Where do you a fence a dead body? That's the latest challenging question for the city's criminal class as some of them carted off a U-Haul from a hotel parking lot that contained a corpse awaiting transport to its final resting place.

Relatives of the dead man on their way to the Four Corners area had stopped at the Residence Inn at Yale and Gibson for an overnight break. Of course, the bizarre heist again splashed ABQ across the national headlines and made our state's status as the nation's #1 spot for auto theft even more notorious. Whatever happened to Rest in Peace? Not in crime ravaged ABQ. (The U-Haul and body were recovered.)

ABQ hotel and motel parking lots have become such easy targets for the carjackers that   they treat them like they're browsing the lot at Rich Ford. The problem is no one is shooing them away--not APD and not the property owners.

The best Mr. and Mrs. Albuquerque can can do now is to tell their undertakers not to tempt the criminals and instruct them to bury them in plain pine boxes, not some expensive bronze casket. Who says we can't fight the crime wave until our dying breath---and even into the afterlife?

WHERE ARE THE FENCES?

No question that this crime epidemic is one of the worst in the city's history. V.B. Price, an author who has written extensively of ABQ and NM for over half a century, raises an issue that has been mostly dormant and mentioned in our first paragraph today: Where is the stacks of stolen property and autos being fenced? Answer that, he asserts in his weekly Mercy Messenger, and the crime wave might start receding:

When it comes to property crime, Albuquerque has a staggeringly awful record. A website called areavibes.com gives Albuquerque an F rating for crime, citing 34,000 incidents of property crime alone last year. The Albuquerque Journal estimates that 27 cars are stolen here each day, which amounts to almost 10,000 cars annually.

What happens to all that loot? How do you get rid of 10,000 cars with almost no one finding out? A highly sophisticated system of stolen property fencing has been in place in our city for decades. TVs, stereos, smartphones, computers, guns, where do they go? They are fenced. The system must be huge and it seems invisible. But it has to be there. And yet how many times have you read or heard of a major fencing operation being broken up, or stolen property actually being returned? Almost never. It’s not a media issue. Crime solving is every bit as newsworthy as a gory accident. Crime organizations are making millions hand over fist selling stolen goods. It must be one of Albuquerque’s larger “industries.” A good strategy for serious “crime prevention” would be to create police task forces to focus on nothing but fences and making it as difficult as possible to profit from all forms of theft.

Well, the fight against the fences will have to wait until the next mayoral administration because this one has simply lost control. That new mayor will be one of eight candidates running and who will take office December 1.

ON THE TRAIL

City Clerk Natalie Howard tells us if no one candidate gets 50 percent of the vote in the balloting October 3 the run-off between the two top vote-getters will be held Tuesday, November 14. We blogged on Aug. 29 the run-off would be on the traditional election day--the first Tuesday in November, but that's not how it works under our City Charter.

We also asked the clerk about reader complaints that there is no early voting in the city election on Saturday. Her office points out there has never been Saturday early voting for any city election, unlike Bernalillo County elections.

And what about Tim Keller, the one publicly financed candidate in the mayoral race? How much in taxpayer money would he get if he were to be in a run-off election? The clerk says he would get 33 cents for each registered voter. With about 380,000 registered voters, Keller would receive about $125,000 to run his run-off campaign. That's not very much when you consider what a privately financed candidate like Brian Colón could raise.

DEFENDING KELLER

Speaking of State Auditor Keller, he's being scorched over how he has handled cash donations to his publicly financed campaign, with mayoral candidate Wayne Johnson filing a complaint with the city ethics board. The press has been bad for Keller, including here on the blog. Reader and Keller supporter  Jeff McConaughy comes with a defense:

Maybe I'm just new to the political finance "game," but I don't get the issue with Keller's in-kind donations. This seems like local news trying to sensationalize a non-issue to increase viewership and the Republican party smelling an opportunity to fling some mud at the front runner.

1. In-kind donations are perfectly legal and legitimate. These are offers of services or materials, or offers to pay for services or materials instead of direct cash donations to the campaign. For example, if I offered to make copies of a flyer or information sheet on their behalf, took the template to Fedex and paid Fedex $100 to make 1000 copies for the campaign, that would be an in-kind donation of $100. The kerfuffle seems to center on checks people have written to Rio Solutions, the company that's managing Keller's campaign. They are providing a service, just like Fedex does in the above example. People are paying for that service. It's exactly the same thing and it seems perfectly legal and ethical to me.

2. The campaign is held to approximately $38,000 in in-kind donations. That amount is tied to the number of eligible voters in Albuquerque the same as the amount of direct funding they receive, but with a different multiplier. Again, what they're doing is perfectly legal up to the $38K cap. They are tracking the in-kind donations and being completely transparent about them, exactly as they are supposed to. That's how KOB found out about the payments in question. As stated in the story, they looked at Keller's public finance reports. Nothing is being hidden, nothing had to be sleuthed out, because it's all legitimate and accurately reported according to the rules.

What am I missing?

And former APD officer and ABQ attorney Tom Grover writes:

It's no surprise that the knives are coming out for Keller. He's the one candidate who stands head and shoulders above the rest to actually bring the train wreck known as Albuquerque not just to a stop, but turn it around. That obviously scares the opponents who fall in Keller's shadow in substance, skills, and success but also terrifies the appointees desperate seeking to preserve their jobs at the City. Only in NM will you find Republicans calling foul about campaign finance issues. Let's get real though, this race is about turning this City around and undoing the mess Berry has made of it and who is the best candidate to do that. It's not a time for amateurs, sycophants, or pseudo-proselytizers.

LEWIS TV TIME


On the Republican side of the tracks, we hear from the Dan Lewis campaign about his  first TV ad. Lewis joins Keller and Colon in focusing on the city crime crisis. He narrates it in a monotone that paints a gloomy picture of the city but says Lewis offers hope. Gothamesque? Kind of.

How much will the westside city councilor spend on that ad? He didn't say but with about $200,000 in cash on hand for the final stretch political pros expect the buy to be around $100,000. That would probably include radio for ads like this one that Lewis released along with his TV spot.

That kind of exposure seems likely to continue the polling gridlock between Lewis and his Republican rival and BernCo Commissioner Wayne Johnson. Both were at 8 percent in the most recent public poll. GOP voters are about to take sides between them them as they see the TV ads and mailers but if the pair continues this split of the R vote the likelihood of a Keller-Colon run-off will stay reasonably high. And if Ricardo Chaves, the other R in the race, makes a TV buy with conservative themes, you could get a three way split.

MAYOR BLOGGING SCHEDULE

We're back blogging to four days a week--Monday thru Thursday and Friday when need be--until the October 3 mayoral election. We don't want you to miss any of the major events so be sure to check us each week day for enhanced blogging of City Election '17.

We put up a lengthy Monday blog on the Keller finance ontroversy and covered the latest polling in a Friday blog. You can read both by scrolling down.

THE BOTTOM LINES

Readers asked who conducted the recent poll on the mayor's race and other city issues for KRQE-TV. Anchorman Dean Staley says:

It's John Couvillon, JMC Analytics and Polling out of Louisiana. 

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(c)NM POLITICS WITH JOE MONAHAN 2017