Albuquerque property owner and APD feud on Twitter about enforcement

By John Cardinale

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    ALBUQUERQUE, New Mexico (KOAT) — Doug Peterson is the president of Peterson Property LLC.

“We are downtown’s largest property owner. We are Albuquerque through and through. So it’s frustrating right now. But we’re going to stick with it. We make sure to have cameras on all of our properties now,” Peterson said.

His frustration comes from what the cameras capture on a daily basis.

“We have to clear people out every day who are trespassing on our properties. They’re sleeping, they’re using drugs, they’re damaging our properties,” Peterson said.

Peterson now says he pays for private security to ward off his problems.

“We pay them over $100,000 a month to do that. That’s on top of the property taxes that we pay. That’s the kind of job Mayor Keller and APD are supposed to be doing,” he said.

Peterson says when he calls the police or contacts the city about his problem, he gets little response.

“I mean, we got people calling 911 and police don’t even come out for three hours. That’s because Albuquerque has an understaffed in police right now,” he said.

Because of this Peterson has now taken to social media, posting every day about the loitering and vandalism at his properties. He shares photos and tags city officials

“We put the photos and videos out there to show them what’s going on,” he said.

We reached out to APD about the problems Peterson has been experiencing and his presence on social media in a statement Chief Harold Medina said.

“We have reached out and tried to work with Doug Peterson but he is more interested in political attacks. Doug Peterson’s constant criticism of city leadership is ironic since Mayor Tim Keller has invested the most financial support for police officers in the city’s history. The Mayor also supports our approach to put criminals in jail.”

Peterson was not happy with the statement.

“If you want to avoid constant criticism, maybe actually do the things that you promised Albuquerque you would do. What political motivation do I have? I’ve never run for any political office. I’m not going to run for political office. I’m Albuquerque’s largest property owner. That’s what I do for a living,” Peterson said.

Shortly after we interviewed Peterson he tweeted this thanking us for the interview and saying in part: “@ABQPOLICECHIEF said he’d tried to work with me when I have never met the man & said I have political intents when I have never run for public office.”

An hour later APD Public Information Officers Twitter tweeted back at Peterson saying:

“Nobody said you want to run for office. you only complain and never offer solutions. You got the @abqjournal’s attention just before last year’s election. Now you got @koat7news’ attention just before this year’s election. Sounds pretty political.”

“If you want to actually do something, enforce the law. Like you said you were going to do. If you’re not going to do it, just get the hell out of here,” Peterson said.

While Peterson is frustrated with what is currently happening, he says he will not stop investing in the city he grew up in.

“We renovated this building into a brewery and a restaurant and just been a contributor in the community. This is the kind of thing that we do with zero government help in downtown,” he said.

We reached out to the mayor’s office; they told us the response from the Albuquerque Police Department addressed the crime and enforcement problem that Mr. Peterson is experiencing.

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