One local business owner says he was just trying to help out and improve his community. But a city fine, a lawsuit over constitutional rights, and finally a shooting death has threatened to put an end to his effort. At the center of it all, the fate of where 15 people call home hangs in the balance.
Quirky Used Books and More is nestled in a neighborhood between Albuquerque’s affluent Nob Hill and the more economically deprived International District, off of Central Avenue and Jefferson Street Northeast.
The owner, Gilum Kerley, said he wants his store to be more than just another shop, but rather a community hub where people of all walks of life can come and feel welcome. He said at first he was just letting people with nowhere else to go hang out inside when it was hot or cold out.
Then he started letting one person camp in the parking lot, and expanded when the City of Albuquerque made public camping a crime. Now an entire community has sprouted up there.
“It became something that we kept being told that people needed,” Kerley said. “That when they camped anyplace on public property, their tents will be taken by the city. All of their possessions will be thrown into the back of a garbage truck.”
Jeremy Ryan and a man who goes by FRE$H said they’ve both been living at the camp at Quirky for several years, and feel like part of something at the bookstore.
FRE$H said it’s more than just a place, it’s a home, and in addition to access to the bookstore’s facilities and electricity, he said the people add to the experience.
“Definitely,” he said. “I wake up and I have a neighbor to my side, and I'm able to wave and say good morning to somebody.“
He said life hasn’t become all roses and rainbows, but it’s a huge weight off his shoulders just having a place of his own.
“I'm still trying to survive day to day,” he said. “But knowing that I have a place where I can lay my head gives me, definitely, opportunity to try to survive more. You know, instead of worrying about where I'm gonna sleep, I could worry about where I'm going to eat.”
But not everyone feels the camp lives up to its intended purpose. Alfredo Barrenechea is a local real estate agent and entrepreneur who owns the building that shares its western property line with Quirky Books, which is the fence where the encampment is located.
“I've been threatened. There was a guy in his parking lot one day with a machete. There was actually a guy in the parking lot with a samurai sword threatening to kill us,” he said. “A guy ran through our parking lot waving a gun once trying to get over there. I mean, you name it.”
Although Kerley said he personally interviews and approves everyone living on the property, Barrenechea said Kerley isn’t doing enough to control what happens there.
“Why are there needles every day? I smell fentanyl being smoked — every morning. I have cleaned up human poop from under the fence. I mean, he's not providing a safe place. And I get it, they're not welcome. It’s a huge, huge issue, and especially in our city,” Barrenechea said. “But what Gil is doing is providing a place for the party. That's where the party is, you know? The drug dealers come and go all the time. I can almost guarantee you that shooting was a drug-related incident.”
On Saturday, November 15 shortly before 1:00 a.m., Gregory Antone, was shot and killed in the street in front of Quirky Book’s parking lot, according to the city, which also sayid Antone was arguing with members of the encampment prior to the shooting.
In response, the city filed an injunction to shut the camp down, which is slated to go before a judge on January 8. The city did not reply to KUNM’s multiple requests for comment.
Kerley said his surveillance camera shows Antone never approached or spoke with anyone living on his property, or as he puts it, his “people.”
The business just north of Quirky north, also had surveillance cameras, but the owners said they didn’t capture the shooting itself.
Sarah Ferrell, co-owner of the Albuquerque School of Healing Arts, said she turned over the tapes to police regardless, which did capture the shooter as he walked by.
Ferrell said she’s also had issues with the encampment. After someone stripped it for copper, she paid $13,000 to replace her air conditioning unit. And after smelling fentanyl smoke and finding syringes, and finding several fires around the neighborhood, she said her main concern is safety.
“It's one thing, what's going on in the parking lot, and then it's created a real attraction of other people to the neighborhood,” Ferrell said.
Both Ferrell and Barrenechea said adding services like security and bathrooms, might help alleviate their concerns.
Albuquerque does have laws regarding safe open spaces, or designated camping areas for people living on the streets, which would require 24/7 security, permanent bathrooms with running water, access to services, and more.
But Kerley said those requirements would price him out of being able to set up a space. The security alone would cost more than $100,000 dollars per year at minimum wage. He said at least this way, he’s providing a space that’s not in a park or on a sidewalk directly in the path of the public.
Kerley is currently suing the city about his constitutional right to do what he wants on his property, including to continue the camp without having to comply with those sorts of requirements.
Ferrell said she understands what Kerley is trying to do, and even supports it to a certain extent, but thinks it should be handled differently.
“We're a school of healing arts. We're here to help people. We're very compassionate,” she said. “We don't like the situation. We want people to get help. We're not just treating it as a nuisance. We're treating it as a systemic problem that we're all involved in and and we'd all like to help.”
Ferrell said because of how she has been depicted in some news stories, that she’s received hate mail and negative reviews and attention online.
“I just feel like people need to know that all the rest of us in this neighborhood, we have become friends. We get together. We try to look out for each other. We let people know when we see something on their property, and that Gil has just been the outlier right from the beginning,” she said. “I feel like he's over there, kind of like fighting this battle, and feeling like he's in the right and all of us are in the wrong for wanting to protect what we're doing.”
Kerley said he has been motivated out of a sense of community, but Ferrel said he hasn’t been very neighborly. She said all he had to do was reach out with his plans in the beginning.
“Like, ‘Here's what I'm up to. This is my mission. This is what I'm doing. I also want to be a good neighbor and learn about my neighbors and what you guys are doing,’” she said. “I just think that we could have maybe not ended up in this situation with this the animosity that we have now.”
She said even when she went to Kerley with concerns directly, their relationship got worse.
“We made multiple attempts to reach out, you know, and like, over the phone and in person,” she said, “and we're just met with a very defensive and, quite frankly, just rude response when we had very valid concerns, and so tensions have risen, and it's unfortunate.”
Kerley admitted he could do better communicating with his neighbors.
“I mean, I think that's a fair point,” he said. “We did start doing this very — we weren't expecting to be doing this, and started doing this very experimentally.”
He did assert Quirky’s employees help other businesses when someone unwelcome is on their property, but he’s quick to point out the problem is never one of the people he has approved.
Ferrel said Kerley consistently denies that someone from within his camp is responsible for anything in the area.
“You'd think if I went over and said, ‘Oh, people in your parking lot are throwing metal objects at me when I'm getting in my car at night.’” she said. “And instead of saying, ‘Oh, my that sounds like a problem,’ he says, ‘Not my people! My people wouldn't do that,’ you know? And it's like, well, you know, I'm watching them do it.”
Quirky resident Jeremy Ryan admits that sometimes the residents, or other people coming to visit, could try harder to keep the peace with the neighbors.
“Because honestly, we're not really doing our part,” Ryan said. “I think we could be doing a lot more to kind of curb all the bullshit, and, you know, make it seem like we are civil. We're not all just out here to get high and party and just do whatever.”
Ryan says he thinks that some of the residents should “clean up their act or kick rocks.”
Ferrell said regardless of his intent, she feels like some of the campers are actually getting worse as the time moves on.
“He's keeping them comfortable, I guess, and giving them a patch of pavement,” she said. “But he's not offering them any services that I can tell. I don't see any mental health or behavioral health services, or job training. I don't see him trying to lift people out of the situation that they're in.”
But the people living there, like Ryan and FRE$H are clear. They say Kerley is helping. And that their situation isn’t something that can be fixed without the kind of support they get at Quirky Books. They both said if they never found Quirky, they would be in a far worse position.
“I’d say anywhere from dead to anywhere — anywhere,” FRE$H said.
“Crashing out behind the dumpster circle K,” Ryan said.
FRE$H said while at Quirky he’s planning to save up enough to buy a truck and work his way into permanent housing.
Ryan is an artist who has been living at Quirky with his dog, Sombre, a pug and coyote mix. He said while out on the streets he faced a lot more discrimination and dehumanization.
“What I don't get is the amount of hate,” Ryan said. “Just sheer hate, man, that comes out of some of these people is crazy.”
But for people in the neighborhood like Barrenechea, that doesn’t excuse what they have had to experience since the encampment started.
“Why is it that these folks’ right to their space is allowed to beyond infringe — to harm — the rights of the other folks that live and work and feed their families from these businesses in this neighborhood?” Barrenechea said. “I mean, it just doesn't make sense.”
On January 8, the court will give its opinion on the city’s requested injunction, deciding the immediate fate of the camp.
Support for this coverage comes from the W.K. Kellogg Foundation
