ABQ City Council candidates talk traffic safety, buses and housing

Albuquerque City Council hopefuls addressed issues ranging from road safety and creating more bike lanes to affordable housing on Tuesday.

“It’s obvious to many that we have inadequate enforcement of (illegal) driver behavior on our roads,” District 7 write-in candidate Jaemes Shanley said. “To drive virtually anywhere, you’re likely to be going at the speed limit and have somebody pass you at nearly the speed of light.”

Shanley was one of 12 candidates who came to Tuesday evening’s public forum, hosted by BikeABQ and the Albuquerque chapter of Strong Towns, a nonpartisan, nonprofit housing development group.

“Over the past year, several years, Albuquerque has ranked among the most deadly cities in the country in terms of traffic safety,” BikeABQ President Patrick Martin said. “We wanted to see how seriously (the) city councilor candidates are taking the issue.”

District 1 resident Jim Brewster said he came because he was “very interested in having safer neighborhoods for everybody ... (and) interested in seeing if we can get city councilors to really promote that.”

Brewster was one of about 75 people to attend the forum at First Congregational United Church of Christ. In the Nov. 4 election, the council’s odd-numbered districts — 1, 3, 5, 7 and 9 — will be on the ballot, as will the mayor’s seat.

‘Work and engage’

Candidates offered a range of solutions to road safety concerns, including increasing police presence on the streets, protecting bicyclists and putting up pedestrian bridges on Coors Boulevard, which District 1 candidate Ahren Griego said he is in favor of doing.

Fellow District 1 candidate Stephanie Telles said she agreed with Griego’s idea. She added “unfortunately, Coors is a state road, right?”

“And so (as city councilors) we have to be able ... to work and engage with legislators to get that sort of work done,” Telles said.

District 1 candidate Josh Neal said he would like to see fewer traffic lanes and more bicycle and walking routes “to make it easier for people to take more than one way to get to work.”

District 5 incumbent Dan Lewis said the city needs to add a stronger police presence on streets and stiffen traffic violation penalties. His opponent, Athenea Allen, said she supported increased traffic enforcement while also wanting to see speed bumps and traffic circles added to streets.

Teresa Garcia, District 3 candidate, said she wants to see bike lanes painted better on roads “so people know it’s a bike lane” and protective barriers to protect riders.

Aside from road safety, many candidates supported bringing ABQ Ride back to full service, including District 7 incumbent Tammy Fiebelkorn.

“We still have folks that cannot use the bus to get to wherever they need to go,” she said, “and the people that can’t use the bus to get where they need to go are the ones that need it the absolute most.”

When it comes to addressing ABQ Ride and public transportation, Griego said he wants the city to solicit input from residents.

“The public should be deeply invested in this, and we should not leave them out of the conversation,” he said.

Along with transportation concerns, candidates talked about housing and economic development.

“(On the West Side) we got tons of housing going up, but there’s no infrastructure for commercial real estate to build for jobs there,” District 3 candidate Christopher Sedillo said. “We need to do some more zoning, make it easier for (companies) to build.”

Garcia said, “We need to diversify what we have in our district.”

“We need to create more affordable housing, and we need to create more workforce housing, right?” she said, adding that she would like to see more economic development in the area.

“We need to give my community the opportunity to work in the district, live in the district, and thrive in the district,” Garcia said.

Neal said there are reasons developers don’t want to invest. For example, it is “incredibly difficult” to get a city site plan approved.

The city needs someone to come in and reprioritize what is important, he said.

“What do we absolutely need to see and review?” Neal asked. “How can we expedite these review processes? And what can we do to make it easier to build in Albuquerque?”