Cooling center offers care to most vulnerable

At the Compassion Services Center in the International District, puppies splashed about in kiddie pools while their unhoused owners relaxed in the shade on Tuesday, the hottest day of the year so far in Albuquerque. Temperatures climbed to 103 degrees that day, placing the city under an excessive heat warning.

The center, which is the only 24-hour homeless shelter in the International District, has opened its doors as a cooling center during the ongoing heatwave. The shelter now offers meals, hydration, air-conditioning, showers, beds and even recreational activities to the population most vulnerable to heat induced illness: the unhoused.

The center even cares for pets, providing water, food and a safe place to play.

“Everyone you see on the streets, comes here,” said Liane Gallegos, who sat enjoying peach tea and a sandwich with her husband under the center’s shade tent, “on this side of Central, anyways.”

She and her husband, Michael Gallegos, have been experiencing homelessness since their apartment complex shut down. They’re currently living out of a mobile trailer and go to the center every day, not just for meals and a cool place to rest but for companionship, too.

Pastor Joanne Landry, who runs the center with the help of a few staff members and her sons, is spoken about in an almost reverential tone.

“Like I said, she knows us all personally,” Laine Gallegos said. “We’re able to come and have somebody to talk to, no matter what.”

In mid-August, Landry will officiate the Gallegos’ vow renewals in the center’s garden, lush with sunflowers and surrounded by turquoise blue murals.

“There’s been a couple times (while) I’ve been here and I’ve felt like relapsing and I feel like no matter what I can go to pastor Joanne and let her know my problems,” said Andre Burwell, who has been sober for the three weeks he’s been at the center. “And she does it with an open ear and an open heart and that’s the reason I stay.”

Landry affectionately calls Burwell “Hatchet-man” because when they first met Landry had to call the police on a woman attempting to strike him with a hatchet, but Burwell refused to strike back. Burwell showed up at the center that night, and Landry recognized him and called out “Hatchet man!”

They’ve been friends ever since, Landry said.

Burwell would eventually end up in jail with a one-year sentence. Burwell called Landry every week and she answered even when she was in the hospital for cancer treatment or on vacation.

The center, which Landry estimated gives out at least 400 meals a day, began humbly on a street corner with a bag full of candy.

Fourteen years ago, Landry started handing out candy and water bottles to those experiencing homelessness outside of the Interfaith Bible Center in the International District. More and more people began arriving, seeking shelter at the church.

“And then we knew that they needed more,” Landry said.

Now, her mission to provide for her unhoused neighbors has grown into the center with help from the city and other benefactors.

The city donated an old Albuquerque Public Schools building across the street from the church, where Landry opened the center, first as a day shelter.

In winter 2021, Landry was concerned about people who had to leave the center when it closed and sleep in the frigid temperatures at a park nearby.

“That’s when I went to the city and I said, ‘Help me save their lives,’ “ Landry said, “Because they can’t live out there. They’re gonna die.”

The city provided additional funding that December, which allowed Landry to open up a 30-person emergency night shelter and hire a security guard.

“The Center is helping to meet the immediate needs for food, safety, and shelter for our unhoused neighbors while also providing connections to resources needed to exit homelessness,” said Elizabeth Holguin, the deputy director of Homeless Solutions, in a news release last year.

But not everyone approves of the center. Last Saturday, Albuquerque police arrived because they had received a call that someone planned on “shooting up” the center, Landry said. The man suspected of making the call was taken to the hospital by police, she said.

Landry believes the caller was a mentally ill man who lived in a house nearby. But this was far from the first time Landry and her guests have been threatened.

Prior to Saturday, someone shot several rounds into the sidewalk outside of the center, Landry said, which caused her to fear for the safety of her guests and move everyone indoors.

Landry said people have also thrown rocks at unhoused people around the center.

While there are, as Landry described, “homeless haters,” there are also compassionate community members donating their time and money to the center.

Last December, the Boy Scouts of America built a wooden shade structure at the center and purchased all the required supplies. Donations from other community members and churches allowed the center to purchase bunk beds, which expand its capacity to 50 people each night.

While people rotate through the night shelter as it operates primarily on a first-come, first-serve basis, there are seven long-term residents there, one of whom is Cyndi Lucas. Lucas became homeless when her son-in-law’s new job fell through.

“We all had to go into the shelter. For about two weeks, I took care of my grandchildren there. And then they decided to get an RV and go back to Las Cruces and just left me here,” Lucas said in a broken voice. “Here I feel like I can go back home.”