Published: February 24, 2007 10:46 pm      

PART II: No concrete answers

Plagued by a shifting foundation and mounting problems with the Hunt County Criminal Justice Center, county officials were forced to take matters into their own hands.

In 2003, county officials decided to hire an engineering firm — Walter P. Moore — and Marshall Addison, a geotechnical engineer, to look into the problems plaguing the facility.

Plans to construct the Justice Center began in the late 1990s, and county residents approved a $13.5 million bond package in early 1999.

Following the approval, the county hired contracting firm J.T. Turner for $600,000 to oversee construction on the building. The county had already approved paying Fort Worth architectural firm Burns Fletcher Gill more than $176,000 to design the facility.

The building, which was deemed safe for inmate occupancy in early 2002, faced a variety of problems from the start, including cracks in the walls and floor, shifting ceilings and floors and other problems.

According to a report released by the Texas Commission on Jail Standards, the jail did not even initially comply with the standards set forth by the organization.

“The facility does not meet minimum jail standards,” wrote executive director Terry Julian in a letter to the county in December 2001. “We request your earliest response to areas of noncompliance, which are attached. Meantime you are not authorized to occupy any part of the facility till accomplishing resolution of all discrepancies.”

Expansion wall joints, toilets and bathrooms all needed more security caulking, shutters at the violent cells did not have latches, privacy shields were not secured, numerous doors did not deadbolt upon closing time, warm and cold water was not available in two cells, a floor drain was defective and smoke detectors in several cells were missing guards to prevent vandalism by inmates, the report shows.

The county’s architect, Norris Fletcher, seemed unconcerned.

“All-in-all, the report’s listed areas of non-compliance are minimal, easily remedied and, required by the contract documents,” he wrote in a letter, which was sent to the Commission and county officials.

It was several years later, though, that structural problems were first noted in state records.

An inspector with the Commission, which monitors 267 jails throughout the state, first noted structural problems in his July 2004 report.

“The facility has construction problems, they have a survey crew looking into it. Hunt County will submit recommendation of the survey,” noted George Johnson, the Commission’s inspector.

By the time the Commission noted the problem, Walter P. Moore representatives, Addison and a slew of subcontractors ranging from engineering firms to plumbers to welding companies were already working to identify the cause of the problems.



What can a county do?

Since the jail began exhibiting structural deficiencies, the county started spending money — thousands of dollars a year — on rehabilitation efforts.

Since the 2002-2003 fiscal year, the county has spent $539,470 on rehabilitation, with mixed results.

E-mails obtained by the Herald-Banner through the Freedom of Information Act, a Texas law that grants public access to government records, indicate the shifting foundation may have started as early as 2001 — before inmates occupied the facility.

Addison, the geotechnical engineer, wrote in a report, “I also received geotechnical related sections of the construction specifications and was provided a copy of the design geotechnical engineer’s (Terracon) subsurface exploration report dated 2/24/99 and their 6/4/01 letter report after floor movement damages were beginning to appear.”

It is not clear what exactly the either of Terracon’s reports said because both of the letters were missing from county records.

When attempting to contact Walter P. Moore about the work and the tests performed on the jail, Walter P. Moore representative Ray Drexler, who oversaw the jail’s repair project, first asked that the Herald-Banner e-mail him the questions. He then responded five days later that he was unable to answer questions without permission from the county.

“Unfortunately it would be a violation of our duty to our client to discuss any project without their prior written permission,” Drexler wrote. “Please feel free to contact Hunt County to ask if they would be willing to give permission for us to discuss this project.”

County Judge John Horn said he would not grant permission to speak to Walter P. Moore representatives because the county’s law firm, Strausburger & Price, were already speaking to the engineers. Horn said he did not want anything to interfere in its investigation into the jail.

“I want to give these guys a chance to do due diligence,” he said.

Horn later called back and suggested contacting Hunt County Attorney Joel Littlefield to get permission.

Littlefield did not return a call seeking permission to speak to the firm.

When attempting to reach previous County Judge Joe Bobbitt about what has been done, a recorded message said his home phone had been disconnected.



What’s been done

Despite being denied access to the engineering firm, it became apparent through interviews with county officials and more than 200 e-mails released by the county what has been done so far.

Commissioner Kenneth Thornton said the county has approved performing a variety of tests on the facility. The people hired by the county, Thornton said, have bored holes in the jail’s foundation, have monitored water levels beneath the jail, used equipment to measure and monitor the jail’s movement and have tried to determine where the water trapped beneath the jail is coming from.

However, where the water is coming from remains a mystery, he said.

“We have spent quite a lot of money trying to find the source, and I think that we’re on top of the situation to determine what can be done and what the problem is, but it takes time,” he said. “There is no quick answer.”

It didn’t take experts too long to determine that the foundation was shifting, though.

By January 2005, Addison was certain that excessive moisture had “activated formerly drier expansive clay soils.”

“As these clays have absorbed moisture, they have increased in volume (heaved) and produced uplift pressures on the floor slab,” he wrote in the 2005 report following tests on the soil.

He also reported that the floor slab in the facility had moved several inches in some places, but in others it barely moved at all.

“This differential elevation change of the floor slab after construction has caused excessive stresses in some building materials,” he wrote. “These stresses have resulted in cracks and separations of varying magnitudes. On going patching of cracked walls and shaving doors to maintain their functionality has indicated the building distress has continued to progress from soon after floor slab placement to today, some four and one-half years later. Particularly concerning is the amount of distress that is occurring well interior from obvious external sources of water.”

It is unknown if those who built the jail knew that water was trapped beneath it. It is also unknown what tests other than a preconstruction swell test, were complete, as all documents including the preconstruction swell test — mentioned briefly in e-mails — are missing from county records.

“… It is readily apparent that the areas experiencing the highest heave are located in areas that have had the highest preconstruction swell test values and water was available for absorption from the placed fill layer,” Addison wrote. “Terracon did not encounter water in any of their soil borings prior to construction.”

Texas A&M-Commerce environmental science professor Chip Fox said preconstruction swell tests are performed by taking dry clay and wetting it and then watching how much it swells up. The test helps indicate how supportive the clay will be when a building is constructed on it.

Whether any preconstruction tests are performed generally depends on the contractor hired to complete the work, Fox said.

“Based on the history of an area, contractors that work in an area would typically know we’re going have these kinds of problems, so we need to test for it ahead of time,” he said. “But, you get an outside contractor that doesn’t know anything about this area or this town or the geology beneath this building, and if they don’t test for it, then they can run into problems.”



The frantic plea

In August 2005, the shifting of the jail became critical following a report that some concrete had apparently fallen on an inmate.

County officials immediately contacted Drexler with Walter P. Moore, and it was decided the problem needed to be addressed immediately.

“Based on our conversation this morning, and a later conversation with Jimmy Moore during which we discussed the new movement problems, we believe a quick visit to observe these new problems is in order. As a result, I am planning to visit the jail tomorrow,” Drexler wrote in an e-mail to Bobbitt.

“Jimmy indicated that the north wall of cells 307 and 316 appears to have moved an inch or two since my July 26 to 28, 2005 site visit. He also indicated that one of the inmates stated that some concrete had fallen on her... We previously discovered and reported to you that the east wall does not appear to be connected to the roof planks.”

Following the visitation to the site, red metal braces were designed and later installed along several walls to help support the ceiling. E-mails described the work as “emergency repairs.”



Hazardous materials beneath the jail?

Also in August 2005, county officials authorized a process known as soil vapor extraction to be performed on the soil.

It is unknown if the actual procedure was performed, but even considering implementing it raises some questions. The test’s main purpose is to remove hazardous materials from the soil.

“The only reason I could ever think of that they would do something like that is there is some kind of hazardous material down there that they are trying to get rid of,” Fox said, saying that’s the only use for the test he is familiar with.

He said with the soil vapor extraction procedure, water is pumped out from the soil, cleaned, and then the hazardous gas vapors are extracted.

Drexler was not permitted by county officials to answer if or why the test was performed or even to say whether or not there were hazardous materials beneath the soil.

However, any time hazardous materials are found, state law requires the a report to be filed with the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality, Fox said.

TCEQ spokeswoman Andrea Morrow said there have been no reports of hazardous materials beneath the soil on the Hunt County Criminal Justice Center property.



Open to the suggestions

With more than $525,000 spent through the 2005-2006 fiscal year, a permanent solution has yet to be reached.

At the March 27, 2006, Commissioners Court meeting, the Court voted to terminate all current contractual activities associated with stabilizing and repairing the facility — before a solution could be found.

But, relations may have been deteriorating between the firm and the county by that point.

At least one e-mail sent by Addison to a co-worker in August 2005 indicated Addison was experiencing resistance from county officials — possibly Bobbitt, who was county judge at the time — mid-way through the process.

“It’s just that we’ve been telling our client for 2.5 years that he needs to make serious drainage improvements to no avail,” he wrote. “Now that he has big problems (i.e. big cracks) he is panicking.”

County commissioners, however, say they have been receptive to recommendations and have done what they can to address problems.

Commissioner Jim Latham said he believes the Court has been receptive.

“What we have done is we have listened to the possibilities of correction. As far as my opinion, I want to give it a little more time because the existing water occurred during the worst drought that we’ve ever had in Hunt County. It’s just logical that that’s not rainwater and we don’t have underground springs — not here anyway. So we have to have a mystery source of water.”

Commissioner Phillip Martin agreed that the Court has been receptive.

“We’ve had to rely on the experts,” he said. “Surely there’s been enough money spent to try to correct the problem and to try to keep on top of it. So I feel that Commissioners Court has acted the best we know how and that is in actuality in dealing with experts that can give us that information.”

Commissioner Ralph Green simply said the Court has been receptive of the recommendations. Commissioner Kenneth Thornton also agreed, saying the county has done what it can to find out the cause.

“I think as we look into finding out what is the cause and what can be done about it, it takes a lot of time,” he said.

Horn, who has just started his first year as judge, said he could not speculate why or why not certain things did or did not happen in the past.

“Why issues weren’t dealt with previously, I don’t know. I can’t speculate on that,” Horn said.

But with more than $500,000 spent and a permanent solution yet to be found, where will the county go from here — and is it worth it to keep the facility open?



See Sunday’s Herald-Banner for the conclusion of this three-part series.