THE DAY RUNNING WATER CAME TO SALDIVAR ACRES COLONIA

 

By  Juan Montoya
For years after they bought their lots in the Saldivar Acres Subdivision (colonia) in the margins of the southeast Brownsville city limits – and into to the early 1990s – the residents there had to do without water connections from El Jardin Water District.

The late B.C. Price was El Jardin manager and his board had argued that the residents there could not have a meter and connections to the district's water mains along Browne Road because there was no dedicated right-of-way on Saldivar Road. They said it was one of many illegal subdivisions that carried over the years in the precinct. Some 31 dwellings lined the unpaved road, and there were more than 150 people living there without running water.

"We're not legally allowed to extend our lines into subdivisions without a right-of-way," Price had explained to county officials, and closed the dialogue.

And so the residents toiled to haul drinking and domestic-use water in plastic 55-gallon drums. Some even had placed large black plastic tanks atop their homes to which they pumped water with small pumps. In this way, they could have some water for their showers and baths. For the most part, they used the only spigot from El Jardin on the Browne Road right-of-way.

"No tenemos otra," said an elderly woman laboring to carry a large plastic bucket at the site to her home inside the subdivision. "Ni modo. Que le hacemos?"

 
Lacking connections to any existing sanitary sewer branch lines of the Brownsville Public Utility Board, the subdivision was serviced by (on-site sewer facilities) septic tanks.

Things had dragged on for years and politicians came and went. The problem, however, was getting bigger and bigger and the people wanted a solution. Over time, they enlisted the aid of activists like Valley Interfaith (Sister Consuelo was her name) and set about to get their water. The commissioner at that time was Lucino Rosenbaum.

County officials suspected that since Price and Salazar were competing developers, that might have played a part in El Jardin's reluctance to provide the hookups. Nonetheless, with the nun from Valley Interfaith applying pressure in the form of camping out in the commissioner's office and showing up en-masse at the commissioners court, things were rapidly coming to a head.

At the time, the area around Saldivar and Browne roads was rural. There was no Ben Brite School across the subdivision. The city water and sanitary sewer connections were still off in the distance ending at Reid-Hope King subdivisions near El Jardin Elementary across Boca Chica (Highway 4) from the airport.

Precinct 1 had Juan Garza, since deceased. Garza was an old-time county employee who had training as a surveyor, but pressed into service, had been acting county engineer. You might have known him. His brother Willy, now also gone, owned the Border Lounge on 14th Street. They were an old barrio family. His wife worked with the federal government as a U.S. Customs agent.

When registered engineer Andy Cueto was hired by the county, he moved to consolidate his territory and Garza – already in his 60s – was unceremoniously let go. Pct. 1 picked him up and made him the Right-of-Way guy.

Tired of the commissioner complaining of Sister Consuelo and her band of Saldivar Subdivision protesters camping outside his office at the county warehouse off 14th Street, Garza came up with a plan to get the residents water, and ease the political pressure on the elected officials.

"El diablo no es diablo por diablo. Es diablo por viejo," he would say laughing. ("The devil is not the the devil because he's a devil," he used to say. "He's the devil because he is old.")  

He researched the matter and came up with a plan. In those days, each precinct controlled its own Road and Bridge budget, basically throwing caliche on the worst roads as best they could. The consolidated Public Works Dept. did not exist.

Garza and the precinct staff went about gathering documentation to establish the fact that county materials and workers had serviced Saldivar Road. Going back on their daily duty logs, they put together evidence indicating the road had been serviced for at least the past 10 years. This took a few weeks to assemble during which the residents continued pressuring the county and Pct. 1 staff.

"Here comes Sister Consuelo again," Rosie, the Pct. 1 secretary/receptionist would call out and the commissioner would scurry inside to his private office. He would send an administrative assistant to face Sister Chelo and the irate group.

"We're not a water district," he had told them in the past. "Vayan con Price."

Old-time precinct employees (going back to commissioner D.J. Lerma, and before) signed affidavits that they had worked on the road. By coincidence, it was found that aside from having gone into the road to service it, at least one old-timer knew some people there (a woman) for whom he spread caliche on her driveway with the result of being the recipient of her romantic affections. Well, why not?

Under Texas law, a prescriptive easement (for the ROW of Saldivar Road) could be obtained by the county if it could prove that county materials, machinery and manpower to maintain it had been used for a period longer than 10 years. Then, an action item was placed on the commissioners court to declare Saldivar Road a part of the county road system by prescriptive easement. Once this was done and the commissioners voted to accept it, the way was clear.

Price was shown the commissioners' court vote, and that an easement through where he could run the lines now existed. To everyone's relief, he gave in. Each connection would cost residents about $3,000 which could be paid in small increments in their monthly water bills. And the residents would no longer have to haul water (it weighs a little over 8 pounds per gallon, we learned) to drink or for domestic use.

Sister Consuelo was happy to have helped the Saldivar Acres residents. They were no longer camped out at the precinct office, and Price had them off his back.

When the water lines were finally run out to the subdivision, they held a prayer service and invited the county's public officials to drink the first glass that ran to the end of the road. And that was the day that water came to Saldivar Acres Subdivision off Browne Road.