Albuquerque’s own “pig house” property racks up code violations

A Albuquerque property once notorious for wall-to-wall garbage and pigs living in their own waste has racked up new code violations, this time under the city’s own ownership. The property at 318 Mesilla Street, which the city foreclosed on in 2023 and demolished that same year, was inspected on Aug. 20 after neighbors called 311 to report weeds taking over the lot and trash piling up again, according to Deputy Director Jeremy Keiser of code enforcement.

Keiser said code enforcement has had “quite an extensive history with the property.” Inspectors returned Sept. 8 and, finding no change, placed a red tag on it.

“A red tag for code enforcement on here is something that code enforcement uses to try to gain the attention of the property owner or the responsible party and to notice that, hey, there’s enforcement actions that are being conducted onto your property,” Keiser said.

Keiser said the city had essentially been sending the notices to itself. The change of ownership had not updated in the code enforcement system until inspectors revisited the file.

“What had happened was the information with the change of ownership hadn’t updated in the code enforcement system. All the way up until we came and looked at it again,” Keiser said.

Keiser said the city will clean the lot and bill the property for the services.

“We have a group that’ll come in and clean the lot, and we will lean the property for the services that have been rendered onto the property,” Keiser said.

Keiser said the city is looking to sell the property.

“That property can be used to build a new home as we know here within Albuquerque, we do experience housing shortages, and this could present a great opportunity for somebody to build a new residence for somebody here in Albuquerque,” Keiser said.

The city said the cleanup order was placed Tuesday and is expected to be scheduled soon. No exact cleanup date has been set.