County sorting out dispute over road renaming

WESLACO — All Juan E. Diaz wanted was to get his road paved.

The small section of Mile 14 North was neglected for the eight years he lived along the quiet route, said Diaz, 19. When he called Hidalgo County’s Precinct 1 offices to ask them to pave it, he found his public service could come with a reward.

Namely, “Juan E. Diaz Road.”

A dispute between the teen and some of his neighbors over the county’s decision to name the now-paved road after Diaz, a receptionist for the city of Elsa, will be resolved through a democratic process.

Diaz said he was honest when he asked his neighbors to sign a petition to change the name of Mile 14 North to Juan E. Diaz Road.

The 72 signatures he got on a petition that clearly says it’s to change the name prompted the county to agree to the switch.

The road was paved and a new sign put up.

But some residents who live along the route claim Diaz never told them the petition would change the name of the route — only that it was to pave the road.

They gathered their own petition asking the county to change the name back to Mile 14 North.

Diaz, who was bitten by a dog when he went door to door, said he worked for a year to get the county to fix the road.

“It was a mess,” he said of the stretch between Farm-to-Market Road 88 and Mile 6 West. “I wanted the road paved, and it’s been done.”

The roadwork would have been done without Diaz, since it was already on the list of streets slated to be paved, said Jeff Riviera, right-of-way director for Precinct 1.

The name change is more difficult to sort out.

The county follows specific guidelines for naming streets, Riviera said. And those guidelines allow the county to rename a road if a constituent brings forward a petition asking that the name be changed.

The Hidalgo County Commissioners Court votes to approve the petition, which it did in this case in June 2008.

Since then, only seven people who live on the road have signed up to get mail delivered to addresses on Juan E. Diaz Road, Riviera said. Most others get mail delivered to rural addresses on Mile 14 North.

There’s some confusion, too, over who signed the petitions. Only property owners who live along the route at issue can sign the petition that addresses that stretch of road.

To deal with the dispute, the county asked Riviera to conduct an election for everyone who lives on the road.

He plans to send out certified letters to all property owners asking them what they want the road to be named.

Majority rule.

Gustavo Solis, a property owner who asked the court to reverse its decision this week, said he was fine with taking a vote.

Solis signed the petition when Diaz came by his house with it last year, he said. But it was late at night, he was tired, and he didn’t look at it when Diaz told him he was fixing the road.

The name change has confused families who lived there for years and offers no benefit to them, he said. He just wants the road to go back to the way it was.

“If it was a war veteran, a hero or Abraham Lincoln, we would be OK with it,” he said. “We don’t want to name a road after anybody (else).”

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Jared Janes covers Hidalgo County government, Edinburg and general assignments for The Monitor. He can be reached at (956) 683-4424.