Clint residents, churches file lawsuit over cracking structures

An update now on amazing story you saw first on ABC-7.

Dozens of Clint residents, at least a couple of churches and the town of Clint have now filed a lawsuit, all of them alleging cracks in their foundations and structures are due to Lower Valley Water District project.

The lawsuit was filed at the end of December and has more than 50 plantiffs, all of them from the town of Clint. ABC-7 spoke by phone with the Corpus Christi attorney who is handling the case.

“What we know for sure is they removed 1,300 acre feet of water, enough water to cover 1300 acres to a depth of one foot,” said attorney Kathryn Snapka. “What it actually did was permanently lowered the water table and it’s not necessary to take that much water out of the system.”

Snapka is referring to Bain and Red Cliff Construction, who are among six different construction and engineering firms listed as defendents in this case. She alleges that after a Lower Valley Water District sewer project began, cracks started appearing in dozens of Clint homes and at least a couple of churches as their foundations sank.

Many residents, including Raymond Jones, showed ABC-7 back in June of 2012 the cracks and drastic changes that they saw in their homes after the sewer project began and water started being removed.

Snapka said she believes the residents and town of Clint will prevail in this case and the total damages awarded will likely be extensive.

“We have the lead plaintiff, which is the Bond Memorial Methodist Church, has stood for more than 100 years with hardly any cracking at all and yet in the two years since this project started there are cracks running throughout the adobe,” Snapka said. “That repair alone will be running into the hundreds of thousands of dollars.”

Snapka said contracts with Red Cliff and Bain Construction state if there is any damage to properties due to the project they would “correct it.” But she added that when contacted they refused to “live up to their end of the bargain,” forcing her to file the lawsuit.

Neither Bain or Red Cliff Construction had a comment on the litigation when contacted by ABC-7.