By Karen Gleason
The 830 Times
A resident of the city’s south side asked city council members on Tuesday to prioritize work on drainage issues in his neighborhood.
Jose Limon, who lives with his wife in a house in the 500 block of West Chapoy Street, came to the special city council work session on the proposed Fiscal Year 2024-2025 city budget to speak to council members about the problems.
Limon spoke to The 830 Times before the meeting after playing several videos he had shot on his phone earlier in the day, depicting flood water inside his residence.
“The problem is that we have a lot of water coming to the houses and the yards, and we’ve already talked to a lot of people here (in City Hall), and they said they were gonna start working on it because the railroad built a bridge there (on the railroad tracks between U.S. Highway 90 and Railway Avenue), and the water now comes straight into our houses,” Limon said.
“All the water from Highway 90 comes into our neighborhood. They’ve been saying they’re going to start working on it, but I haven’t seen nothing done yet,” he added.
Limon also said even moderately heavy rains cause the drains in his home to back up.
Despite there being no citizen comments on the agenda of the council’s work session, Mayor Al Arreola invited Limon to speak to the council after the meeting’s opening ceremonies.
Limon recounted the problems caused by runoff in his house and neighborhood.
“I want to know if somebody’s going to do something about it, because we’re getting old already,” Limon said.
He told the council he and his wife were up at 3 a.m. Tuesday to get ready “for the water to come in so we could start throwing it back out of the house.”
Limon added, “The alley in front of the house gets full of water. It looks like a big, big river, so I would like to hear some answers. Is the city going to help us or what’s going to happen with that?”
Limon also said the city repaved Chapoy Street and made the street higher in the center.
“So now the water comes into our yards and straight into our house. Every time it rains like that, water goes into the house. We’ve had to buy new furniture, new everything. . . Sometimes it catches us asleep, and by the time we wake up, the water is in the house already,” Limon said.
“That’s my concern. Are we going to get some help over there?” he added.
As Limon stood expectantly at the podium, Arreola told him, “We can’t answer that, but we’ll get back with you, Mr. Limon, and we’ll have a sit-down with you.”
The writer can be reached at delriomagnoliafan@gmail.com.
