Key colonia bill backed by Proyecto Azteca passed by Texas House
Steve Taylor
April 26, 2009

Weeks after Hurricane Dolly some San Cristobal colonia residents still found it difficult to get to and from their homes. (File photo: RGG/Steve Taylor)

AUSTIN - Long after Hurricane Dolly came and went last summer, colonia residents living in low lying areas were left stranded in flooded neighborhoods that caused a potential health hazard.

Residents' homes and property were ruined, roadways were blocked and the stagnant water became a breeding ground for disease-carrying mosquitoes. Piles of trash and hurricane debris piled up.

Hidalgo County Judge J.D. Salinas was as frustrated as anyone about the situation. He explained that his work crews could not pump the water out or clear up the debris because the colonias were located on private roads. County work crews could only perform clean up operations on county roads, he said.

Under new legislation from state Rep. Veronica Gonzales, the next time a hurricane strikes the Rio Grande Valley county governments will be able to help colonia residents.

House Bill 1579 will give counties, in the case of a natural disaster, the authority to provide flood relief to residents residing in colonia neighborhoods, if the removal of the water protects the health and safety of residents.

Gonzales’ bill won unanimous support in the Texas House on Friday and now moves to the Senate.

“I am pleased to have passed this bill to help some of our area's poorest residents who suffered from the flooding of Hurricane Dolly for several weeks,” Gonzales, D-McAllen, said. “This bill will help the county provide flooding relief and eliminate health and safety concerns for the entire community.”

Gonzales was approached to carry such a bill by Ann Cass, executive director of San Juan-based Proyecto Azteca.

“We found it unfortunate that in the ten colonias in Hidalgo County where we work, that by November, nearly four months after Hurricane Dolly, the ground was either so saturated with water or still had water standing, that we were unable to move families into new houses,” Cass said.

“We had a disabled veteran in a colonia north of Weslaco in one of our new houses who could not get out of his house because it was surrounded by two feet of water.”

Cass said Hidalgo County officials told her that they could not help the colonia residents because the only access was through private roads, for which they had no jurisdiction.

“While I felt this was absurd because to me water standing for four months is a health and property problem, I nonetheless asked Rep. Veronica Gonzales to assist us with this bill,” Cass said.

The only disappointment for Cass and Proyecto Azteca is that colonias are designated as 11 homes and above. So, any house that is in a neighborhood with less than 11 homes will not be covered by the legislation. There was no way round this stipulation for Gonzales when she and her staff wrote the bill.

“The disabled veteran in Weslaco could still not get help as his colonia only has about six houses. In my humble opinion, they should not have to give a number to define a colonia,” Cass said. “Perhaps we can adjust this next time around.”

Cass said colonia families and the staff of Proyecto Azteca are “excited and grateful that Rep. Gonzales wrote the bill, sponsored it, and that it passed the House.”

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