  Our City, County, and State Government have the resources and tools to enable faster and more effective action to convert unused commercial properties into functional and transitional housing.

WHAT THE CITY COUNCIL CAN DO

City Council is a representative body.  From my perspective that should also make it a body that is consultative with its constituents. District 7 residents deserve a City Councilor that:

• Prioritizes issues by the scale of their impact on D7 and the City,
• Bases their actions on facts rather than generalities or wishful thinking,
• Proactively communicates with constituents about measures of impact BEFORE voting,
• Commits to Ordinances & Resolutions that clearly and understandably reveal all their provisions and their direct implications for the community,
• Solves or measurably improves real problems,
• Performs rigorous due diligence in advance of voting on measures,
• Demands factual accountability for major expenditures,
• Has an unwavering commitment to a vision of Albuquerque that is economically thriving, socially cohesive, sensibly sustainable, and in visual harmony with its unique heritage.

I have the best motivation to be a more proactively engaged citizen: the inspiration gained in observing, listening to, and learning from the people, remarkable in thought and deed, I have been privileged to meet and observe in my “deep dive” into the reality of Albuquerque.

In doing so, I have also come to understand profoundly why my parents, who moved and retired here in 1970, after living all over the world, believed to the end of their lives they had parachuted into paradise.

Albuquerque does not need to fix what is not broken.

It does need to engage the entire community to fix what is broken.

We can restore Albuquerque’s integrity and vitality with the right vision, strategy, and fully accountable tactical plan of action.

Respectfully for your consideration,

Jaemes Shanley

President Mark Twain Neighborhood Association

Vice-president – District 7 Coalition of N.A.’s

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POSTSCRIPT

Jaemes Shanley first arrived in Albuquerque in August 1969, after graduating High School in England, to attend UNM from which he graduated in 1973.  His parents followed a year later, and his father retired in Albuquerque after a 30-year career as a US Naval aviator.  In 1971 they purchased a home in the Mark Twain neighborhood where they resided for the remainder of their lives.  Jaemes worked in the private sector in sales, marketing, and business strategy for U.S. corporations in Australia, Japan, and the United States.  His work required extensive travel throughout Asia Pacific and Latin America, routinely on the ground in more than 30 countries.  Jaemes and his wife returned to Albuquerque in September 2006 to renovate and take up residence in his parent’s Mark Twain neighborhood home where they reside today on their family “compound” along with 5 rescued cats.  Jaemes drives the corridors of Albuquerque on an almost daily basis to deliver carrots to his horse, Rembrandt, who resides in Corrales.