A new dashboard created by the City of Albuquerque with monthly data related to homelessness shows the city logged over 1,000 encampment sweeps in January.
The site shows how many people use the city’s shelters, how many families move into permanent housing through navigation programs and how many receive eviction prevention assistance, among other metrics.
Katie Simon, spokesperson with the city’s Health, Housing and Homelessness Department, said the department hopes this will help the public understand budget and program decisions.
“We wanted to display it this way and this in this format so the public can understand a little bit more about what we've got going on every day,” she said.
Among the data is a number for what it calls, “actions on illegal camping,” where city workers removed the belongings of a person or people experiencing homelessness. For January, that number was over 1,067 and public and private property.
A court injunction last year mandated that the city not remove encampments on public property, but people experiencing homelessness and their advocates say the city has continued the practice. The city is challenging the court order. The injunction allows the city to remove campers who are blocking rights of way, are on school property, and in parks with children’s programming.
Simon wrote in an email that the city's process is to address "illegal camping on public property starts with outreach offering folks a shelter bed and storage of their belongings, and if those offers are denied, notice is issued to vacate the area." However, advocates who have been protesting the clearances say that process is not always followed and people lose their belongings and documents.
The dashboard shows over 800 people on average used the city’s shelters each night in January. Five families and six individuals moved into permanent housing through navigation.
It also has a map for service locations, and provides charts showing where people experiencing homelessness in Albuquerque are from.
Editor's note: This story has been updated to reflect the January removals were on public and private properties and that the injunction allows removals on public land if campers are blocking rights of way, are on school property, or in parks with children's programming. It also includes the city's process it says it follows when conducting clearances.
This coverage is made possible by the W.K. Kellogg Foundation and KUNM listeners.
