The fate of two high-profile proposed ordinances seems headed for a close vote at the Las Cruces City Council on Aug. 5.
Queries from the Las Cruces Bulletin, combined with previous public statements, show the council apparently split, with at least one member still making their decision.
If passed, the measures would reshape Las Cruces Police Department’s approach to policing homelessness even as unhoused residents and community advocates call the suggested changes inhumane and ineffective.
The topic has become a flash point for Las Cruces politics as conservative and pro-business groups such as Coalition of Conservatives in Action and Businesses for a Safer Las Cruces have backed LCPD in pushing for the changes.
When he spoke to the Bulletin on July 30, Mayor Eric Enriquez said he’d decided to vote for both proposals and lamented that the public debate had reached a boiling point.
“What I see and say as a mayor is we've got to start somewhere, and we move towards the direction that's going to benefit us all, including those on the street,” Enriquez said. “It's not just ‘enforce a law’ or that we just penalize and incarcerate everybody, it's a law that we try to make our city safer.”
Yet that is precisely the criticism the bills have received from civil rights groups and community advocates. They decry the bills as criminalizing homelessness.
“The proposed ordinance is both cruel and impractical,” Nicole Martinez, the executive director of Community of Hope, wrote in an op-ed. “The alternative interventions proposed in the ordinance for individuals who are charged do not currently exist in Las Cruces, leaving the police with no option but to jail people.”
What the bills and officials say
No advocate for the legislation has been more determined than LCPD Chief Jeremy Story.
Since presenting these two proposals to the council on Apr. 29, Story has consistently pushed for their passage, whether at a council meeting or before the state Legislature.
“At this point, I've heard hundreds of stories, and I have my own with my family and my daughter, of people being assaulted, people not being able to shop or put gas in the car because of aggressive behavior,” he said.
But Story also felt the conversation around the bills had widened to a point where the range of outcomes was misrepresented. In an interview, Story and City Attorney Brad Douglas outlined expectations for the public and police officers if the bills pass.
The first bill, Council Bill 25-007, also known as the solicitation bill, would make solicitation or loitering on or near a median illegal, punishable by a fine of up to $500 or 90 days in jail. However, a judge could order community service or mandate mental health or substance abuse treatment.
“When someone is charged with a misdemeanor, it makes it more difficult for them to get a rental lease or a job in the future. Adding charges to the records of individuals living on the street will undermine our community’s ongoing, holistic approach to homelessness through housing, support services and enhancing employability,” Martinez said.
The bill also clarifies the language regarding solicitation already prohibited under city code and removes unconstitutional and unenforceable language regarding roadway solicitation and solicitation on private property.
“The goal of this legislation is to ensure that solicitors are acting in a safe manner by not entering busy streets with speed limits posted at or above 30 miles per hour and to keep persons off thin slices of pavement where there is traffic passing in both directions,” said Douglas. “So long as the median area has a flat surface at least four feet in diameter, and the activity doesn’t cause any person to illegally walk upon an area not marked for pedestrian foot traffic, solicitation would still be allowed.”
The solicitation bill presents itself as a traffic safety ordinance, its preamble stating that pedestrian fatalities in the city increased 150 percent from 2020 to 2023 and that New Mexico has led the country in pedestrian deaths per capita for seven years.
New Mexico Department of Transportation data confirms that vehicle vs. pedestrian deaths are high compared to the rest of the state and country – but there is no evidence to suggest that panhandling in the median is a significant cause of this trend in Las Cruces. A review of news articles, news releases and other public data did not yield a single instance in which a pedestrian was killed in the median while panhandling. A request for data from the city was pending as this edition of the Bulletin went to press.
Story also could not cite an instance in which a person was hit or killed panhandling in recent memory. He noted that most vehicle vs. pedestrian incidents result from pedestrian error.
“Pedestrian error means that a pedestrian is leaving the sidewalk or median and entering traffic and being struck. And so, this isn't just about panhandling. This will apply to someone who's standing in a median, whether they're doing nothing or whether they're panhandling,” he said.
But it’s also not entirely clear if the bill would reduce visible panhandling since only a few medians in Las Cruces would be affected.
“Is it going to stop all fatalities? No,” Story said. “Is it going to hopefully reduce the amount of injuries and deaths that are occurring from pedestrians? That’s the hope. And even if it's just one or two fatalities a year, I'll take it.”
The second bill, Council Bill 25-008, also known as the shopping cart bill, would create a new section of municipal code addressing businesses that use shopping carts and people who use them outside of a business.
Businesses would be required to prevent shopping carts from leaving their property by affixing restraints to them and securing them outside of business hours. They would also be required to document plans to prevent shopping cart removal. Non-compliance would result in fines and potentially jeopardize the business’ ability to operate in Las Cruces.
The shopping cart bill also penalizes people caught with a shopping cart outside a business. A conviction would be a petty misdemeanor carrying a potential jail term of up to six months and a fine of up to $500. However, a judge could choose to sentence the person to community service, substance abuse counseling or mental health treatment.
“It's one piece—maybe even a small piece—of a larger solution to the issues that we're facing,” Story said. “It’s not going to solve homelessness. No one's claiming that it would.”
If implemented, Story said LCPD would begin with a “non-enforcement” period during which officers would approach shopping cart users and tell them they need to find an alternative. Story also said the city and LCPD were working on offering other means of storing items beyond what's already available.
However, Story also noted that the carts represent a problem of perception. Possessing stolen property is illegal, and shopping carts fall into that category.
“That's a very important point for me,” Story said. “We're essentially turning a blind eye to that, which does have ramifications down the line for many other crimes.”
So far, business owners and public officials have dominated the conversation around the two bills; yet the changes would have the most significant effect on Las Cruces' unhoused residents.
One such resident emphasized the importance of her shopping cart.
“Everybody has a different reason why they are homeless,” the woman said, requesting anonymity to speak about her situation because she believed she could secure housing soon and did not want to jeopardize the opportunity. She divulged that she had lived in Las Cruces for about two years after moving from the Alamogordo area.
“For a homeless person, it’s just safer,” she said when asked why she used a shopping cart to carry her belongings. “And I'm not going to need it after a couple of months, until I get at least a driver's license and I can get back inside.”
With a shopping cart as opposed to a backpack or pull-along cart, she said she worried less about rodents and bugs with her belongings open to the air. She also said it allowed police to see what was in it quickly.
She reported being regularly gifted with carts by employees of large businesses and, at least on one occasion, had been given a letter by a store manager endorsing her use of the cart.
“I think it's really important for a homeless person to have a cart,” she said. “One time, from when I was still active duty, we got together and got some carts for the homeless people and they really appreciated it.”
Another man who spoke to Bulletin said he’d been paying attention to discourse about shopping carts and panhandling. He, too, requested anonymity, stating that he feared the dialogue had reached a point that jeopardized his safety.
Both people told the Bulletin that they felt the unhoused were wrongly targeted on the shopping cart issue. They noted that other people, ostensibly with housing, used the carts to ferry their groceries to a bus stop or their residence before abandoning them in desert areas.
“Aint no homeless people leaving their cart in the desert,” the woman said. “It doesn’t make no sense because they’re going to have their stuff with them.”
As for panhandling, which they called “flying a sign,” both people listed several factors they consider before approaching a car and asking for money. They also acknowledged that some who ask may be intoxicated, increasing the risk of walking in front of oncoming traffic.
Still, they said moving into the median was sometimes preferable since drivers stopped at a light are easier to approach.
“You know, it just depends on how safe it is,” the woman said.
For coverage of the Aug. 5 vote, visit LasCrucesBulletin.com.
