ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — In the last few years, Albuquerque officials have cracked down on homeless encampments across the city – from shutting down Coronado Park to daily patrols in the International District.

However, is part of Albuquerque’s answer to homelessness actually making it harder for people to get off the streets?

According to a new ProPublica report, the city isn’t following its own policy when it comes to clearing encampments. They have also cleared twice as many encampments in the last year.

The people who call those camps home say a lot of important documents and personal items usually get thrown away in the shuffle.

“We interviewed almost 30 people who had experienced an encampment removal,” said Nicole Santa Cruz, a ProPublica reporter.

She took a video earlier this month that showed the moments after a garbage truck drove off and the owner of the discarded tent returned.

“I actually ended up talking to the person whose tent that was,” Santa Cruz said. “And he said he had not been offered any sort of storage. Under city policy, even if someone is not present at an encampment, the workers are supposed to try to make a meaningful effort to try to find the individual who might be living there.”

Earlier this week, KOB 4 sat down with Albuquerque’s Homeless Innovations Officer Maria Wolfe to get clarification on what the city policy is.

“So before a sanitation truck pulls to an encampment, that encampment has had at least two outreach touches,” Wolfe said. “They go, they talk to them, they provide them with resource cards, they try to see if they can help them get set up to go to one of the service providers who can do a housing intake, who can provide a day shelter, provide transportation to the Westside Shelter. Those are all things that are offered, at least what I mean in most places, 72 hours in advance.”

But, as Santa Cruz found out, that isn’t always happening, and city workers are not always offering to store personal items.

“The city is visiting hundreds of encampments every month,” Santa Cruz said. “Even from November through mid-May, the city stored the property of 80 people and 11 people were able to retrieve their possessions over that time period.”

There were other numbers that Santa Cruz found shocking. In 2022, the Solid Waste Department reportedly cleared 2,000 encampments. Then in 2023, they cleared more than double that amount.

“The city is on pace this year, if it continues at the current rate, to clear nearly 6,000 encampment locations,” Santa Cruz said.

For our full conversation with ProPublica reporter Nicole Santa Cruz, tune in to Eye on New Mexico on KOB 4 at 5:30 p.m. this Saturday.