Governing Body Meeting
Wed, Jul 10, 2024 · Governing Body
https://santafeminutes.space/meeting/3

== Executive Summary ==
The City Council meeting covered several significant topics, with a primary focus on a proposed ordinance (Bill 2024-7) regulating standing on medians, particularly those less than 36 inches wide. This bill generated extensive debate, with proponents emphasizing public safety and the need to prevent accidents, while opponents raised concerns about criminalizing homelessness and poverty, potential constitutional violations, and a lack of supporting data. After a lengthy discussion, the Council ultimately passed the ordinance with an amendment to delay its effective date until February 1, 2025, allowing for a six-month period of public education and outreach.

Other key discussions included the postponement of a public hearing for an appeal case due to a witness's unavailability, and the approval of several appointments and reappointments to various city boards and commissions. The Council also took time to remember a constituent and a friend, and the Mayor extended thoughts and prayers to those in need.

== Key Decisions ==
- Approved the agenda by roll call vote (all present councilors voted "Yes").
- Postponed the public hearing for Item 8A (appeal case for 30 and a half West Houghton Street) to August 14th.
- Approved a motion to take up a land use case at a specified date (without a time certain) unanimously (9-0).
- Adopted Amendment C to Bill 2024-7 (Median Safety Ordinance) to clarify disability protections (9-0).
- Adopted Amendment D to Bill 2024-7 to set the effective date as February 1, 2025 (9-0).
- Approved Bill 2024-7 (Median Safety Ordinance) as amended (8-1, Councilor Castro voted No).
- Approved the reappointment of Randall Limacher and the appointment of John Flores to the Airport Advisory Board (9-0).
- Approved the reappointments of Alyssa Kenny Guyer, Anne Watkins, and Ken Hughes to the Community Development Commission (8-0, Councilor Romero Worth excused).
- Approved the reappointment of Thess Hunter Chanel to the Human Services Committee (8-0, Councilor Castro joined late).
- Approved the appointment of William Carnoso to the Santa Fe Public Library Board (8-0).

== Motions & Votes ==
- Motion to approve the agenda — Passed by roll call vote (all present councilors voted "Yes").
- Motion to postpone Item 8A to August 14th — Passed.
- Motion to take up the land use case at a specified date (without a time certain) — Passed unanimously (9-0).
- Motion to call the question on Bill 2024-7 — Passed (9-0).
- Motion to deny Bill 2024-7 — Failed (2-7).
- Motion to approve Bill 2024-7 — Made and seconded.
- Motion to adopt Amendment C (Mayor Weber's amendment regarding disability protections) to Bill 2024-7 — Passed (9-0).
- Motion to adopt Amendment D (Councilor Faulkner's amendment for a six-month delayed implementation) to Bill 2024-7 — Passed (9-0).
- Motion to approve Bill 2024-7 as amended — Passed (8-1, Councilor Castro voted No).
- Motion to approve Airport Advisory Board appointments — Passed (9-0).
- Motion to approve Community Development Commission appointments — Passed (8-0, Councilor Romero Worth excused).
- Motion to approve Human Services Committee appointment — Passed (8-0, Councilor Castro joined late).
- Motion to approve Santa Fe Public Library Board appointment — Passed (8-0).

== Public Comment ==
The public comment period was dominated by extensive discussion on Bill 2024-7, the Median Safety Ordinance. Many speakers, including Gail Austin, Stephanie Beninato, and representatives from the ACLU of New Mexico, expressed strong opposition, arguing that the bill violates First Amendment rights, criminalizes homelessness and poverty, and would lead to costly litigation. They highlighted concerns about the disproportionate impact on unhoused individuals, the lack of affordable housing, and the need for compassionate solutions over punitive measures. Speakers also questioned the effectiveness of the ordinance in addressing actual safety issues, suggesting that driver behavior is a greater concern. Some, like Katherine Rivera, supported the ordinance, believing it could help address potential human trafficking. Councilors also referenced public comments regarding the availability of community service as a penalty and the need for education and outreach.

== Topics ==
- Public Hearing Postponement
- Agenda Approval
- Median Safety Ordinance
- Community Health Services
- Airport Advisory Board Appointments
- Community Development Commission Appointments
- Human Services Committee Appointment
- Santa Fe Public Library Board Appointment
- Invocation
- Remembrances
- Procedural Items

== Full Transcript ==
Madame Clerk, Mayor Weber, you are live. Thank you. Let me call to order this continuation of our previous meeting. We are now back in session. It's about 5:06 p.m. on July 17th. Madame City Attorney, Madame Clerk, I think we have a change in our agenda that you might want to advise us about and how to proceed.

Mayor, Counselors, I think we have a requested change. I don't know what the specific request ended up being, but we do need, I think we need to actually call that, have that matter in front of you, make the motion on it, and have the request in front of you by the parties.

Okay, so the motion we're looking for is to take off the table or no?

Mayor, I think we should go to the matter. We postponed it until this meeting. We're now live and we're here. So the matter in front of us, Madam Clerk, why don't you read the item that we... I think we need a roll call still. We've got to start with roll call.

Yeah, point of order. Yeah, we need to get the meeting underway and approve the agenda, correct? And then there'll be a request on one of the items. So let's call the roll and let's get the meeting going.

Councilor Cassett: Here.
Councilor Castro: Present.
Councilor Chavez: Here.
Councilor Faulkner: Here.
Councilor Lee Garcia: Here.
Councilor Michael Garcia: Present.
Councilor Lindell:
Councilor Rallworth: Here.
Mayor Weber: President.

Mayor, you have a quorum.

Terrific. We're going to do the whole thing. Okay. I have no idea who's on, who's... I don't have it in front of me. There we go. Thank you. Perfect for the invocation. I'm just going to recite the Prayer of St. Francis. "Lord, make me an instrument of your peace. Where there is hatred, let me sow love. Where there is injury, pardon. Where there is doubt, faith. Where there is despair, hope. Where there is darkness, light. And where there is sadness, joy. Oh, Divine Master, grant that I may not so much seek to be consoled as to console, to be understood as to understand, to be loved as to love. For it is in giving that we receive. It is in pardoning that we are pardoned. And it is in dying that we are born to eternal life. Amen."

Thank you. Are there remembrances tonight? Go ahead, Counselor.

Councilor Garcia: I lost a constituent over the weekend to a house fire. And so I'd just like to offer a prayer to her, for her family, and for those who loved her. And know that we're thinking about them and if they need anything, we're here for them. Thank you.

Any others? Yeah, go ahead, Counselor.

Councilor: I just wanted to remember a dear friend of mine, Nan Balain, had a birthday on the 14th, and we lost her about a year ago. So I just wanted to remember her. Thank you.

Let's also call to mind those in our community who are struggling with problems of health, problems of well-being, community problems. Let's extend our thoughts and prayers to everyone in Santa Fe, Mexico, around the world, who's dealing with hard times. They're in our thoughts and prayers. Thank you, everybody. We got a little ahead of the roll call too soon. Can we, can we, can we escalate by the fact that I was out of order with the roll call and instead go to the approval of the agenda?

Mayor, I do recommend you go ahead and approve the agenda and then go to the item because we need to postpone it as part of the case itself.

Is there a motion to approve the agenda?

Motion to approve.

Second.

There's a motion, there's a second. Madam Clerk, can you call a roll on that?

Certainly, Mr. Mayor.
Councilor Cassett: Yes.
Councilor Castro:
Councilor Chavez: Yes.
Councilor Faulkner: Yes.
Councilor Lee Garcia: Yes.
Councilor Michael Garcia: Yes.
Councilor Lindell:
Councilor Rallworth: Yes.
Mayor Weber: Yes.

Motion passed. Thank you. So take us to the item that is in front of us then, please.

Madam Clerk: This is item 8. It's a public hearing. It's 8A, appeal number 2024-877 of case number 2023-2024, 30 and a half West Houghton Street. And we have Assistant City Attorney Rebecca Manik Herman here to present.

Good evening, Mayor Weber, members of the governing body. I am here tonight to suggest that the hearing be moved to a different date. That could be done on motion if the governing body chooses to do so. The reason for the proposed change is that a witness in this case is not available tonight. He is the architect for the property, and I think that he has, I think that he's an important witness that would have information that would probably be useful to all parties in the governing body as well. And so because he's unavailable, I think that that would impact the governing body's ability to have a complete hearing tonight. And so for that reason, if the governing body were to choose to, if a member of the governing body were to choose to move to have the hearing on a different date, I would respectfully suggest either August 14th or August 28th. I think that the appellant had a slight preference, or I'm sorry, the appellant had a slight preference for the 28th due to that being a fairly light agenda on that day. And I think the applicant, the appellee, had a slight preference for the 14th. It's also a fairly light agenda on that day as of right now. But I think that they just wanted a slightly earlier hearing date. So that would be my suggestion at this time if the body is willing to entertain that.

I would entertain a motion. Councilor, Councilor Lindell, then Councilor Garcia.

Thank you. I move that we postpone to a date certain. Did you say August 14th?

Yes, August 14th or the 28th. I'm recommending August 14th.

Second.

Is there discussion? Michael for Garcia.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor. I do see we have the appellant in the audience. I appreciate Ms. Manik Herman sharing this information, but I think the request should have come from the applicant and the appellant. So if the appellant could come before the governing body and one, make sure that that's okay with you. I mean, that postponing this is okay with your schedule. I don't know if any of the governing body members had any questions for the architect. My questions had no relevance to the architect right now. So I'm just wondering if this is okay with you.

Stephanie Benan, I'm the appellant. I would have preferred an earlier special meeting like tonight so that we could get this done. But apparently that was not well received informally by City Council. So I actually suggested next, the 24th or the 7th. My concern is trying to get a meeting that's light where you're not going to have an item on consent that may take hours to discuss and therefore the start time being very unpredictable. We're having a heavy agenda where there are public hearings and this kind of taking up space or starting very late. I do have questions of the architect that I think are important in pointing out certain significant issues. And again, this was a request. I can let the lawyer for the owner speak, but it's their inability to be here that drives this change. Thank you.

Thank you. And I guess my next question is for the City Clerk or acting City Clerk. Is there a reason why we couldn't have it on next week's meeting agenda?

Sorry, Mayor, Councilor Garcia, do you mean the July 31st?

I apologize, yes.

I think we have, let me check the schedule, but I think that agenda might be full. And Mayor, Counselors, to clarify, I believe the appellant is asking for a special meeting on a day you don't have Council, which is either next week or the week after your next Council meeting.

Understandable. I understood that request. My request was, I think if we could accommodate this to be heard during a regular governing body meeting, just given that this is business that we had hoped to accomplish last week, and essentially we're pushing it out by a month if we go to the 14th, over a month if we go to the end of August. And I would think that this takes precedence over any of the upcoming business unless it's time sensitive. And we can move any of the potential items that were scheduled to be heard during the July 31st meeting to the August 14th meeting and arrange it that way. I'm just wondering, why are we, why is the applicant's architect going to be in town on the 31st?

Thank you. Thank you, Mayor Weber. Councilor Garcia, I have not spoken with the applicant about the availability of their architect on the 31st. I think it, I think it was just a concern about the busyness of that schedule, the agenda on the July 31st. I don't think there's, but it might be better to direct that question to the architect or to the applicant. I'd be happy to step aside, let them speak if you'd like to hear from them.

I mean, just because I, we, we don't, sure, sure, happy. The dates, I just want to ask a clarifying question here. As we're looking to be as sensitive to both the case and the other business, the two dates, or the dates you brought to us tonight, those were proposed individually by the two sides. They offered those two dates.

The, the, the appellant had proposed a couple of special meeting dates, so the two Wednesdays coming up that were not governing body dates. And then the applicant, appellee, had proposed, I believe the 14th. I believe that was what was in the filing that they submitted. Is that correct? August 14th, right?

Okay. Yes. Okay, just checking. I'm back to you, Council.

Okay, that the dates, right? No, thank you for clarifying that, Mr. Mayor. I know that there are some items. I mean, and this is where I don't really understand what items are going to be held on the 14th, the 28th. I know on the 31st, we've got the voucher, which is going to be lengthy. It's my understanding that there is potential for the bars for the one-time funding that is coming before us could be lengthy. Do we know when that is going to be heard before the governing body?

I have not received those, the bars yet, but we do have the voucher and there are no public hearings for land use cases on the 31st of July.

I believe from what I was told, the bar requests are supposed to go to finance the end of this month. I don't know if they were going from finance to governing body, which I hope is not the case. But I, I, I think no matter what, our governing body agendas are usually pretty packed. And using the justification, well, it's going to be light right now. It's light right now because it's a month out. We're looking at a month and a half. It's going to be lighter because we don't know what's there. And I, and I think, if we could accommodate it on the 31st, if we can confirm that the architect is, let's get this issue addressed and move forward because, yes, yes, absolutely. Why don't you get to the podium first before you start speaking so people who are watching or listening can hear you.

Yes, Steven Domas, attorney for the applicant. I'm not the architect's brother. He is apparently deathly ill, which is why he's there, why he's out of town today. Whether or not he's going to be available on the 31st, as of right now, I do not know. I do know, however, that I will be out of town on the 31st. I chose the 14th because the City Attorney informed me that y'all had a very busy agenda on the 31st and that the 14th would be preferable. And it's the next time that the entire governing body would be meeting. So I thought it would be accommodating as well as I could, both sides of this case. Or an agreement that it can be moved to either the 14th or the 28th. So there's no controversy there. Got it. But I will be gone on the 31st.

Okay, so I guess is there anything that prevents us from making a motion at the beginning of the 14th meeting to have this item be heard as the first item of that meeting's agenda? That way we can address this matter, move on to consent calendar, and get business conducted as normal because these land use cases, who knows what's going to be on consent or discussion or anything before that. And it could be, we can hear this at 9, 10 o'clock. And I would rather get this completed as soon as possible.

I would too. So, Mayor, Counselors, what you could do is identify a time certain as well as to...

the date certain, and I recommend you do that now rather than later, and particularly if you're going to move it up compared to where it's scheduled, such that the schedule is reflecting when the public can come to make comment. Our procedural rules do say to have public hearings after 7:00. You could waive those rules, but for a public hearing on a land use case, it's less recommended, I would say. So if you can set a time certain with your date certain in the motion tonight, that would be great.

Oh, I would recommend that we move it to a time certain at the beginning of our August 14th meeting. We didn't waive the rules for tonight's meeting. It's 5:00, it's before 7:00. We're having a public hearing. That's my recommendation. I'll yield the floor, Mr. Mayor.

Okay, so Mayor and Councilors, the motion you made was to have the special meeting tonight. We started at 5:00, and that's how it was posted and publicly announced. What I'm just recommending is that whatever we do is reflected in the agenda. Ideally, let's get some more. There are other folks whose hands are up who want to comment on this. Councilor, go ahead.

Thank you so much. I just want to point out that last time we were here, I did have a few constituents a little bit frustrated that a matter that pertained to two individuals was put before matters that pertain to the entire community. So I would actually suggest maybe we do that before City Council, and that way folks would have the opportunity to just look at the agenda and be part of public comment at 7:00 as normal.

I agree. I'm sorry, Councilor, could you? Councilor Faulkner.

I agree with Councilor Castro. Say a little bit more if you don't.

Well, it just, it seems like, I, it feels like a dangerous precedent that we would set an issue that's between two people ahead of all the other issues that we have in the city. So the proposal is to leave it in the regular order where public hearings would take place. Indeed. Any other comments? We have a motion currently that only says a date. It does not set a time certain. Is there any further discussion? Madam Clerk, let's call the roll on the motion to take this up at the date specified by Councilor Lindell.

Councilor Costo? Yes. Councilor Travis? Yes. Councilor Faulkner? Yes. Councilor Lee Garcia? Yes. Councilor Michael Garcia? Yes. Councilor Lindell? Councilor Ralworth? Yes. Councilor Cett? Yes. Mayor Weber? Yes.

Motion passed. Thank you. Thank you all. We will take it up then, and we will hopefully be able to get to a disposition that night. Next item on the agenda, please, Madam Clerk. Can you take us to that one?

Yes, Mr. Mayor. The next item is nine, public comment on bills. 9A is consideration of Bill number 2024-8, an adoption of an ordinance sponsored by Councilor Amanda Chavis and Councilor Carol Ralworth. It's a bill authorizing the City of Santa Fe borrower to enter into a loan agreement with the New Mexico Environment Department for the purpose of obtaining project loan funds in the principal amount of $151 million plus accrued interest, designating the use of the funds for the purpose defined in the most current project description form as approved by NMED, declaring the necessity for the loan, providing that the loan will be payable and collectible solely from the borrower's pledged revenues defined below, prescribing other details concerning the loan and the security for that purpose.

Very good. This is a public comment on this bill. So if anyone, either on Zoom or in the chambers tonight, wants to speak about this proposed measure, now would be the time to come forward to the podium, or if you're on Zoom, to raise your hand and have a couple minutes, two minutes of opportunity to have your thoughts and concerns in the record. Is there anybody on Zoom, Madam Clerk?

No, Mayor. No attendees on Zoom.

Is there anybody here who wants to speak to this bill? Okay, ma'am, let's go to the next item.

Madam Clerk, next item is item 10, final action on legislation. This is a public hearing. 10A is consideration of Bill number 2024-7, an adoption of an ordinance sponsored by Mayor Alan Weber. It's a bill relating to median safety, creating a new section 12-6-4.9 of the Uniform Traffic Ordinance, Exhibit A to Section 24-10 SFCC 1987, regulating the use of medians in the City of Santa Fe, providing a $25 maximum penalty.

Thank you. This is a public hearing, and so we will very soon go to that before we even entertain a motion. But I would like to take a few minutes to talk about the bill, and then while it doesn't identify it as such, Councilor Faulkner is a co-sponsor on this bill, and I'd offer her a chance to say a few words, and then we'll go directly to public hearing.

I want to speak to what this bill is and what this bill is not. This bill is a public safety bill. It addresses a concern that I think is very much a matter of common sense, and that is we have, could whoever has a phone operating please deactivate it? Thank you. We, I think common sense reflects what we all see as we look around the city, and that is there are a number of medians that are very narrow, that are frequently in parts of our city where there are busy streets and high traffic volumes, and that those particular medians at that width and in those locations are really unsafe. They're unsafe for people to stand on them, and they are unsafe for the drivers who are seeking to go past them.

There is no attempt in this bill to prevent people who are trying to cross a street from being able to do that. In fact, I spent a good amount of time talking to the members of the Mayor's Disability Advisory Board about their concerns, and there are amendments that have been drafted to try to make sure that the simple act of crossing a street is not going to be affected in any way by this bill. The city's streets team, working with our IT department, has come up with a pretty good GIS report on how many medians we have in the city and how many medians in our city are more narrow than 36 inches across. That GIS interactive map is on the city's website. I have a little bit of a printout, and it documents what I think is really a data approach to this issue, which is that we have more than 500 medians in the City of Santa Fe, and among those medians, roughly 50 are more narrow or 36 inches in width. They tend to be at very busy intersections. They tend to be the ones that are dangerous for anyone to stand in for any reason, whether it's to hold a sign protesting a political issue or selling flowers. It's a dangerous place for anyone to stand, and therefore, for reasons of public safety, I'd like to see the city pass an ordinance that would put us in a position where the police would have a tool that they can use so that those intersections will be more safe for everyone, for the drivers and for pedestrians. It will, I think, offer our Police Department a useful tool without in any way preventing people from expressing their views.

This, I think, this measure has been spoken about in previous meetings by members of the public as either being anti-homeless people or anti-poor people, criminalizing poverty or criminalizing homelessness. And the fact is that the city spends something like $14 million a year trying to help homeless people find housing. Most recently, we opened up our first safe outdoor sleeping area. We have opportunities to add to that. We supported the purchase of Santa Fe Place Hotel. We support Consuelo's Place. We are working very hard, as we heard at the Quality of Life Committee recently, to get a really accurate by-name list of the individuals in our community who are experiencing homelessness and to help them get housed with the services they need. Similarly, we've done over the last few years an enormous amount of work through the city and our departments to try to help people get out of poverty. The Mayors for a Guaranteed Income project is just one example. The direct cash payments that were enabled during COVID through our use of federal dollars is another example where I think we are really sensitive to and deeply aware of the injustices that poverty inflicts on people. And those issues are not addressed by this bill. This is a public safety bill that is trying to address very specific medians at very specific intersections, roughly 50 out of 500, where we feel, I feel, and our Police Department and others feel we do have a genuine public safety hazard.

So with that overview, I'll also turn to my co-sponsor, Councilor Faulkner, and then we'll go directly to a public hearing, and then the members of the governing body will have an opportunity to consider a motion, and we'll take this matter up. But Councilor Faulkner, I know you signed on as a co-sponsor. I'd like to give you an opportunity to summarize your own thoughts.

Thank you, Mayor. I've received a lot of phone calls from my district related to people being hurt in the median, people being hit by vehicles, vehicles having to slam on their brakes trying to avoid hitting people who are standing on these portions of the medians. I think one thing that we have to reflect on when we're thinking about governance on issues this complex is that the answers are rarely black and white. There is nuance in this kind of decision-making to find practical answers for some of our greater challenges, and I would urge the community to understand that this piece of legislation is a nuanced response to trying to solve a much bigger issue that we're going to have to solve in pieces because it is so complex. For my part, I know that my district is very concerned about the dangers related to people standing in certain portions of the medians, and for that reason, I stand in support of this legislation.

Thank you for the overview. Now let's go to a public hearing. If you have a word you want to say about this proposed bill, please come to the podium, line up. Everybody will get an opportunity to speak for two minutes and share their thoughts about the proposal and how you feel about it. And the City Clerk will keep the clock. Please be respectful of the time so that everybody has an equal amount of time and an equal opportunity to address the bill. Give us your name, and then you'll have the floor.

Thank you. My name is Gail Austin, and I want to thank the Mayor and the Council for allowing me to speak. And that, of course, brings me to the First Amendment of our Constitution, which guarantees our rights to freedom of speech and peaceful assembly. I believe that this ordinance violates both of these constitutional rights, and I don't think that safety is a good excuse to violate a constitutional right. Throughout our history, people have disseminated information in public spaces. Town squares were places where people could go to hear the latest news, philosophical ideas, advertisements, religious sermons. Now that people have cars, they don't gather in the town square, but as they drive around Santa Fe, they receive information from people standing on the medians and sidewalks, whether the message is "Jesus saves" or "Get your taxes done here" or "My body, my choice" or "Free Palestine" or "Abortion is murder" or "Black Lives Matter" or "Going out of business sale" or "Make America great again" or "I can't breathe" or "Love is love" or "Home vet, please help." Citizens of the United States have the right to speak and assemble peacefully in public spaces. Please vote no on this ordinance. Thank you.

Stephanie Beninato. I have really mixed feelings about this ordinance. I do believe that there is a safety issue involved with people standing on the median. I've seen people standing on the median with a dog tied up, but the dog wasn't tied tight enough, and it leaped off the median and almost got hit by a car. That's just one example. I understand people think it has to do with free speech and assembly, but assembly is in terms of government.

to the government, and not all speech is actually protected. My problem is with how do you actually deter people from standing on the median when they need the funds? That's really, we're not really talking about disseminating information. I think we're talking about people who are asking for funds, and they don't have the money. So then you impose a fine on them. At least you're not criminalizing their existence, but where are they going to get the money to pay? And if you do community service, it seems to me that the city has really dropped back on that alternative punishment. And for example, I know that the Recreation Department will no longer allow people to do community service at recreation facilities. So that's one avenue that is closed off to them. So I think, I believe that it is a safety issue. I think the penalty or deterrent part is the really problematic part. Thank you.

Thank you very much. Mr. Mayor, members of the Council, my name is Daniel Williams. I'm a Policy Advocate at the American Civil Liberties Union of New Mexico. And as you've heard me say before, and as you've heard from our legal director, the ACLU of New Mexico is opposed to this proposed ordinance. You received a letter when this ordinance was first introduced that we have serious concerns about the constitutionality and enforceability of this ordinance, and the possibility that if it's passed, it will expose the city to potentially very costly litigation. But it's not only the constitutional issues that concern us, and we're incredibly grateful for all of the work, much of which, Mr. Mayor, you just enumerated, that the city has done to approach the issue of homelessness with compassion. Unfortunately, we believe that this ordinance would run counter to much of that work. And while we appreciate that the intent of this is not to criminalize poverty or homelessness, we do believe that the enforcement of this will disproportionately fall on poor people and on unhoused people.

I also want to raise, to sort of problematize the assertions made about public safety in relation to this ordinance. During legal proceedings challenging a similar ordinance passed by the City of Albuquerque, an expert reviewed nearly 900 accident reports, and of 400 cases that involve car versus pedestrian accidents, only four, so 1%, clearly involved someone standing on a median or ramp. The U.S. Department of Transportation has acknowledged that pedestrian safety is an important issue, including here in New Mexico. They recommend three areas for policy: safe crossings, appropriate driving speeds, and improved visibility. This bill addresses none of those. And further, the Federal Highway Administration, in their guide to countermeasures for pedestrian safety, recommends that enforcement actions be targeted at drivers rather than at pedestrians, which is the exact opposite of the approach taken by this bill. So for all of those reasons, and for many that you'll hear tonight, we respectfully oppose. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor, members of the Council. Thank you for having this public hearing. My name is Judith Gabriel, and you've heard from me before. I am opposed to this ordinance, and I'm asking you to vote no on it. I do believe it is punitive to our unhoused population, and I once again ask for data about pedestrian injuries and deaths or driver injuries and deaths that are directly related to people in the medians. The city has not demonstrated that those are the causes of the problems, and I question how big the impact will be when it's 50 out of 500 medians. I do think it is going to complicate things for people who are unhoused and get fined, whether they can try to pay the fine or they can't pay the fine. I think it's going to complicate their lives. And I do appreciate also, as the gentleman before me, all of the efforts to help our homeless population here, and I don't think this is the answer. Thank you.

Thank you. Hello, I'm Elizabeth McMahon, and I also oppose this bill. And I think really to truly make our city different and safer, if we're going to deal with homelessness, we really need to make it a human rights issue, housing as a human rights issue. So that's broader than where you're going right now, it seems. But it does affect the homeless, that's very clear. And I think they should not be criminalized, and I think this will do that to them. And I also think you shouldn't criminalize someone like me and those like me who would be standing and who stands on those medians. If you want to do something, like make them larger, great, make them larger or wider. But I don't think this bill addresses those concerns, and they're both pretty important. But I really feel that this bill again criminalizes and puts not only homeless people who are needing to ask for funds in a place where they can't, but also putting people like myself who protest in a position of being criminalized. Thank you.

Thank you very much. I'm Alexander Upton. I oppose this legislation. There are a couple points I want to make, and while I acknowledge the safety language the Mayor has couched this legislation in, I think this caring stance is going to further entrench our unprotected community in the criminal justice system. This will result in their being pledged. If they don't have $25 to pay the fee, it might as well be $2,500. I've been subjected to this. I've been stuck in the criminal justice system because I was not able to pay fines, and it took me years to get out. You know what I did when I didn't have the money I needed to keep myself well? I held up security guards. I robbed from your local stores, right? I also went into your homes. This is what we're going to do. If you take away a safe avenue for people who really need this money to obtain it, you're going to see a rapid rise in violent crime, and I can promise you that. Thank you.

Thank you. And I also oppose this ordinance. The reason being, I'm a pedestrian, as is my 74-year-old mother. We use these sidewalks, curbs, and medians to get from point A to point B, and every day we are fundamentally unsafe because of aggressive driving, distracted driving. And these are things that if you were really concerned with safety, we would be using our law enforcement resources to really target the things that are making pedestrians, be it protesters, homeless people, myself, unsafe every day. If drivers are so distracted that somebody standing there with a sign is a dangerous condition for them, maybe they need to join me among the ranks of pedestrians and not drive, because there's going to be a ton of distracting things: people wearing T-shirts you want to stop to read, people with cute dogs, people with big hair. Like, where does the responsibility for drivers go? This is, it just seems to me like we're just creating potentially more problems while not really solving any problems. The problems that we're creating are going to be with fewer available medians, more competition for the medians available, or going into neighborhoods, approaching more people in parking lots, having to find other avenues to ask for the money. This is again not solving any problem and potentially creating a host of others. Thank you.

Thank you. Good evening. My name is Katherine Rivera. I'm a resident of District One. You've seen me before on this topic. I am in favor of this proposed median ordinance. I do not have a picture for you again tonight, but I do want to paint an image. On Alam Street, a woman holds up a cardboard sign asking for money while a man stands feet away watching her from a nice white truck. According to witnesses, the woman hands the money to the man on a regular basis. Witnesses say she's been seen regularly at this spot for months. This location is in my district. Another image from the narrow median on Cordova and St. Francis Drive, another woman panhandles while being watched from the parking lot of Trader Joe's. Periodically, she abandons her stuff in the median. She delivers any money collected to the man and then returns to her spot in that narrow median. These are just two examples from reports by constituents on our local social media. There are over 100 comments on these posts. There are genuine concerns by the constituents in Santa Fe over this issue. One of the commenters asked the question, "Is it a white truck?" Because I saw one white truck dropping off a homeless person with a dog at an intersection on Cerrillos and Rodeo. Then later, when I went to go pick up my son's friend from work early in the morning, I saw that truck drop off a different person another day. That person was a woman. While these may be truly examples of free will, we will never know if it's actually indentured servitude or enslavement or activity that is typical of human trafficking. Santa Fe must look closer at this. My hope is by passing this ordinance tonight, it will allow for opportunities for local law enforcement to use this tool to render assistance where necessary. And secondarily, passing this ordinance would serve notice to any human organized trafficking activity that the Santa Fe medians are closed to this type of business. I encourage you to pass this ordinance. Thank you.

Thank you. Thank you. City Council, Mayor, my name is Nicoletta Monroe. I am a resident of District 1. I appreciate the opportunity for us to speak tonight today about this very serious bill. In order to prepare for this, I read the Grants Pass case on the United States Supreme Court website. That's the case 23-175 about encampments. They ruled from a very conservative court that people may not be unhoused in Oregon in the Ninth Circuit. And I feel that it's very serious that the country, because we have such a heavy right side of the U.S. Supreme Court, is moving right unwillingly, and this bill is in that exact category. It is moving our city to the right unnecessarily. People who are unhoused who stand on medians are not going, they're not going to stop panhandling if you tell them that there's a narrowness rule. They will continue to panhandle. And my worry is that what will happen next? Will there be a crime wave? The new mayor said in the newspaper that we cannot ticket our way from homelessness. You said this recently in an article, yet you are ticketing the homeless. The Grants Pass case is centered on the Eighth Amendment, the punishment clause, that it's cruel and unusual to punish people who are homeless with fines, and we are doing exactly that. The $25 fine is cruel and unusual because people who are homeless do not have $25, Mayor. That's why they're standing on the median. Thank you.

Thank you. My name is Reed Fahy, and I'm with the Lived Experience Advisory Board, together with the Santa Fe Homewise, Santa Fe Affordable Housing. And one thing I would point out was a gentleman from the ACLU that, yes, he said like 1% is regarding margins or not margins. Anyway, that it's a small problem. It's like crossing the street and so forth. With regard to the woman who saw someone on the street in a median, I had a similar experience actually with like a woman, a mother watching her two siblings, no, I meant her two children, like take turns soliciting. And that was at Siler and Cerrillos, where like she was watching and meanwhile taking care of like their dog or whatever. People don't bring dogs or cats onto the median just haphazardly. It's because they're, you know, family, so to speak, and they don't have anybody to take care of them that could sit on the side. So I would say to the constituent that said, "Oh, well, this white woman or woman dressed in white," all of these questions, unless you develop a relationship with the person, then it just becomes fear. Well, it can turn into fear-mongering, whereas if you just like have it in your head, go up to the woman in white and ask her, you know, what's her life about? Who is she supporting? It may look like a drug transaction, but it ain't necessarily.

Stephanie George here. I work here in Santa Fe. I do physical therapy, and I shouldn't be here, and I'm very angry that I'm here talking to you today, because my job is basically to take care of all of you every time you have a hip replaced or a shoulder injury. And here you are trying to make a decision that will hurt other people. We sell newspapers in our medians, and that's fine, right? And these people will go into our homes and start stealing from us if you don't give them an outlet, and you are not choosing a compassionate option here. Whereas places like in California, and I think there was even a UBI trial in Georgia of all places, Universal Basic Income, sir. It was a thousand a month, and it got these people employed. It cut their unemployment in half, their numbers. I'd rather not be here every time you people want to make a punitive decision towards other people, and it's very frustrating. My job is hard, it's tiring, and I should be at home resting right now. And you know what's really dangerous? Being homeless. That's even more dangerous than what they're doing on the side of the road. And these are people that we should be providing housing to. And you know what? Why aren't they in some of the places that are offered for free for them to be housed in? Well, maybe these places aren't safe for them. Maybe they don't feel safe. Thank you.

I'm going to try to make this quick. It seems you want to sweep our—

Sorry, my name's Becca. It seems you want to sweep our social ills under the rug in order to impress wealthy tourists, developers, property owners who are here visiting their third or fourth vacation homes. And I doubt any of you hang out at any of the other shelters or dumpsters or buildings or arroyos and parks in the heat, rain, snow, and wind, and it shows. You pass this ordinance, it's no different than places who are making it illegal to sleep in public, be able to lie down on a bench, criminalize people who feed the unhoused, businesses who pour bleach on dumpsters in order to prevent dumpster diving, tear down tents, harass people car camping in parking lots, and issue tickets to those who are loitering. You can't get blood out of a turnip, and you cannot find and arrest these folks out of existence. What are the options if these folks can't support themselves in a legal, constitutionally protected way? Our affordable housing here is a joke. You just sold the property that has a Midtown shelter and rehabilitation center for men and has been made impossible for unhoused people to be able to get government-issued identifications forever, which means they can't get a job, a lease, or anything else legitimately. Some folks are getting even more desperate. Some folks are going to get more desperate and start harming each other even more so, breaking into cars and homes even more so, maybe even turn to mugging rich-looking tourists on the Plaza, which I know you would hate. It isn't fair to expect law enforcement to have to deal with this when they are already underpaid and understaffed. Having them go and confront someone who is panhandling will certainly cause more of a disturbance and safety issue than if they were left alone. This is absolutely unfair to put upon professional helpers like myself who work with the unhoused, who are already burnt out, brokenhearted, understaffed, underpaid, who are working within a beyond broken system with subpar resources. 53% of unhoused people have at least one traumatic brain injury, and more than 50% of them suffer from at least one form of mental illness and/or substance abuse disorder, and 25% are severely mentally ill. Thank you.

Thank you.

Hi there, my name is Britney Rodriguez, and I work for the New Mexico Coalition to End Homelessness. My comments tonight come directly from the letter recently sent to the Governor's office asking for a halt to the special session on Public Safety, which includes statewide legislation regarding median safety similar to that being voted on here tonight in Santa Fe. In addition to my own agency, other public health, behavioral health, and career professionals in the field believe that the well-being and safety of all New Mexicans comes from investing in communities to meet people's needs. The city has recognized that systemwide solutions are complex, and the city has recently made significant gains to address underlying issues surrounding housing and homelessness. While well-intentioned legislation to criminalize panhandling threatens to exacerbate the very issues you've aimed to fix, legislation that will saddle unhoused people with unpayable fines does nothing to meaningfully address pedestrian safety or solve our dearth of affordable housing and wraparound services. At the same time, criminal records and debt will make it even more impossible for unhoused people to attain housing. As experts dedicated to advancing equity, justice, health, and community safety in New Mexico and in Santa Fe, we are all ready to come to the table and collaborate. We must work towards solutions that invest in long-term health, safety, and well-being of our communities. As organizations who work for and with individuals and communities most impacted, we share the urgent desire to bring these solutions to bear. We strongly believe the legislation proposal put forth will have a detrimental impact on Santa Feans rather than achieving the aims you seek. Thank you.

Thank you very much.

Good evening, City Council. My name is Dylan Schwagel, and I'm here because I have experience working in outreach and case management with the homeless population. And I would just like to say first that it's been very heartening to hear so much from so many people coming out tonight and articulating a lot of the things that I thought I might want to say tonight. And so thankfully, you've made my job a lot easier. And so I would just like to just talk first about over the past few weeks, I have been out around town speaking about legislation, including this particular legislation, with a lot of my colleagues, service providers, and social service workers around town and getting the general sense of how people are feeling about legislation such as this. And I can tell you, City Council, that the consensus among my fellow social service workers is that although perhaps the intention of this is for safety, in practice, there is very little doubt that the enforcement of this legislation would be disproportionately towards the homeless. We understand concerns about safety. We have concerns about the safety of our clients that are jaywalking and on the medians as well. But ultimately, this is not a substantive solution to that issue. There are substantive solutions in which the city has pursued, and substantive solutions that are coming up for a vote in this body here soon. And so we would emphasize that we cannot have it both ways. We cannot give in addressing this issue of homelessness in this city and then take with the other hand. That consensus is broadly held across many for many of my colleagues. We feel very strongly about this, and we do have past experience in the manner in which the police department has enforced ordinances such as this disproportionately against the homeless, especially in this part of town. Thank you.

Thank you. Anyone else physically in the chambers before we go to the Zoom room who would like to speak on this issue? If so, please come forward now.

Madam Clerk, is there anyone on the Zoom room?

Yes, Mayor, we have one attendee with their hand raised, and I'll allow them to talk. Rachel Thompson. Can you hear me?

Yes, very clearly.

Hi, my name is Rachel Thompson, and I'm sorry, I'm just terrifically upset by all of this, and the longer it's gone on, the more it's upset me. I find it so wholly lacking in compassion, and I have had an opportunity to work with unhoused people over the last several months thanks to the S3 Housing Volunteers group and an effort I began with another woman. And I have become so aware of how people who are unhoused and who live on the street live entirely within a world of no. No, you may not walk there. No, you may not sit there. No, you may not sleep there. No, you may not make a choice about the food we give you. No, you will not do this until you give us your name. And now, no, you don't stand there. And it's so wholly inhumane, and it just, the more we do things like this, the more we take away people's dignity. And I just want to say that I have a cooler in my car. I'm trying to do a little part. I do it very inconsistently. I'm a very ordinary person, but I have a cooler in my car that has Gatorade in it, and I've been giving to people who are standing outside with no shade. And I approached a man who was on the median at Smith the other day, and I said, "How'd you like to earn five bucks and help me unload my cooler of the melted water under a tree so that I don't dump it in the parking lot?" And he was absolutely lovely, and he helped me, and he was a total human being. And then I gave him a couple of Gatorades, and I went and I got some more ice. And the more people are willing to engage and talk and stop with people, stop and visit with people, and sometimes intersections are the best places to do that. If you happen to get caught in an intersection, there's a homeless person there, and they might be filthy, and they might not look like somebody you want to have for dinner. But if you roll down your window and you talk to them instead of pulling over to the other lane and avoiding them, you know, slowly, I personally have discovered that there are real human beings there, and I didn't know that always for my life, and I'm so glad I know it now. And I so urge you to think about it. Thank you.

Thank you. So please be as compassionate as you possibly can. Plus, so far as I can, there is no, there is no—

I'm sorry, Thompson, finish my sentence. May I finish my sentence?

Yeah, your time is expired, but go ahead. Go ahead. Did you want to finish your sentence? Did we lose her?

No, Miss Thompson, did you want to finish your sentence before we run out of time? What do you see?

Mayor, she's muted. I asked her—

I was muted, so you didn't get to hear all I said is I don't believe there's evidence to support this policy either.

Okay, thank you. Others in the Zoom room? We'll go now to Miguel Gabon.

Good evening, Mayor and City Councilors. I'm here to speak regarding this matter, which has been postponed several times because of all the emotional testimony that's been going on on both sides of this topic. I think what's important is to realize that the issue is regarding back-to-back curbed medians, which have no space for a person to stand on. And when you talk about these medians, you discuss the issue of public safety regarding the person standing on the median, whether they're exercising their First Amendment right, whether they're asking for money, whether they're banging on a window of my mother-in-law's car and threatening her safety, or whether they're having a dog trying to get more water or something. The issue is narrow medians. There are plenty of medians around the city to perform all your First Amendment rights, to solicit money, to request assistance from the citizens of the city or tourists or visitors. But we must remember the focus of this bill, which is safety in narrow medians. People will be on many medians performing the acts that they've been doing for many years, whether it's selling papers or not. When we discuss the issue of safety, you speak to the 1% of people who struck a pedestrian who slipped off a curb into the lane in front of their cars. Ask them what it's like to hit an unknowing person when they slip off the curb. Ask them what it's like and what trauma they go through. Those are the things you're trying to prevent. If you want to wait for it to happen like the ACLU does, then don't file a lawsuit when it does happen. Don't sue the city because they didn't—

a measure to protect the safety of a pedestrian standing in a less than 3-foot median. So I ask you again to continue your efforts with dealing with homelessness in San, because it's difficult and it's a big problem. But I ask you to take this measure to protect the safety of all individuals who are in medians, whether they're walking through the median, expressing their First Amendment right, or asking for money and help, as well as the drivers who are focused on driving and go through intersections every day. Thank you, sir. Thank you for your time and have a good evening.

Thank you, Madam Clerk. We have others in the Zoom room. If any of the other attendees in the Zoom room would like to speak, please raise your virtual hand.

Mayor: No other hands are raised.

Very good. All right, I appreciate everybody's comments and I appreciate the sticking with the two-minute time and getting your comments in on the record, and for being here or for being on Zoom. So at this time, what I'd like to do is to entertain a motion and then we can have discussion following that.

Move to deny.

Is there a second?

Second.

There's a motion to deny this bill. We have to discuss it and then we can vote on the motion. Yes, go ahead, you have the floor.

Thank you, Mayor. So I do have a lot of questions and I want to say that I just want to thank everybody for their feedback and input on this. I think that it shows the compassion that as a community we have and that needs to be at the core of everything we do. I agree with that. However, I also know that when we want to address an issue, there needs to be a common goal and all resources need to be moving in a common direction. And so as a city, we are working with Built for Zero. That is our goal in addressing homelessness. And I know we say this is about median safety, and I agree that this helps with median safety, but I think in addressing the concerns of the community, we can't ignore discussing homelessness.

With Built for Zero, it is tied to a by-name list. It is about making contact with individuals that are unhoused and learning about their wants, their needs, and how the city could better support them. I think that this does increase contact with these individuals and I don't necessarily think it's a bad thing when we're talking about Built for Zero as our common goal. Even with working with community partners, all of our community partners are aware that this is our goal as a city and they are assisting us in this process and achieving this goal. And so I don't think that that fact can be ignored, that yes, this can seem very punitive, but knowing our public safety, knowing how we approach individuals and how we do really rest and heavily emphasize wraparound services, that this also helps us achieve our goal for Built for Zero, which is ultimately what we want. We want unhoused to be housed. We want people who need social emotional support or behavioral health resources to have access to that. And it is our responsibility as a city to identify that and somehow get them help with that. Though this can seem punitive.

So I think my first question comes with for the sponsors or for, I think Chief Joy is here, to understand the progression of implementation. So if someone is on a median that they're not supposed to be on, how does the progression of implementation look? Do they get a warning? Do they get added to the by-name list? Do they get resources before they get fined? I think that's very important to clarify and to understand for me. So I don't know if the sponsors or anyone can discuss that. So is there a warning that comes with services first and then a fine when someone's not taking advantage of those services? And then when the fine's not paid, what happens next? So I think it's very important that the community understand that. So that's my first question. I don't know if Mayor, you want to address that or if there's someone here that can.

Thank you. Great, great question and very sensitive to the many different elements in this bill. Thanks to the way it has been amended, and I, Councilor Mayworth, I don't know if you want to speak to your amendment that has been now attached to the bill. This, this citation would be a $25 citation. It is not a criminal, it is a civil matter. It can be appealed at court, it can be dismissed at court, it can be converted into other kinds of ways to defray or eliminate the fine entirely. It doesn't escalate. There's no, there's nothing attached to it that would then turn this into a matter where the person would be in an escalating situation. Chief Joy, I think perhaps if we speak about implementation of any piece of legislation that involves police enforcement, I know you've spoken in the past about how our officers approach many different situations and how they apply their skills and in addition, the availability of the altern—

Oh, I may have misspoken about the bill. Let the City Attorney correct me.

Mayor, counselors, it is, it is not punishable by jail, but it is still a criminal citation, not the misdemeanor with up to $25 fine, but it's a $25, it's still, it's still criminal, which is why the police would be involved. But it's of a minor level, very low level.

Right, and it doesn't escalate. Chief, I was going to mention or ask you to mention the approach that our department uses in general, but also point out to your larger question, counsel, the availability of the ARU to step into certain circumstances where there is not only somebody involved with a violation by being on a too narrow of a median, but also exhibiting some behavior that would trigger additional support from the Alternative Response Unit.

But, and I, and just to add something, just as a question, is this something that Public Safety Aides could take on in your department so that, so that the perspective of being approached on this topic may be less threatening? Because through different perspectives, I think that could escalate situations. And then just like the concept, which I'm really wanting to get clarity on, is, is there going to be a warning process? And I have a next question that kind of leads to that, may help eliminate that. But, so first, just like warning before the fine, and then could this be addressed or be assigned to Safety Aides as a priority? Is that a possibility?

All right, so I'll try to cover everything and I'll apologize in advance. My Support Operations Captain was supposed to handle this to the last one, but the lightning strike took that out. So I'll just give it a couple seconds to shut me down. But, yeah, so a couple of questions here. So first and for, and I'll kind of relate this back to when we were enforcing the COVID masks and the approach of the department was an education first. And that is whenever we take on these kind of more, how do you say, novel ordinances and newer approaches, that's always the first thing we do. That's always the priority for our department. And, and I'm going to speak outside my realm here, and whether or not there's an avenue to color code these medians so that there's a more awareness of what they can and can't do. Again, that's not my role, but I, I certainly would support something like that so they could better visually see where they can and can't go.

As far as Public Safety Aides, they don't issue criminal citations with the exception of like parking citations. So like vehicle citations, if there's a crash, they'll handle low-level crashes and some other calls for service. But if there's a situation where a citation needs to be issued, they'll call for an officer. So to the extent that they could issue a first warning or something along those lines, they, they could certainly do that. That's within their, within their realm. But as, as far as escalating to actually issuing a citation, an officer would have to do that.

Great, thank you. And I agree, that was my next question, was, has there been any conversation in planning this about signage and messaging? I feel like some of the individuals that this may impact the most won't have access to this information, and to be approached about something they may completely be unaware of seems unfair. I think that, I don't know, I feel like signage or like you suggested, like them being painted a certain way, but just something that sends the message that this is an unsafe place for someone to be for a long period of time. Has there been conversations about that or, you know, that being put in, put in place prior to this being enforced?

I can give you a little bit of, of feedback or insight on that. Yes, we've, I've spoken with our Public Works team. I think it's not impossible to do something that involves an indication so that people are not left wondering if they are in an appropriate area. I, I'm personally not excited about more signage, but something that like the Chief suggests is a recognized painting of a strip of the median so that we're, we're identifying it on behalf of people that yes, you can cross the street here, but this is too narrow, please don't stand here and occupy this space, would be completely doable.

All right, great. Yeah, I think that, I think it's very hard to not start somewhere and having interaction and consistent interaction with individuals that need support. I think that this is a start. Is it the best way? I'm not sure. But I think it's a start and it's a place to assess ourselves and whether we're making a positive difference or not. If we do nothing, we don't know if we're making a positive difference or not. And we're making a lot of assumptions that this could be negative. We're also making assumptions that this could be positive. We don't know, but I think we have to start somewhere to meet our goal. I am in leadership and I feel like when you set a goal, you commit to a goal and you align to it. I keep going back to Built for Zero because we've made progress in that. And I think anything that gets the city having, like I said, face-to-face interactions with individuals that need support is moving in the right direction.

With that, I will say that we are completely without adequate services to really meet any goals successfully when it comes to behavioral health. And I just want to leave that out there. As a city, as a state, we have to do so much more to actually create change that's lasting and supporting individuals in our community. I want people to know I'm aware of that. Everyone up here is aware of that. I think unfortunately, in my opinion, that's just not being prioritized the appropriate way to actually make the difference that needs to occur statewide. But we're just going to keep working at it. So I will say I support this for one reason, and the one reason is it's a way for us to start somewhere to have interactions with people that need help, to take responsibility for the fact that they may need help and get them resources, to increase safety. But I think that as a governing body, we're going to be responsible for assessing whether this is actually working in a positive way or not. So this isn't like, this is the solution. It absolutely isn't. It's just a start in order for us to know which direction to go next. And so I just wanted to make that statement. I think it's important that we start somewhere. So I, I do thank Mayor Weber and Councilor Aulner for at least bringing a start. And I hope to work with you to make it better or to change it as it's appropriate for the community. Thank you very much.

Thank you, Councilor Michael Garcia.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor. I've had the opportunity to review this legislation through a couple different lenses, whether it be on a council committee or through a citizen-led advisory committee, in particular.

the Bicycle Pedestrian Advisory Committee, and through both of those bodies, there's been requests for data. I still have yet to receive any data pertaining to median accidents involving folks that are standing on medians, pedestrian injuries, pedestrian deaths. So, is there a reason why we cannot produce this data? Is the data nonexistent, or the data shows it's not in favor of this legislation? I mean, I'll ask the sponsor, where is the data for this legislation?

Well, a really good question, Counselor. I think the challenge we have is, among other things, that in the absence of this legislation, it's very difficult to correlate directly people standing in a median versus pedestrian accidents that occur from simply people crossing a street and getting hit by a car. And it's, we have many reports from residents in the form of emails, eyewitness accounts, people who have witnessed dangerous situations or even fatalities. But those, but the accumulation and aggregation of specific cause and effect data is very difficult in the absence of a piece of legislation that would give us the basis for collecting those pieces of information.

I do share the feeling that was expressed earlier that, I'm not having driven, you and I, everybody on the governing body, we're on the roads a lot going to meetings all over town, and I have witnessed more than my fair share of close calls. I know from my own personal experience that people do have dogs on the medians, and I have seen dogs dart off the median, a narrow median, into a right-of-way. I have seen cars pull up at a red light with a dog in the vehicle and have the dog on the median and the dog in the vehicle begin to get agitated at each other and distract the driver. And I regard this as a public safety bill that is common sense and preventive. I really don't want to watch people get killed or dogs get killed increasingly while we wait to collect data. I'd rather take the step of preventing those deaths from happening and not wait for a new data collection effort to demonstrate the correlation between standing in a narrow median and having an automobile or pedestrian accident.

Chief, you and I have spoken about this many times. I think you've got some right material.

Mr. Mayor and Council Garcia, so just pedestrian vehicle fatalities so far, and we went back to 2021. There have been two so far in 2024, the most recent one on May 31st on Airport Road. That individual was found on a median. There's no, that doesn't necessarily mean that he was hit on the median, but that was where he was located. 2023, we had three. 2022, there were four. And then 2021, there were two. These are again, vehicle versus pedestrian fatalities broadly. So that's 11 altogether.

But also what I found to be of interest was I did pull calls, well, my analyst, I take credit for it, my analyst pulled calls for service, again, kind of more broadly about what they're seeing in the median and kind of behavior and concerns of people as they're driving by and businesses. In 2023, we just did it for 2023 and 2024 so far. 2023, we had 113 calls for service. That includes welfare checks, disorderly conducts, non-fatal crashes, assaults, batteries. Those are all across the board. 2024 so far, again, all calls for service, there are 56 so far, calls just in median.

Thank you. And so we do have data, and that's what I really want us to rely on, is making data-driven decisions. And so let me ask you a question, Chief Joy. If an individual is standing on a median and they are struck by a vehicle, who is at fault?

Well, short answer, I'd say the driver would likely be cited initially.

Okay, so I think this is where I really have some concern around this, because we are relying on the assumption that somebody from a median is in the roadway, which is, unless they're trying to cross, unless I'm misunderstanding the law, it's currently illegal, correct, to be in the middle of the roadway? It's illegal, am I understanding that right?

Yes.

Okay, so I'm trying to understand what we are doing here, given the data from, and let me dive deeper into the deaths, Council Lindell. I understand, I was just making sure everything was okay. And so when an individual, there's a pedestrian fatality, there is an investigation conducted, or is there not?

There is.

Okay, so during that investigation, is it determined the cause of death, and is if the individual was in the roadway, if the individual was in the median, if the individual was on the sidewalk, is that type of information determined during an investigation?

Yes.

Okay, so of the data that you provided, even the recent May 31st, you had said where an individual was, they were in the median when they were found. Was it determined that this vehicle struck them in the median or the vehicle struck them in the roadway?

No, he was found in the median, but he was believed to be crossing the roadway.

Okay, and that was pedestrian error.

Okay. And that's the one, that's the more recent one, but yeah, that was determined to be pedestrian error.

Okay. And so in regards to the other incidences, the other one in 2024, three in 2023, four in 2022, and others in 2021, did any of those reports indicate that a vehicle struck an individual that was standing in the median?

That information I don't have.

Okay. And this is the information I've been asking from the beginning since this ordinance was introduced or this bill was introduced. And so this is the data that ultimately helps me to make a decision, and without that, it's hard to really make a decision. So I've got a next question in regards, since you're up here, Chief Joy, and it's around enforceability. And I really, and so I wanted to look at the map that was produced, and I have some deep concerns about this map that was produced, and I've got questions about it. But in particular, I want to look at just because one of the comments from previous testimony, I believe it was along the West Alameda, St. Francis intersection, and I am in particular looking at the west side of West Alameda. And this median from this GIS map, I can count one, two, three, four green dots, and at the far end of the median, there is a red dot where it looks like the median is above three feet, and then it's sharply at the end of the median goes to less than three feet where the red dot is. So as an officer, how challenging is it going to be for you to enforce such a law on medians like this where the vast majority of it is in excess of three feet, whereas, and I don't have the dimensions how much it is less than three feet, but it seems like it's not much. And so how challenging is it going to be for you and your force to enforce this law? Could you, if somebody has a phone that's not silenced, please silence it. I hope their team is winning.

Well, similar, we'll need that map more broadly, so we'll need the same map you're looking at. We don't, and I don't have it, but in order to enforce it appropriately, these guys are going to have to know, again, just like everybody else, where it's okay and where it's not, and where their enforcement zones are and where they're not.

Okay. And so in regards to the enforcement, who would ultimately be responsible for enforcement? I know that there are certain members of the force that do certain actions, right? Detectives do detective work, we've got folks who work on our focus on traffic violations. Who would be ultimately responsible for enforcing this law?

Any of the sworn personnel, regardless of where they are, could enforce it.

Okay. It would, so yeah, just not civilians or PSAs. So, so any officer driving down the road, so ultimately if an officer notices a violation and they are engaged with enforcing this bill, but does that mean there's one less officer to respond to maybe a more critical matter in our community, such as a burglary or a more time-sensitive issue in our community?

Well, all of our, all calls for service get prioritized, and so a call like this would not be a higher priority than any other call for service. And if they are engaged in conversation with someone, you're in median, you can't be in this median, you got to go over here, and dispatch notifies them that there's a priority call for service, they would abandon that conversation and go to the call for service. Similarly, and even from my own experience, when I was a real police officer, if I was engaged in a traffic stop and I'm in the middle of the stop and I'm issuing a citation or I'm talking to the driver, and I get dispatched over the radio that there's a priority call, I abandon that traffic stop. I'm no longer, so even if you're on a call for service, you're still subject to a higher call for service if you need be.

Okay, that answer your question?

It definitely does, but it, so I guess how often does that happen when somebody is, and let's use an existing law, right, where somebody might be pulled over for speeding and there is a priority call. How often does that happen where the uniform officer says, "Sorry, I can't issue this ticket, I've got to head out to somewhere else"?

I don't know. I could give you an accurate number off the top of my head. Once a week, maybe once every couple of weeks, probably.

Okay, thank you for that, and I appreciate the feedback. And I would consider you a real officer. You're top brass, you're one of the best.

I try, but I don't, I'm not doing the hard work that these guys are doing out there. I don't want to take credit for it.

So my next questions revolve around the map, just because it's really hard to decipher this map. I mean, I look at it from, I minimize it, and it's really hard to, I mean, I see definitely more than 50 red dots, and I think that's the challenge, is how do we identify the locations where it's more or less? Is it just the concentration of red dots, or is it in the instance of the example I gave earlier, because there's one red dot, then do we have to narrow down specifically where that red dot lies on the median? And I think that's a question for, and I don't know who, it's not for you, Chief Joy, I mean, because that is, I see a challenge with enforcement, right? And if somebody wanted to fight this, because what if somebody says, "I wasn't on that red dot, I was on the green dot"?

Yeah, and again, I don't have the map in front of me, but for the purposes of enforcement, I would want to have, is, how do you say, is, to the extent that it can be user-friendly, very clear indication of where things are and where they aren't. So yeah, and in an example that you're given where like, let's look at that West Alameda part where there's a green area and there's a red area, as long as they're on that green area, I would expect that not to be enforceable. But if they are, you know, again, there's a very clear distinction of which part of that median they can use. Okay, you can't be on this side, but you got to be on this side, right?

But I think that's, hold on one second, Mayor, just let me follow up this thought before I lose it.

No problem.

If we think of, and I'm looking at a different median, Cerrillos Road heading into downtown area, and this is in particular the median that's in front of Whole Foods, it looks like area. Don't, no, it's, yes, that median, but it's more so in front of their parking lot and right next to the hotel. That median goes from red to green to red to green to red to green. So are we going to begin to paint our medians red to green to red to green? I love, I know we love a red and green chili, but I mean, I ultimately want to make your job easier.

I would love that to, I leave that to the discretion of the folks who would be painting the medians, and if that's the decision, Mr. Mayor, please.

I don't think, I think Chief Joy can legitimately say that that's not his department. Let me, let me speak to the map, because I don't want to get, I don't want to get it, turn it into a,

The reason that I asked our Public Works team and our IT team to use our GIS capability to do any kind of a map was so that the question that seemed to me to be obvious would at least have the beginnings of an answer. We've heard from a lot of folks that they're concerned that this will eliminate the ability for anybody to stand in any median anywhere and hold a sign. We heard the various forms of protest or selling flowers or holding up a political sign and that all medians would be equally affected.

So, using the best available, but still rather inexact technology of our GIS system, I asked them, "Give us an indicative map of what are we talking about? How many medians are in the city and how many would likely fall under the 36-inch rule?" I didn't want to occupy the level of effort that it would take for Public Works or other personnel to actually go to where there are indicated likely narrow medians and measure, get into the striping or painting that has come up tonight. But I think if we were to adopt this measure, we would absolutely not leave it to a matter of a dot on a map. We'd have to get very specific and we'd have to take the time to go out and be clear which medians are and which medians are not covered under this ordinance. That's the same way we try to do our best to indicate striping for pedestrian crosswalks. We try to indicate speed limits in specific areas.

So, I guess my point, Counselor, not to diminish your line of questioning in any way, but to say the map is indicative, it is not definitive. And when we, if this bill were to pass and we were to say there is a specific width of a median that is deemed too narrow for people to stand on, while others are not as dangerous, we would be absolutely required to make those distinctions. I do believe that out of more than 500 medians, we're talking about roughly 50 or in that neighborhood. I don't think it's going to be overly onerous to do the more, using the map as a guide, but not an exact location device. We can figure out which ones apply and we can make it clear to the public and to the police and anyone who's asking, "Where is it deemed too narrow to be safe to be standing and where isn't it?" Equally important, where do we believe that there's a safe enough width that people can protest politically or sell flowers or do the things in the medians that are not as dangerous as simply being at a very narrow neck-down area?

Mayor: Thank you, Mr. Mayor, because that kind of confirms my thoughts on this map of it being not exact because there's just too much inconsistency here with this to really determine the enforceable areas and in particular, medians that go from three feet to less than three feet because of a turning lane, but it's one consistent median. So I think that is, begins the challenge because if we install signage, it could imply the entire median is off-limits. If we go the painting route, then again, you get this zebra effect.

The painting brings up an interesting issue because I've worked with some constituents recently around no parking enforcement in certain neighborhoods and the roads or the curbs used to be painted yellow and their request was to repaint the curb yellow. And the feedback from staff was that we no longer do that, we install signs. And so I think we get into the predicament, if we install signs, how are we going to indicate in those situations where a median has multiple lengths or multiple widths? Now, when we get into signage, you would start talking resources. I know from the perspective of, as the Chair of BPAC, we are constantly asking for more signage or bicycle and pedestrian safety and we keep getting told the answer, "There's not money for it." And so, does this bill allocate resources to install the appropriate, whether it's enforcement tools that would help you, such as signage or painting? So, does this bill allocate those resources? I guess that's for the sponsor.

I'm not the sign guy or the paint guy, so I wouldn't be able to specify. This bill does not define an implementation system. It simply, like most of our ordinances, identifies a policy and a legal approach to solving a problem. If the governing body chooses to pass this bill, then we'll sit down with our Public Works team and talk about the best way to implement it.

But it doesn't necessarily need to be incorporated in the bill. It could have been outlined in the memo and it could have been referenced in the FI saying, "It's going to cost us this much to implement this bill." Am I misunderstanding the process? Because the public deserves to know, whether it's this or any other legislation, how much it costs for us to implement it. And we shouldn't have to come back and say, "Well, we thought about this and it's going to cost us X." And that might have changed the determination because, you know, I'm going to throw a number out there, "It's going to cost us a million dollars to implement the appropriate signage." Would that change a person's mind on this? I don't know. And I think from my position, cost of implementation, I do take into consideration. And so, and it's not a question for you, Chief Joy. I apologize. You can, you can go ahead and leave. I don't have any more questions for you and I don't want to imply that I'm asking you a question to be here, Chief. I think you can sit back down. Thank you, sir.

And I think that's where again, I'm all, I'm 110% for pedestrian safety. As the Chair of BPAC, that is our priority. It's been our priority for the last five years since I've been the Chair of that committee. And that's where I began to take the perspective, if we're really looking at making our roadways safer for pedestrians, because if that is the true intention of this legislation, why are we not as a city really putting forth a proposal that would improve our infrastructure that would make medians a minimum size or there's no median at all? I think if anything, if we're going to approach individuals on the median that needs support, we should be doing it from a proactive, supportive manner, not a punitive manner. Because I think we as a community really care about individuals and there is a reason why folks feel comfortable asking for support, whether it be on a median or on a corner or at the exit of a retail shop. Our community cares. We give to those people in need. And so I guess I'll ask this one last question and it's for the sponsor. Is the intention of this bill to prevent panhandling on medians?

Councilor Faulkner has her hand up and I'm happy to also directly answer the question, but go ahead, Councilor Faulkner.

The concern for me, and I'm going to talk a little bit about my personal life. I have done hospice for and I have lost family members to addiction and mental health issues. And what I consistently hear is that the population that we're talking about this having an impact on is a population that is extremely vulnerable and that at times is not in a position to make the best decisions. And so part of the reason that I support this legislation is because I don't think it's smart to take a volatile situation and allow a more dangerous situation to occur when there's things you can do to mitigate it. It is not to say that this is the only answer to the situation. It is to say that it is absolutely more dangerous for someone who is intoxicated, under the influence, or having a mental health breakdown to be standing on a three-foot part of a median versus the larger part of a median. And so for me, this is a matter of safety. It's a matter of safety because I have members of my family who are homeless. I have members of my family again who struggle with mental health issues and with addiction. And it has never seemed sound to me to allow an unsafe condition to continue. We're not asking that this entire median would not be available. We're saying the parts that are overtly dangerous should not be available. And I know from personal experience that not only have I seen animals who are in the median step into traffic, I have seen people push each other into traffic when they're having a fight. I have seen a person clearly unaware of where they are walk straight into traffic. And I luckily have not seen someone die from this circumstance, but I have seen traffic accidents because of it. I've seen swerving vehicles because of it. I've seen pedestrians and people driving cars get into hostile conflict because of this situation. And so to me, this is absolutely a matter of safety.

My question was, is the intention of this bill to prevent panhandling on medians? Just for reference, that was a question I posed to the sponsors.

Yes, sir. First of all, I take very, very seriously the First Amendment issues that have been raised. I think free speech and the ability to protest or make your point by speaking out is absolutely guaranteed under the Constitution. And there is nothing in this bill that would prevent or diminish that First Amendment right. We are absolutely aware that panhandling or standing in a median that is a safe place and making a political point or simply being there is a protected right, freedom. It is a First Amendment right. So I don't have any truck with the idea that we're somehow going to eliminate people's free speech and their First Amendment rights.

I also think if we're going to delve into the depths of this issue, I think it's a mistake to conflate a number of issues that are not the same. For example, I've been very, very deeply involved in the effort to help homeless people get housed in Santa Fe. I think since we joined Built for Zero, as has been mentioned, I've made a concerted effort to be an advocate for both services and fundamental housing for all of our unhoused people. From talking with our ARU folks, our fire department and others, most of the people who are in the medians right now are not homeless individuals. It's conflating two very different issues. I think they have a protected right to solicit in a safe place, whether it's on a sidewalk or in an area where there's no danger. But these are not primarily homeless people who are doing the panhandling. It's just that is, those are, they're different populations that are being brought in this discussion as if they were the same people.

I do think that the fundamental purpose of this bill from the beginning, and I've said it every time I've been asked about it, is a matter of public safety with regard to dangerous spots in our city where common sense tells you that there's a problem and where we want to avoid any likelihood that people standing in those very narrow places are either at risk of their own life and safety or the potential of creating a problem for drivers, passengers, people who are going by those dangerous points. So that's the real, the fundamental purpose, as I've said over and over and over again. We have a common sense problem and we have a common sense approach to addressing it. And we are not trying to criminalize homelessness. We're not trying to criminalize poverty. We have many efforts in the city to work to make life better for people who are struggling with homelessness and to provide resources to people who are trying to get out of poverty. The young lady, Miss George, who spoke about the UBI pilot project in Georgia, I'm very proud of our Mayors for Guaranteed Income right here in Santa Fe. We had tremendous success in providing a guaranteed stipend to 100 families where a member of the family was attending the community college and we were giving them a monthly stipend to help them stay in the community college, not have to drop out if they were forced by some unanticipated financial crisis to leave their community college education and go get whatever job they could get. To me,

that crisis. That's what the UBI does. Although the guaranteed income is not a universal basic income, it is a very targeted income stipend to people who meet a test of means. So I'm familiar with the UBI, I'm familiar with the Mayors for Guaranteed Income, and I agree that poverty is a fundamental issue for our community. Homelessness is also a fundamental issue, but we have a separate issue, which is the question of safety in very specific places where the width of the median is not conducive to allowing people to simply stand there. So I hope that answers your question, Counselor.

Mayor: Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Unfortunately, it doesn't because my question revolved around panhandling. I think it's very dangerous for us to overstate or imply that every person that is asking for resources or support on our medians is under the influence, that they are addicted to something, that they might have mental health issues, or they might not have a home. I think it's very dangerous for us to just immediately think that. It's such a discriminatory mindset. And this is where, if we really want to walk the walk from the talk we're talking in regarding to supporting members of our community, let's begin to dispatch folks that are creating the by-name list and make that the priority. Ensure that every person that's on a median, if they're unhoused, then they go on the by-name list. If they have other supports, we begin to point them in that direction. But we don't know that. We don't have that information because there's not contact being made with these individuals.

So I think, in the name of safety, there are these unintended consequences that ultimately will filter out. And so this is where I would strongly, should this pass, I would strongly encourage us to incorporate some type of review, a six-month review, a one-year review, to really understand what impact this is having on our community. Because I would really want our community members to ultimately also understand the medians that are impacted by this, because I don't want to give the false impression to folks that should this pass, nobody's going to be able to be on medians, and that is not going to be the case.

I think of the medians that I see individuals on just in my regular routine. Every single one of those medians is not impacted by this ordinance, by this bill. And I think I don't want the... I would really encourage our public to understand, and could we, Madam City Clerk, can we put that map up on the screen just so the public can see what we're talking about here, where the medians are going to be good to go green and then the no medians? Because from my understanding, and this was testimony provided during the committee meeting, I believe it was from Officer Grundler, that a majority of these are in residential areas. And so this is where this map has so many red dots. I can't identify the impact in regards to one median versus now one median has 10 red dots and one median has one. I mean, it's so... I think we should, should this pass, really can promote a challenge for enforcement.

And I guess this is a question I would like for the residents of Santa Fe to ponder. Just because we have a serious crime issue in our city right now, and as Chief Joyce said, they will respond based on priority. But in that meantime, where they're not responding to a priority call, would you rather have folks out stopping folks from panhandling or being more proactive in the community to prevent other serious crimes from happening? And from my conversation with constituents, they want serious crimes being prevented, whether it be personal crime, shoplifting, speeding down the road. I mean, we know how much of a challenge that is in our community, the excessive noise. So let that resonate with the community in regards to where some of these, well, as it kind of was, or at least I interpreted earlier, that's not an exact science for a map, but those are the identified medians throughout our city. The residents who have challenges with panhandlers in their community can really understand if the panhandler that they see on their daily commute will be impacted by this or will they not. With that, I'll yield the floor, Mr. Mayor.

Mayor: Thank you, Counselor. Let me take an opportunity to try to respond to some of your points. I can't cover them all. First of all, I don't think anybody said that everybody who's standing on a median is dealing with some sort of mental illness or behavioral health issue. I think that's a misinterpretation of comments that were made, and I think it's really inappropriate to put words into other people's mouths. It was stated, Mr. Counselor, excuse me, I have the floor.

I think we have a safety issue, and it's based largely on the areas where there is a confluence of narrow medians and significant high-volume traffic. And I think the issue is not what your personal, what the individual is dealing with who may be standing there, but whether it's safe for them to be standing there. I agree with you completely that it's a mistake to put together things that don't belong together. I was the one who answered your question by saying this is not about homelessness, this is not about people who are panhandling. This is primarily about a map that shows specific categories of medians that are very narrow and streets that are very, very high volume. And the people who are there may not be panhandling, Counselor. I didn't even use the term panhandling. They may simply be there in a dangerous place, diverting attention from drivers because they're holding a provocative political sign, as we heard earlier. It's their right to hold a provocative political sign, but don't do it in a place where it could cause an accident. Over on the sidewalk, sidewalks are wide and they're safe. Don't do it in the middle of the street.

As far as public safety and the ways to make our streets more safe, I also completely agree with you that we have an opportunity to do a much better job. New Mexico has a very high volume of pedestrian deaths. And you've been chair for BPAC. I'm still waiting for your first proposal to come to the city government as an ordinance or a Vision Zero proposal. I haven't seen those forthcoming, so please do bring them forward so we can take steps coming out of BPAC to implement the strategic plan and do things that will reduce pedestrian deaths. But it's not an either/or choice. We can do many different things all at the same time that reduce pedestrian deaths, provide more safety on our streets, and allow our officers to have a tool in their toolkit to address situations that common sense tells you are dangerous.

The police are very good at prioritizing their calls. The police do an outstanding job of recognizing where their time is best spent in crime or responding to calls for service, and we can do, they are capable of doing many different things with the resources we have simultaneously. You mentioned enforcement of noisy cars, enforcement of speeding, and enforcement, in my opinion, of unsafe situations where people are standing in very narrow medians and are putting at risk the life and limb of themselves and of the drivers. It's not an either/or choice, any more than it's a choice of improving driver safety through BPAC recommendations or implementing this ordinance, which can also provide safety in critical parts of the community where there is a common sense recognition that people are standing in a very unsafe place and risking themselves and the people who are driving by there. So I don't see it as either/or. I don't see it as we have to do one thing and not the other. I think the safety of our public and of our community asks us to do both of these things simultaneously. Let's let some other voices respond.

Can we get some... Yeah, we need time because I think all of us have... He directly referenced my history, but I want to respond. I just... But just going forward here, I think we need to... You'll have it. We'll come back around, Counselor. Have him respond, but I think, you know, this has become... You know, it'll be... We... Some other voices. I promise you, we'll come back maybe. Let's look to this side of the Counselor. Let's just take... Everybody will have a chance. Everybody's got strong feelings.

Councilor Lee Garcia: Thank you, Mayor. Yeah, I think that so we don't have anyone here from our Land Use Department who may have some experience in engineering, maybe civil engineering. They all left. Well, I think where I'm going with that is just trying to focus on what we're trying to discuss here in regards to this bill. And as we can see, there's going to be some consequences for people if this does move forward. And yet, I think what we need to really look at is what is the intent of the bill and how is it going to affect or how is it going to work for the purpose that it's being designed for, without making any assumptions as to it's for panhandling. I mean, if it's for panhandling, then I think we need to revisit panhandling. I know that that's part of what we're discussing here. It's already been stated that we don't enforce panhandling because of certain rights for people that are afforded to them by the Constitution.

And so I just Googled it, okay, medians. What is the purpose of a median? And it's just, it's just basic. So a median is to divide the roadways. It says raised barriers in the center proportion of the street or roadway are appropriate in some locations. They're not appropriate in others. They are a pedestrian benefit because they can serve as a place of refuge for pedestrians who cross a street mid-block or at intersections. It's not for them to hang out there, it's for them to cross. If you were to take a look at another, and I'm referencing just a quick Google search, a median is the area between opposing traffic lanes, excluding turn lanes. Medians in urban and suburban areas can be defined by pavement markings, raised medians, or islands to separate motorized and non-motorized road users.

And so my focus here is what is their purpose? And again, we realize how they're being used in certain ways for people to express their freedoms, whether they're asking for money. But it's not a place of refuge, permanent refuge, or not permanent refuge, but extended refuge. And so, you know, I think that we do have, Chief, I might ask the Chief to come back up here really quick just to ask you a couple of questions. Chief Joyce, could you come back up, please?

Chief Joyce: Hi there. Miss you guys.

Councilor Lee Garcia: Thank you, Chief, for being here tonight. And I don't think that you could probably back this up by data because I'm sure there's a lot out there and you weren't prepared for this question, but what is probably the number one reason for vehicle accidents at intersections, especially vehicle accidents that end up in very serious either injuries or death?

Chief Joyce: Mr. Mayor, Councilor Garcia, I would not be able to tell you that off the top of my head. That's certainly something I can pull for you. I can tell you what we did pull, and it's not really answering your question, I guess, but I had them pull citations related to driving over the past couple of years. Reckless driving, 2024, there were 40. 2023, there were 66. 2022, there were 80. 2021, there was 62. Total of 248. Careless driving citations are a total of 916 over that same time span. Prohibited activities while driving, including hands-free devices, texting while driving, animal or child in the lap, 1,621 citations for that. So, but really specific to your question about the cause for crashes at intersections, I wouldn't be able to tell that off the top of my head.

Councilor Lee Garcia: Thank you. I think where I'm headed with this is that my just basic assumption would be distracted driving, whether it's being texting. We have ordinances that address that. We have

ordinances that address, basically, and it goes towards driving, when people are in the middle of roadways or let's just say on medians. Could that be a possible reason why somebody may be distracted?

Well, Mr. Mayor and Councilor Garcia, I'm going to kind of bounce around a little bit, but if someone were distracted to the point by someone in the median that they were to get into a crash, that would be considered at fault on the driver who was distracted. Similarly, if they were, just as they would be if they were distracted because they were looking at their phone, anything that takes their focus away from the roadway is going to be considered distracted driving. I don't know if that really answered...

It does. And again, I guess I'm just going back to the safety aspect of this because what is the purpose of medians? It's really not to be on there. And I know we're just focusing on the medians that are less than 36 inches. And so, I drive around town and I see many people on medians that are almost only a foot wide, and it's very distracting when you're coming up to the light and you know, you may hit the person in front of you, you might have to change lanes. I see many people moving over just because there's somebody there asking for money and they don't want to get in that lane. I think that's wrong. If you give money, don't give money, I don't know, it's a person's prerogative to do so. But I think that it does create an issue of safety in our community. I think that, you know, I go back to the basic purpose of the median. It's basically to separate traffic. A line between the two lanes is basically considered a median, and I would assume people wouldn't stand on that line because that'd be very dangerous. You don't want to run over somebody doing that. I just go into, I think that's really it from your perspective.

Well, maybe one other thing. And so we'll just talk about sidewalks. Sidewalks are for pedestrians to walk on, correct?

That is correct.

Okay. We do have ordinances in our city that do not allow people or individuals to either congregate or block sidewalks. They can congregate as long as they're not obstructing a sidewalk.

Yes, can obstruct. Again, there's another rule in another ordinance that speaks to what these items are intended for. And I think that it's unfortunate that it does affect, it will affect individuals who utilize these areas for certain reasons. And you know, I'm as compassionate as anyone else to try to help someone, but I think that the more that we allow this to happen, especially in areas that are very narrow, creates a situation where not only the individual is unsafe, but so is everyone else. Vehicles are deadly weapons. They are. Crashes kill people every single, and I think that a lot of this happens through being distracted. And I think this is one area that contributes to that. I think that's really about it, but no more questions for you, Chief. I'll just make my comments.

And in regards to, you know, wherever anyone relies on this in their thinking and how it's right or it's wrong or it will work or won't work, I would like to see, if this does pass, some sort of data, historical data going forward so we can kind of see if it's working. If it's not working, well then, you know what, I think that's something that we need in terms of all of our ordinances. Are these working? Are they being enforced? And if they're not, well then retract it. But I think from a safety perspective, I think this is a good start. I am in favor of it, and I do understand and realize how compassionate you all are for people that are unhoused. And I think that that's not a conversation for what we're dealing with here. I think this really is for safety of not just people standing on medians, but also those that are driving in vehicles who could possibly be distracted just trying to reach in their pocket to get a couple of dollars out. You know, a good deed turns into something that really does affect somebody else's livelihood tremendously. Thank you.

Thank you, Councilor. I'm going to try to go back and forth across the sides. Councilor Caster, did you want to take the floor?

Sure, thank you so very much. Great questions from everyone, very interesting conversation. I am going to have a few questions for the Disability Board, so I hope some folks will be able to answer those questions. I will also have some questions for Chief Joy, so please don't go too far. I also have some for City Attorney, so I'll try to go down the line. Here we go.

I think that there was a sort of misclassification of some of the concerns from the community stating that all medians would be affected. I think it was more a concern that anyone would be negatively affected by this legislation. I think there's a big concern that we're not trying to allocate dollars through ordinances like this, and we've been told several times that that's something we shouldn't do. There's another piece of legislation we have coming up that we are actually holding back to make sure that we have an implementation process before that goes into effect. And yet, in this situation, we are most literally criminalizing folks, as we have heard today, without any implementation and without knowing where those dollars are coming from. So I am a little bit surprised. I am concerned that we are regulating a problem that we have heard. I mean, folks, I drive a vehicle that could hurt someone, and instead of regulating those vehicles, we are regulating the pedestrians that are most at risk from those vehicles. So that's also a little bit interesting to me. We're focusing on the problem from a really interesting angle and saying some of these folks might be unhoused, some of these folks might be needing to make a living. I find it very interesting that we're using the example of selling flowers. I do find it not only a little bit racially charged, but a very good example of somebody who is making a living from those medians. We've talked about medians and the safety on roadways, yet there is no conversation about folks that are using cones on double lines. I buy my paper from somebody who is not even on a median, is on a double line, and this doesn't regulate that at all.

I think that a lot of the conversations that we've heard today actually can be dealt with, as Councilor Garcia mentioned, by other ordinances like obstructing the sidewalk or obstructing any pathways. But also, human trafficking and slavery and exploitation is against the law. If somebody is being forced to ask for money on a median, that is already against the law. We don't need to pass this legislation for that to be enforced. If we are asking law enforcement officers to be in the median and talk to folks, that is putting another person in the median at risk unless we're going to shut down the entire roadway while this is happening. Is there anything in this legislation that protects the folks who are on the median from harassment from drivers? I've seen drivers throw things at people, throw coffees, scream and shout at people who are in the median, who are clearly not having the best day of their life that day. Is there anything that protects those folks in this legislation? So I'll defer to the sponsors to answer a few of those questions.

Let's see. There is nothing in this bill that addresses protecting people who are standing in medians less than 36 inches from anything. No, this bill is not designed to protect people who are standing in medians from bad behavior by drivers. If, to your point about laws that are already on the books, if somebody is on a sidewalk and they're assaulted, that's already a crime. If somebody is in a median and they're assaulted by a driver or another pedestrian, that's already against the law. So I think I might need Chief Joy for the next few questions. One of those is, if somebody is assaulted on a median, what is the process by what means can they report that? Another question would also be, what does enforcement look like and how much do you think it might cost to enforce a program of education for both our officers and our community members?

Okay, so I'll do one at a time. So as far as, let's say a person in the median is assaulted or battered by someone that are driving by, they would call police. Hopefully they'd be able to record the license plate of the vehicle, and that person would face charges or they could be again cited. It's not a misdemeanor exception, and that's a whole separate conversation. So they couldn't be arrested, but they could be issued a citation or summons into court for it.

I would imagine you would need some sort of evidence if somebody was word against word, I imagine.

Right. If it's a he said, he said, he said, or he said, she said, they want to work that out. Yeah, that makes it more challenging. It would still be documented, but without a witness to verify or some sort of video, some sort of supporting evidence, then yeah, it's unlikely charges would be brought forward.

Thank you so much. So I know that you and I have had some conversations about the difficulties with some community members dealing directly with law enforcement. And part of our outreach to community members that are unhoused is sort of meeting them where they are. What we've heard today from service providers is that they don't actually feel that this is going to help. By and large, the folks who are in this room who work daily with the unhoused population feel that it is better for somebody who is trained in mental health services and possibly the ARU. We've heard from some other folks. What is your opinion on law enforcement interactions with some of the folks who are having mental health crises or are in unhoused communities? So far, have they been positive overall or negative overall?

So let's see. I'm not sure I'm going to answer this right. So as someone who has been a large proponent and supporter of ARU, yeah, ideally, these folks are first contacted by our professionals who are trained and better specialized in getting them services. And that is why again, I'm in support of the expansion of ARU to the extent that it can be. How that relates to law enforcement, often times, and I've referenced this before, the behavior that they're being, that they're exhibiting at the time of a call or whatever, appears as criminal, right? Even though maybe the underlying factor in and of itself isn't criminal. That's why the majority of the calls for service that we get year to year, the majority of those calls are disorderly conducts and welfare checks because the behavior exhibited by the person being called on is such that the person who calls is concerning. I don't know if I'm about around this here. So beyond ARU being a preference, refresh again for me what your question is.

I guess I'm sort of leaning towards the idea that there are other agencies besides the police department directly, being that we are a little overstretched, that could be dealing with some of these issues. But because of the way it's written, I'm sorry, cut you off there.

Could be and should be. I agree with you, but they but they aren't. We are because of the way this legislation is written. And I think this may be as for City Attorney, the police officers are the only ones that can issue this citation, is that correct?

City Attorney: May Councilor Castro, for criminal citations, that's the case. Yes, that is how this is written.

So to piggyback off City Attorney, that nothing in there, in the legislation, in the ordinance, would prohibit ARU from encountering these folks first. And as it is now, they have access to our dispatch system, and so it's not uncommon for them to jump.

calls when I say get ahead of those calls before law enforcement because they'll read the narrative, they'll see what it is, and they'll say that that call lines up more with us than it does PD, and they'll take that call for us. So I guess this is a question for the sponsor, Councilor Fagner, and we'll ask the mayor when he comes back if they would be open to possibly changing the wording of this legislation to allow for more inclusive and maybe an approach of different agencies, because my understanding is ARU is in fire right now, not in police. Is that correct?

They are under fire, but they respond to police calls.

Pro Tem Lindell: Councilor C, to be clear, so in terms of enforcement of the ordinance, absolutely police. But to Chief Joy's point, absolutely other agencies are allowed to be involved in these situations. So I don't want my comment to be misinterpreted to say ARU couldn't approach an individual, et cetera. So, and I'll re-ask the question if I was misleading on that, I apologize.

No, no, no. I guess what I'm asking is, would they be open to including language that is a little more explicit in saying that other agencies might also be part of the enforcement mechanism?

Mayor: Councilor C, so if it's an enforcement mechanism, then enforcement refers to the penalty, so that would be criminal in this case. So it would have to go in a totally different section. You could do, I don't think it would be appropriate in this section, which is the uniform traffic ordinance, which are criminal penalties. So my understanding is it really is a, because of where it is in the ordinance, it is a little bit prohibitive that we talk about enforcement because it is necessarily criminal under this part of the ordinance.

Mayor: Councilor Caster, in relation to the enforcement, yes, but that does not preclude other types of community services being involved if that was appropriate. And I'm so in this particular section, you can have multiple sections in an ordinance. I think this, it sounds like you're talking about an additional ordinance because it's somewhat outside the scope of what's been proposed at this point.

Sure. I guess what I'm trying to point out is that this particular ordinance in this section can only be enforced criminally. In terms of enforcement, there might be other agencies that can respond to the call, but when we're talking about actually enforcing this particular ordinance, it is a criminal matter. So for enforcement, yes. So I guess the answer to my question would be, they are not open to that language because we can't do it that way.

Well, I would, let me, I think you and your colleague next door are on to a very good point, which is this: there are many different issues that again, I think we're potentially combining in ways that are not helpful. It's absolutely the case that the ARU is a huge resource for dealing with all kinds of behavior on the street that, where as you said, people are not having their best day. There's no doubt about it. And I'm really proud of our ARU team. And like Chief Joy, we, I think we all want to add resources and grow it and try to make that a really strong part of our community response to people who are, they don't necessarily have to be homeless. Let's not get pigeonholed. People who are having a bad day at in their home could be visited by the ARU and helped in many ways. Our fire department does a huge amount of responses to people who are at home struggling with a domestic situation. So there's absolutely nothing in our current setup that would prohibit all of us from saying to our ARU team, our Miho team, others, you know what, we not only want the ARU to respond to people who are struggling with bad days, but we're sensing that there's a lot of these folks who may be standing in medians and pose a risk to themselves, and we'd like you to make that another part of your response to calls for help.

Sure. And I don't think that that's excluded from possibility, but this ordinance in particular, I think my concern is limiting the contact with folks who might be hesitant with uniformed law enforcement officers. So is there a way that we could potentially do the work of safety without having to include a uniformed police officer who could very well, to my colleague's point, be doing things in other parts of the city, dealing with violent crime, dealing with other resources? I use the sound ordinance as a perfect example. We don't have the manpower to enforce every single ordinance we pass. We are all working on that collectively. So it doesn't seem like overburdening both our code and our law enforcement officers is the best way to go. And I'm thinking of alternatives of how we can not only help Chief Joy, but also activate some of these other agencies.

And Councilor Caster, what I'll say too is what this does do is it also gives ARU another avenue to make that first contact because if the behavior exhibited is illegal, like standing on a median that they shouldn't be standing on, that gives cause for ARU to initiate that contact, whereas they wouldn't have that for someone standing on a larger median. So they can make that contact and be like, "I'm letting you know this behavior, what you're doing now, you can't do it. It's against ordinance. So you can move, but also do you need some other assistance that we can't give you?"

100%. And I think that the goal is to get people resources and services. I just don't think that creating a criminal element to standing in the median, even though it's not particularly punitive, is necessarily going to direct those folks to seek services, get support, or be in a better place. Thank you so much, Chief Joy. I think those are all my questions for you. I appreciate you. I do have a few more questions for the sponsors, but we did talk about sound ordinance. I am concerned that even though we did just raise some salaries for our law enforcement officers, we are still fairly underserviced. We need more officers. We need more city staff, including in public works, to Councilor Garcia's point. If we can barely keep up with the sidewalks and parks and painting that we already have, how are we overburdening our public works department with even more to have to paint these medians, possibly to have to create signage? We just passed a bullying ordinance that is going to need a few signs in all of our city buildings. We could better use the resources that would to enforce this in other parts of the city. That's why I have a ton of other questions, but I'm going to cede the floor to my colleagues. I really hope that we do not pass this today. Thank you.

Counselor, I'm going to turn to my left now and ask Councilor Cassidy to take the floor.

Thank you so much, Mr. Mayor, and thank you everybody, both public and my colleagues on the dais, for a lot of robust conversation. You know, I've had a lot of back and forth. I'm of almost two minds around this ordinance. I think some of the comments that my colleague, Councilor Lee Garcia, were making around the purpose of a median, and I don't believe that medians are safe for people to stand in. We have a lot of conversation around creating separate bike and pedestrian areas because it is safer for them to be in there. A median, quite frankly, is designed in order to, as Councilor Choy was mentioning, separate traffic that is going in opposite directions or act as a refuge as pedestrians are crossing the street. So I think, I think it is a really, you know, kind of interesting aspect of this conversation of, of, you know, whether or not medians should be utilized for these things. They are not designed for this purpose. They, they truly are not. I know that I have seen a number of scenarios that have either put myself and at times my child in danger. I've had situations where people have stepped off a median. I've had to slam on my brakes. Thank God somebody didn't rear-end me with my five-year-old in the car. That's scary. People should not be there. They should not have been standing on that median. However, I, I do think that it is important that we look at the, the overall complexity of this issue, and this is why I do start to have some challenges. I, I have concerns around enforcement. I have concerns around, to Councilor Travis's point, around education, and, and the fact that the individuals that are going to be impacted by this are not watching this meeting. They're not reading the New Mexican. They are probably not on Facebook and looking at, you know, anything that might be discussing this. And so how is that, when we start to think about the equity before we even get to the, the logistics of enforcement, but the equity of enforcing this ordinance, and the people that would impact, how would we really go about this? And what is our primary purpose? I think the point that this is not going to be a monolith of a population is incredibly crucial. This, this is not going to be everybody's homeless or everybody's panhandling or, you know, and, and that allows for some or requires some, I think, nuance in how we start to, to figure this out. I know that in some instances, and I believe we did this actually with, with mufflers, the noisy cars, if you will, not always mufflers, apparently we learned a lot with, with that conversation, that we did have a delay in actually, in actual enforcement, and we spent some time asking for there to be an education of sorts, you know, for individuals that were violating what would eventually be an ordinance, that there was an opportunity to be having these conversations around, by the way, come X date, this is no longer going to be allowable. It is interesting in, in the context of some of this conversation we've been having around who are the different populations, what might the different needs be for these populations, and would potentially a delay in actually implementing this ordinance allow for, for a focus of the ARU, although I do hesitate to say that because I do know that our ARU is heavily utilized, and so I would not necessarily want this for them to be utilized in this way. But our public safety aids, to Councilor Travis's point, or, you know, I, I believe we, we should have a street outreach team somewhere. Do we, does anybody know if we have a street outreach team still? Is that operating under us or under somebody?

You're talking about to do outreach to homeless individuals?

Correct. Do we have, yes, there's a very good, good point, good question. You have people in the audience who are active participants in street outreach. And hang on, we're not doing audience participation, but thank you for doing street outreach. We have, that's the, when, when Built for Zero was mentioned earlier, the whole foundation of Built for Zero is outreach, and it's done by working with a number of groups, the LifeLink and others, the S3 group, the people who do, who are part of our lived experience group, the coalition who testified tonight is very actively engaged in coordinating the efforts for more and better street outreach. As we've now implemented the mobile hygiene unit, working through the interface shelter, that's actually a form of outreach because as folks come to use the mobile hygiene unit to get cleaned up, we're able to have that kind of one-to-one contact with people and get their name and get their, more importantly, get their story about their experience with being unsheltered. So the, the foundation of Built for Zero is, as was said, a by-name list, and the by-name list is built by outreach and one-to-one engagement. It's also collected names and, and, to the extent that people are open to sharing that, is something that our ARU unit asks people politely if they will identify themselves when there's an interaction that is not an existing client, but somebody they're seeing for the first time.

Right. It's that whole no wrong door approach that there is a variety of ways that people are going to be coming in.

the system. As mentioned, law enforcement actually is one of the ways that people sometimes come into the system. So it is interesting as we start to think about these overall goals and what is the goal for these various pockets.

One, when we talk about public safety, I do think that it is important that we take people's stated concerns at face value. I know that it's a lot easier for our own arguments to try to pretend that it's coming from a place of fill in the blank. I don't think that's beneficial for this conversation. So I'm going to take at face value a lot of the conversations from our, you know, my colleagues up here and constituents who have spoken about the various concerns because there really are many, they're numerous. So I am curious because of some of these different issues that we're running into, concerns that we're running into, how we might structure either a timeline or to Councilor Chavez's point earlier, a, you know, is there a warning system? What does this start to look like so that we really are getting to our various goals in the community?

One, we do want pedestrian and driver safety. I mean, it is incumbent upon the driver to stay focused as much as possible. There's always a lot happening and I can't imagine how terrible it would be for somebody who did accidentally hit somebody because they were somewhere that they really should not be. It is not safe to be in a median. It just isn't. They're not designed for that. So, excuse me, please keep it down.

So I think that that's something that I'd be interested in exploring as we did with the mufflers of potentially delaying implementation for three months, six months, knowing that we do have a variety of tools that we can dispatch at this time to say, "Hey, by the way, in about December of this year, we are going to be implementing this law. This ordinance has been passed. It is going to go into implementation. We want to give you the heads up and provide some information." And that way, we also do have a chance to make contact with some individuals that potentially may be interested in resources.

I also know that when I've encountered individuals that are panhandling and I've said, "You know, sorry, I don't have money. I do have a lot of access though. Would you like me to help you get connected with somebody?" I often get rejected. And part of that might be that they do not trust me. And so that kind of repeated exposure, we know, can be really beneficial. And so I do think that again, there can be a very creative solution here that did not get to any of my questions.

So now down to some of the nitty-gritty. Right now, we have changed this as it is currently in front of us for a $25 citation. We should have community service available as an option. Is that still accurate? And I am not sure who would be the appropriate person to answer that as we do not have community here, but maybe city attorneys. Otherwise, city attorney went back to the back of the room, but I can wax poetic for another moment to let her come down the ramp if we need.

It's my belief that when matters come in front of our judge, the judge has the option of a number of things, including dismissing the fine entirely. The court is obviously run independently of any of us and the judge has the latitude to make those decisions.

City Attorney: Did you hear the question about Mayor, Councilors? I believe I heard as they asked the question was whether or not community service would be an option. So it's not a matter of the police deciding. It would be a matter if it were in citation or appeal to court and the judge would look at it.

Okay, because somebody had mentioned that that was no longer occurring, so I wanted to make sure that that is not the case.

Mayor: Councilor, I'm not aware of that not occurring. What, who was the someone?

One of our, one of the public comment.

Mayor: Okay, Councilor, let me just embellish just a touch. We had a really very optimistic and I thought very progressive presentation from our judge at our last governing body meeting. And I thought many of his innovations that he's implemented since taking that role demonstrate the extent to which he's trying to find new ways to engage with the community and to demonstrate that there's flexibility and there's equity in his application of our laws. And I think he struck a really good note, at least with me, in terms of the way in which he's approaching his job, that there's a lot of creative problem solving rather than a one-size-fits-all application of our ordinances. I have a great deal of respect for how he's handling that job.

Okay, well, thank you for letting me know. I'll have to YouTube it since I was out sick last time. I've lost my train of thought. I apologize.

We're sorry. Does an escalated education approach? Okay, hold on. Sorry, I have a lot of chicken scratch here. Guys have given me a lot to talk about.

Albuquerque has had a similar ordinance in place, correct?

Mayor: I, are you, can't speak to that. I know that in the past, ordinances that have really been drafted in a way that does affect First Amendment rights have been struck down. But I don't know what the current situation in Albuquerque is.

Right. I believe, I'm not sure if anybody potentially has this data, but my understanding is that Albuquerque has something similar in place. I'd be curious if, you know, when this was being drafted, if it was looked at how long that's been in place and what has been the impact. What has, you know, has that been successful in really addressing the issues that we are looking to address? So, Castro, you look very excited about this question.

Sorry, I'm pretty sure the one in Albuquerque is being challenged, but I was going to defer to Daniel Williams at the ACLU.

Yes, I do know that it's being challenged, but I was just curious how it's been working. So that's something that looks like we don't have that information. I'll see if I can.

I don't think I'm certainly not equipped or qualified to speak to how Albuquerque's approach to median safety is functioning. I do see a Councilor Garcia.

Councilor Garcia: Sure, I can cite a KRQE News 13 report produced on March 5th, 2024 that says APD is now 10 months into an enforcement campaign with officers writing 55 citations tied to a newer ordinance banning standing on the median.

Right. I'm just curious if it, if in terms of, you know, again, that's how many citations have been issued. I'm curious about the impact on the underlying goal and as if there's been any information there. Sounds like it's kind of a newer pilot still. So something to continue to explore.

Yeah, I think that there's a lot here. I think that there truly are some public safety issues. And we know that there is an intersection with the issues that we deal with homelessness. I know that there have also been some statements by the public that if we were to put this into place, that there would be an increase in crime. I would again be curious if that is true, if there's actually data to support that or not.

What I do find very fascinating is when you look at this, when you look at the map, one of the big areas where there's a lot of, a lot of medians that people should not be standing in are along the Cerrillos Road corridor. And as one of the many councilors actually who represents a big swath of the Cerrillos Road corridor, it splits a lot of our districts. But really speaking from the perspective of District 4, a lot of my constituents who live within about a half mile from Cerrillos Road experience very negative impacts from individuals who are panhandling and come into the neighborhood, who are unhoused, who are crossing back and forth on Cerrillos Road to get to the different medians for different purposes.

And again, I think that it's important that we can both look at this issue. I come from public health. My background is actually working with the unhoused population. It's why I'm here is because I saw that the systems and structures did not work to support individuals. And so I said, "Okay, fine, if I'm going to have to do policy, we're going to have to do policy." However, I cannot ignore the very real lived experiences of my constituents who deal with some of the negative impacts of people being on their sidewalks and being on their streets. And they are experiencing break-ins at 2:00 AM and people on their roofs and their cars getting broken into and very scary situations. They are experiencing people standing on medians that are too small as they're trying to drive to the gym at 5:00 AM in the dark and having negative experiences with that.

So I do think that there's a lot of validity here for, for, you know, the whole plethora of issues that this is involved in. But I think that we may have an opportunity to strike a, strike a balance with maybe a delayed implementation, with maybe some really focused efforts on education as to what's coming, as well as how do we then look at the various facets of this population that we may be seeing on the medians and the various potential resources or, you know, if it comes to it, punishments of individuals that that may be necessary as we kind of how we divide these different individuals. So I will yield the floor for now. Thank you.

Thank you very much. Go back to this side of the house and then we'll come back to that side of the house. Councilor Lindell.

Councilor Lindell: Mayor, well, we have been every place we possibly could go with this. I don't know where else we could go. It's pretty simple. It's medians that are 36 inches or less. I don't think it's safe to stand on those with traffic going around you. There's plenty of other medians in this town, folks. It's not that complicated. It frustrates me how we do complicate these things. Not safe. Stand on this much room. The car is going by at 50 miles an hour on both sides of you. It's not safe. A lot of other places you can go stand, tons of them. Close map shows us that we've gone a long way around the barn with this one tonight. So that's really all I have to say, Mayor. Thank you.

Councilor, Councilor Mayworth, you have been very patient. It's your turn.

Councilor Mayworth: Thank you, Mayor. And thank you to my colleagues for the questions, the comments, the thinking, the work on this. It has been amended. It has been through committee. We have spent a lot of time looking into what it is, what it isn't. And, you know, here we are in this moment of needing to make a decision. I do have one question for Chief Joy, which I think might be helpful in a couple different ways. There's concern about educating the population that might be affected by passage of this ordinance. There's also, I think, concern around who would ultimately be ticketed. My understanding of police work, and I'm hoping, Chief, you can speak to this, is that you have discretion. And maybe you can talk about that element of policing and and maybe the philosophy and and and how you as the leader instruct your force in using discretion.

Chief: Mayor, Councilor Mayworth, yeah, as I've said, the closest thing I could think of in relation to this was the mask ordinance that I went through in 2020, where the initial push was an education, education-based enforcement. So as it would relate to this, I would expect the officers when they make initial contact or even PSAs when as they're available or ARU, to advise the individual, "This median, you can't be on this median. There's plenty of other places you can go. We're going to need you to to go somewhere else." If that person were to come

comply with that and relocate somewhere else. Awesome, that's great. Then a request was made, and they honored that request. If the person wants to push back or insist or do some otherwise challenge to that request, then certainly I would expect a citation probably come out of that, and then they would be encouraged to go to court and challenge it in court if they insist on going that route.

So if you saw somebody on the median repeatedly who'd been told over the course of some period of time that that median was not a safe place to be, and they weren't listening, that might be a situation where you would then, under this ordinance, have the authority to issue a citation.

Councilor: In a situation like that, I would expect, yeah, if the officer has firsthand knowledge, "I've told that guy or person," or "I know another individual has advised that person they can't be there," then I would certainly expect the next step to be a citation. And again, if this passes tonight, how would you instruct your force in their approach to implementing this ordinance?

It's no secret to my department what my preference is as far as taking the opportunity to educate the public first. That is something that even when we have the broader conversation of de-escalation and having compliance and working with individuals, no one wants to just issue a citation first off for something like this if we can encourage that person, especially when we talk about calls for service, to go somewhere else. If I'm on my way to a call for service and I can roll my window down, "Hey man, you can't be in that median," while I'm going to handle that thing, then great. And if I come back after that call for service and they're still there, and I might have that one-to-one contact and be like, "Hey, I drove by, did you hear me when I said that you can't be here?" And we re-engage and have that conversation again. But that first contact could be as simple as rolling my window down on my way to a call for service and say, "Hey man, you can't be on that one. There's plenty of other places you can go." Broadly speaking, that is the preference of folks that work with us here.

Do you have the ability to reach out to the ARUs and say, "Hey, there's somebody on a median that's not safe, and could you direct them?" Or does that all have to come through the call center?

No, so our officers absolutely can do that. And I heard a call for service today, actually, where, and I don't know the nature of the call, I just heard the tail end of it, where they went back in service and advised that they were referred to ARU to follow up with. And so for, and our guys, our men and women, our officers have gotten really good about self-recognizing when a call for service is better suited for ARU. So something like this where they know they're busy, we know we're busy, they can also request ARU handle certain calls for service.

Okay, thank you. Thank you for being here tonight. That's all I have, Mayor.

Thanks. Thank you, Councilor Faulkner. You got an early overview of your thoughts and a response to a question, but if you have anything else that you want to add before we go back around, I give you the floor.

I guess I just have, yeah, I want a final question. I don't want it to pass without us realizing that we have a lot of questions, and it seems that there's still work that needs to be done on this. And a vote to pass this resolution today will, in fact, criminalize anybody that gets a citation, whether we like that or not. Where it is in the code, that is what we are doing. Thank you.

Thank you. Comments, questions? Councilor Garcia.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor. I just want to refer back to some comments you made earlier around your interpretation of myself now bringing forth any legislation that, in particular, I think you referenced BPAC. And so I just want to refresh your memory on some of the legislation that not only has come before this governing body but has passed. Creation of complete streets, making our community safer. Passage of the e-bike ordinance, making our community safer. Who can forget the maintenance resolution, my golly, making our community safer. And then there's been other work that necessarily hasn't been legislation but other critical matters such as wayfinding. And so I just want to set the record straight and not have misinformation be put out there in regards to legislation that I've brought forth, the legislation that BPAC has brought forward.

Now, on a separate topic, I believe a delayed implementation is warranted for this. We've been allowing this type of activity forever, and as referenced by one of my colleagues, we actually have an ordinance that prevents panhandling that we don't enforce because of the constitutionality challenges that it could bring before our community. And I think it is prudent of us to, should this pass, delay the implementation of it, which would allow for an appropriate plan of implementation to be developed, whether it be signs. I know Albuquerque has signs that refer to the ordinance or the painting of medians, whatever it may be. But I believe there needs to be a coordinated campaign that ultimately informs the community in regards to what is now law. Because I think at the end of the day, we all want a safer community. We all want to ensure that Chief Joy and his team can appropriately enforce the law. And I think I can speak for myself, I hope that whether it be a response be provided by PD for criminal citations or the ARU pinpoint folks in the direction of appropriate services, the delay for at least six months would allow for appropriate planning for implementation. So that's all I have, Mr. Mayor. Thank you.

Councilor Lindell, I'm going to move to call the question.

Second.

Okay, oh, remind me, remind me how that worked. We, Councilor, so it's, it's has a second now, and it's not debatable, and it goes to a vote, and you need two-thirds.

Okay, we need two-thirds to call the question. So, oh, the question at hand is whether or not to deny.

No, the question at hand is the question was called, and we have to vote to agree to that. So why don't you call the roll on the motion to call the question?

Councilor Travis? Yes. Councilor Faulkner? Yes. Councilor Lee Garcia? Yes. Councilor Michael Garcia? Yes. Councilor Lindell? Councilor Romo Worth? Yes. Councilor Cassett? Yes. Councilor Castro? Yes. Mayor Weber? Yes.

Motion passed.

Okay, so the question's been called, and the matter in front of us is a motion to deny the bill. And we've discussed it. Everybody's had ample opportunity to speak. I will ask the clerk to call the roll.

Councilor Faulkner? No. Councilor Lee Garcia? No. Councilor Michael Garcia? Yes. Councilor Lindell? No. Councilor Romo Worth? No. Councilor Cassett? No. Councilor Castro? Yes. Councilor Travis? No. Mayor Weber? No.

Motion did not pass.

Okay, I'll entertain a different motion.

I move to approve Bill 2024-7, adoption of ordinance 2024. Do we have a number?

No, Councilor, we don't have an ordinance number yet. Could we add to that or what? One thing at a time. Let's get a motion on the floor. Then there is already a package of amendments, and then there may be additional amendments that people want to introduce. But I'll second.

We have a motion to approve the bill as introduced and a second. And we also have some ideas for amendments. Councilor Lindell.

I would move that we pass Amendment C that is in our packet. It is an amendment introduced by Mayor Weber.

Is there a second?

Second.

There's a motion and a second to adopt this set of amendments. As the sponsor, I would just indicate that almost all of these were directly a response prompted by a series of conversations I had had with our disability community who were eager to make sure that there was no ambiguity about people trying to cross the street. Somebody who is a senior citizen or somebody who has some form of a different capability who gets to the middle of the median but hasn't been able to make it all the way across the street would be under no circumstances covered by a citation. That people who are injured and need help would be helped. That the people who are helping them would not be subject to any kind of citation. That we're really trying to focus very much on the safety issue, but not people who are dealing with a disability and can't make it all the way across the street, but whose intent clearly is to cross the street in a safe and legal manner. And so that package, this language, this package of language amendments really derives from my discussion with the chair of our committee and other members of that committee, and then working to make sure that the language is clear and helpful to both people who are trying to cross the street and to make it clear to our law enforcement personnel what the limits of this bill really are. So that's entirely what the package is about. Any other discussion about the amendment? Madame Clerk, there's a motion to amend the main amendment. Can we call the roll on the amendment?

Yes, Mr. Mayor. Councilor Michael Garcia? Yes. Councilor Lindell? Councilor Romo Worth? Yes. Councilor Cassett? Yes. Councilor Castro? Yes. Councilor Chavez? Yes. Councilor Faulkner? Yes. Councilor Lee Garcia? Yes. Mayor Weber? Yes.

Motion passed.

And I think Councilor Faulkner, you have an idea that you'd like to bring forward. Y'all need the city attorney's help with this. Did we get language for the amendment, and do we have an amendment number?

Mayor Weber, Councilors, I think this will be Amendment D. I'm not, I think our policy, we might have it. Our legislative director was working on that. Can I just give broad strokes? So the idea is to introduce a Part D that creates an effective date six months from passage. Marcy, do you have the language? So because they have to consider it in writing, our process requires a written amendment.

May Councilors, it sounds like it is coming in hot. You emailed it already. We should have that to be able to put on the screen here in a minute.

Okay, go ahead. While we're getting the actual language on the screen, I think you might want to take the floor to talk about what your amendment is intended to do.

Right. So I think there were a lot of good points from our colleagues and from the community. I think giving six months is an appropriate time to allow us to educate the people that are most impacted, including people in the vehicles and the people in medians. I also think it might give us some more time to dive into implementation a little bit more. And so, been listening to all of you, that would be my amendment.

As a sponsor, Mr. Mayor, question. Yes, maybe it's for the city attorney. I know we frequently have this conversation around, you know, how detailed do we get in some of these pieces. Again, that six-month goal is really, or, you know, as Councilor Faulkner just stated, and I think that I've heard from, well, I'll speak for myself, really this education piece and outreach component. It sounds like some more information from implementation is what would be desired from the governing body as a whole. And then I would be curious about, I know we've discussed in the past kind of having review of, did this, is this doing what we wanted to do? We don't frequently put that in ordinance because that's going into code. But I am curious what the, do we, you know, stating it enough, like what is the mechanism by which we kind of put this intention in place?

Marcy, Councilors, so intentions aren't generally an ordinance. So certainly you can review an ordinance at any time. And the council doesn't have a mechanism in place to review certain things that are in resolution. There's at least one I'm going to flag for the council that is.

scheduled to be reviewed that we haven't reviewed because there wasn't a mechanism to remind the council to do so. That was a resolution, but you certainly can review at any time. So I think having an effective date totally makes sense. I don't think you want to put obligations of particular, I think having a timeline is the best way to do an effective date, I guess would be the best thing to say.

Okay, yeah, thank you. I appreciate that. I know we've had this conversation before because of the nature of an ordinance as opposed to a resolution, which is the statement of the governing body. So I just want to make that clear in terms of what's on the record, that over that six months, that that is what I'm really interested in seeing, is this education component and maybe a focused outreach, and especially deploying those resources that we already have in place to most efficiently and effectively reach out to individuals that we want to both let them know about this, but also this is another opportunity as we continue to build that by-name list, as we continue to try to find different resources for people because obviously this is not how we would like people to get resources in our community. We are working very hard to build other opportunities that we would like individuals to take advantage of. And so I would like us to use this time for those purposes. Thank you.

I totally agree, Council. I also neglected to weigh in in a supportive way with Councilor Chavez's comments about community health and services that support our folks who are struggling. The front page in the paper this morning suggested that while some progress had been made with behavioral health and mental health services, we're still far, far, far from having adequate services for people who are in need. And while the Built for Zero model begins with the by-name list, so we know who is struggling with homelessness and we can address individually those individuals' needs, at the end of the day, the success depends not only on housing, but also on what you pointed out quite accurately, the need for people to get supportive mental and behavioral health services. Housing is a start, but if there aren't additional mental and behavioral health services, it really isn't enough. It's necessary but not sufficient.

Counselor, I just want to point out real fast with Built for Zero and the by-name list, some of the individuals on that list aren't unhoused or are choosing to be unhoused, but still having the contact puts responsibility on us to still meet their needs where they're at. So as much as it meets the goal for homelessness that we're trying to achieve, I think that I just want to emphasize it's the contact and the other resources that can come with that outside of housing that's important with that movement.

Yeah, thank you. Any luck with an amendment that we can all take a look at?

Mayor: I'm waiting for the scan to finish.

Oh, you have to, it has to clear our filter. Yes, ma'am. It shouldn't take too much time. And there it is. Madam Clerk, for the benefit of people who aren't in the room but might be listening, can you read it out loud? Because it's a very brief statement.

Letter D, effective date. This ordinance is effective February 1, 2025.

Very clear, very short, very specific. Is there a motion? Second. You can't have moved it until we saw it. Okay, make a motion.

Motion to approve Amendment D.

Second.

There's a motion and a second to add this amendment to the bill. It would create a new date by which, for which this measure would become effective. Is there a discussion of the amendment?

I think it's, I support it. I think it is very responsive to what we heard from the members of the governing body and also from the community. No other discussion. Madam Clerk, can you call the roll?

Yes, Mr. Mayor. Councilor Lindell? Councilor Romero Worth? Yes. Councilor Cassett? Yes. Councilor Castro? Yes. Councilor Chavez? Yes. Councilor Faulkner? Yes. Councilor Lee Garcia? Yes. Councilor Michael Garcia? Yes. Mayor Weber? Yes.

Motion passed. Very good. So now we have a main motion as amended. Is there a discussion of the main motion as amended? Madam Clerk, can you call the roll?

Yes, Mr. Mayor. Councilor Lee Garcia? Yes. Councilor Michael Garcia? Yes. And I'd like to explain my vote. Councilor Lindell? Councilor Romero Worth? Yes. Councilor Cassett? Yes. Councilor Castro? No. Councilor Chavez? Yes. Councilor Faulkner? Yes. Mayor Weber? Yes.

Motion passed. Thank you. Councilor Garcia, you have the floor.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor. This is a really troubling matter in regards that we are, from my perception, passing a law with deep, deep, deep lack of data. And that is not how good government moves forward. I will be keeping a very close eye on this ordinance because my hope is that the city can take the approach of being proactive and provide support services versus penalize anybody that's on a median that is less than 36 inches. I think the city needs to take the approach of giving a hand up, and by criminalizing folks, you're giving them a hand down and giving them a fine. And so I'm encouraged by Chief Joy's words that I heard earlier around education and not necessarily criminalization. And so I hope that carries out in practice because if we do see a lot of criminalization versus helping individuals that are in deep need, then I strongly encourage us, we begin to revisit this. Thank you, Mr.

Thank you, Counselor. Madam Clerk, can you take us to the next item on the agenda, please?

Certainly, Mr. Mayor. The next item is 11 appointments. 11A is appointments to the Airport Advisory Board. Randall Limacher, reappointment, term ending February 2027. And John Flores, appointment, term ending February 2027. Councilor Lindell, do you want to speak to this? You are our Airport Advisory Board leader.

No, I think that I think it's important that we do have some turnover on some of these boards. We've recently had some problems getting forums, and I think that getting new folks in that are interested and want to have input, that it's really important. So I support these. Thank you.

Thank you. Is there discussion or can I get, did we get a motion to, no, we need a motion.

Councilor Lindell, move to approve.

Second.

There's a motion and there's two seconds. Is there a discussion of either of these individuals? Madam Clerk, can you call the roll?

Certainly, Mr. Mayor. Councilor Romero Worth, she had to be excused at the last minute. Okay. Councilor Cassett? Yes. Councilor Castro? Yes. Councilor Chavez? Yes. Councilor Faulkner? Yes. Councilor Lee Garcia? Yes. Councilor Michael Garcia? Yes. Councilor Lindell? Yes. Mayor Weber? Yes.

Motion passed. Thank you. The next item for appointments, Madam Clerk.

11B, Community Development Commission. Alyssa Kenny Guyer, reappointment, term ending March 2027. Anne Watkins, reappointment, term ending March 2027. And Ken Hughes, reappointment, term ending March 2027.

Is there a motion?

Move to approve.

Second.

There's a motion and a second. Is there a discussion of any of these individuals? Madam Clerk, can you please call the roll?

Certainly, Mr. Mayor. Councilor Castro? Yes. Councilor Chavez? Yes. Councilor Faulkner? Yes. Councilor Lee Garcia? Yes. Councilor Michael Garcia? Yes. Councilor Lindell? Yes. Councilor Cassett? Yes. And Mayor Weber? Yes.

Motion passed. Thank you. And we have one more or two more. Let's go to the next one.

Next one is Human Services Committee. Thess Hunter Chanel, reappointment, term ending March 2026.

Is there a motion?

Move to approve.

Second.

We have a motion and second. Madam Clerk, would you call the roll?

Councilor Chavez? Yes. Councilor Faulkner? Yes. Councilor Lee Garcia? Yes. Councilor Michael Garcia? Yes. Councilor Lindell? Yes. Councilor Cassett? Yes. Councilor Castro? Mayor Weber? Yes.

Yes. Motion passed. Thank you. And Madam Clerk, I believe we have another one.

The last one is the Santa Fe Public Library Board. It's William Carnoso. This is a county appointment and he will be filling an unexpired term ending July 2025.

Is there a motion?

Move to approve.

Second.

We have a motion and we have a second. Is there a discussion? Madam Clerk, can you call the roll on that item, please?

Yes, ma'am. Councilor Faulkner? Yes. Councilor Lee Garcia? Yes. Councilor Michael Garcia? Yes. Councilor Lindell? Yes. Councilor Cassett? Yes. Councilor Castro? Yes. Councilor Chavez? Yes. Mayor Weber? Yes.

Motion passed. Thank you. Thus, we complete our agenda, Madam Clerk, and