Hardballs

Now there's a wall three stories high holding it back from nature's path—the DART parking garage. So when Peak Creek comes roaring back to life, the little houses across the alley on Alcalde Street flood to a depth of three feet, and families cower in attics.

Basic water law in Texas says that you can't change the flow of water in a way that screws your neighbor. In the past, Betz and his neighbors have sued DART, and DART has settled with them.

In 1995 a study by Halff Engineering left little doubt that the parking garage was flooding Alcalde Street. DART has attempted to cure the flooding problem by making openings in the rear wall of the garage, but the changes have been poorly designed.

A flood in 2006 did more than $3,000 damage to Betz's rent house and damaged other houses up and down the street. DART, which had paid full damages on earlier floods, went hardball this time and offered to pay only half the damages. Most of the residents snapped up the money.

Betz did not. Representing himself, he sued DART in small claims court, increasing his demand to $5,000 to cover copying and other costs.

At that point DART went super-hardball, claiming "sovereign immunity." That's a principle of law that says you can't sue a governmental entity for things it does in carrying out its duties. DART said under sovereign immunity that Betz's case should be tossed out, snuffed, not even heard. Kick him outta court, your honor.

Roscoe Betz—the 89-year-old former B-29 pilot, correspondence school salesman, real estate investor and tree trimmer—persuaded Dallas County Justice of the Peace Court Judge Al Cercone to give him a hearing on the question of sovereign immunity. Last October, DART sent a team of lawyers out to Cercone's court on St. Francis Avenue, and they had a day of it.

Betz beat 'em.

Cercone said the rule didn't apply. Betz had found the right exceptions to sovereign immunity. DART had to come to court and defend itself on the damage charges.

That trial took place in January, but both sides are still awaiting a ruling by Cercone. In the meantime, Betz continues to plead his case, always eloquently and backed up by engineering data, before the DART board and anywhere else he can find an audience, including parked in his car with me out in front of the house on Alcalde on a very hot recent afternoon.

I'm not a lawyer. I cited all of what Betz had told me in a very summarized form to DART spokesman Morgan Lyons and then put what I thought was the central question to him in the very best technical legal terms I could come up with:

"Why not pay the guy?"

It's five grand. The law says you can't change the flow of water in a way that damages your neighbor. They built a wall across a river. The poor attempts they have made at fixing the situation and the settlements they have made in the past demonstrate that they know they are at fault.

They gave everybody else half. The man's not asking a million dollars for emotional trauma. He wants what it cost him to get his house painted and caulked.

Why not pay the guy?

Lyons wrote me back: "Since the case is in litigation we're limited in what we can say, but I should note given the history of flooding in the area, going back to the 1930s, DART does not believe it is at fault and therefore feels the settlement offer is fair."

Yeah, you know what, DART? I think it would be very fair for you guys to open up to an outside audit and tell me why your construction budget was suddenly a billion dollars short last year.

Oh, and there was another incident last week where a citizen noticed that they were tearing up more than a mile of brand-new track in East Dallas before it had ever been used. The same Mr. Lyons said it was sort of a safety issue and would probably be charged to the contractor, therefore not to worry.

The cost involved? $600,000.

Well, how come it's always not-to-worry when you guys are on the line, but when it's some taxpayer you've screwed, then it's hardball? How come the kind of DART board members who actually sympathize with a taxpayer seem to get bounced off the board, and what we have left are people with their tongues hanging out and their fingers greasy, worried about who's going to get the next construction contract?

I don't think these folks think they are working for us. Like I said, sometimes it just sort of hits you over the head.