CORPUS CHRISTI, Texas — There’s not much on Starry Road by Yorktown Boulevard in Corpus Christi.
If you drive by, you’ll see few houses and a few empty fields. In one of those fields, the Corpus Christi Independent School District is building Creekside Elementary School.
However, the city’s development services department stopped developers from continuing construction because they did not have the proper permits.
They also said it would interfere with future plans connecting Oso Parkway to Yorktown Boulevard.
“We met the contractor, the architect, the school district, the city, we’re all partners, right? And there are processes to be followed,” Al Raymond, the city’s director of development services said.
Raymond said the developers were issued an at-risk permit, which allows them to move dirt, but once they began pouring concrete, the city issued the notice to stop working.
“These are conversations that should have happened, I want to say, a year ago. There should’ve been a global look at how we are connecting the dots and we weren’t,” Raymond said.
Raymond added the developers will be cited and the city could also fine them.
In the three years he’s been working at the city, Raymond said this isn’t the first time CCISD has started construction without a permit.
“During the last three years, all of their projects seemed to have started without the proper permits in place,” he said.
KRIS 6 News requested an interview with CCISD, but they responded with a statement that said the at-risk permit allowed initial work to start, while they waited for the final permitting.
“The district and project contractors have been responsive to all city requests for permitting materials, and will continue to operate in accordance with city regulations,” the district’s statement said.
They said they are following the stop-work order and are reviewing the project timeline.
Corpus Christi Councilman Gil Hernandez, who represents the area the school is being built in. said the project should only be delayed three weeks.
He said the city needs to be more involved in CCISD’s planning process.
“The whole process to make sure we’re doing things right is ultimately for the safety of everyone involved,” Hernandez said.
Raymond said the city is working with the project engineer and hopes to have a conditional permit in early September.
He added they are also working to resolve the issue of future road plans.
