Tyree Street Builder Wins ‘Stop Work’ Battle as Elm Thicket Neighbors Keep Fighting

The Dallas Board of Adjustment on Tuesday reversed the decision of a city building official who earlier this year issued a “stop work order” for a construction project on Tyree Street in the Elm Thicket/Northpark neighborhood. The Board stopped short of doing the same for a second Elm Thicket builder who has poured thousands into a duplex on Victoria Avenue, deferring that case to Nov. 19.

In the case of Akber Meghani’s duplex at 6801 Tyree St., the Board voted unanimously to reverse the decision to stop work based on land use. The board voted 4-1 that the city’s building inspector erred by stopping work on the project based on lot coverage, height, and roof pitch. Board member Phil Sahuc opposed the latter propositions. 

The Board appeared to zero in on the land use matter, stating that the lot was zoned as a duplex and therefore the building official screwed up when he cited single-family zoning and halted construction on a duplex. 

Dallas Admits Elm Thicket Permits Were Issued Erroneously, Builders Ordered to Stop Work

A staff member determined “visually” that the lot was zoned single-family but there are two water meters and it’s been zoned for duplex use “all along,” Board of Adjustment Panel A chairman Dave Neumann said. 

Gus Perez, who served on the Elm Thicket Authorized Hearing Steering Committee, told CandysDirt.com after the meeting that Meghani’s lot on Tyree was in fact zoned single-family, based on changes that went into effect more than two years ago.

“Interior lots would be single-family and we allowed duplexes on the exterior streets like Roper and Mabel, fronting Lemmon,” Perez said.

The Morton Street resident said Meghani will have to refile for his permits and the Elm Thicket neighbors will continue to fight and ensure that the Board of Adjustment does what it is charged to do —uphold ordinances passed by the Dallas City Council.

The Board of Adjustment is a quasi-judicial panel limited in its authority. It can affirm or revoke the action of the building official, which in this case was to issue stop-work orders on construction projects in various stages of completion. 

Frankly, Tuesday’s meeting, which started at 10:30 a.m. and ended just before 8 p.m., was about as confusing as how we got here. The video of the Oct. 22 Board of Adjustment Panel A meeting was not posted at press time, but when it is, it will be here, under the Boards and Commissions tab. 

Board members didn’t reach their decision lightly. 

“This is probably one of the toughest cases I’ve heard in several years on this board,” said member Jay Narey. 

Elm Thicket Neighbors React

Elm Thicket residents who have opposed the builder appeals said the Board of Adjustment decision was based on “made-up evidence pulled out of thin air.” The Board members appeared to have compassion for builders who would be forced to tear down their projects, but they didn’t seem to be sympathetic toward the residents who fought for years to ensure that new construction was compatible with the surrounding area in an effort to prevent displacement and gentrification, they say.

The builders knew their plans were based on outdated zoning, the neighbors have argued, but all seem to agree that city officials should never have stamped plans and issued permits.

The Board decision comes three months after zoning inspectors placed “stop work orders” on dozens of projects in the neighborhood, saying that although the projects were permitted and plans approved, those permits were issued erroneously based on outdated zoning. 

The panel first heard the appeal on Meghani’s property at 6801 Tyree St. in August and reviewed the Meghani case and Danny Le’s property at 6529 Victoria Ave. in September. Both matters were deferred to the Board of Adjustment’s meeting this week.

Last month the Board asked that the builder, city officials, and neighborhood representatives “figure it out” and come back with a compromise. 

That didn’t happen. 

The latest memorandum from Interim Assistant City Manager Robin Bentley on the Elm Thicket building permit oversights and violations, dated Oct. 18, shows that 13 sites remain out of compliance. The memo also includes frequently asked questions that address how neighbors can engage in the Board of Adjustment process. 

Neighborhood Engagement

The Dallas Board of Adjustment has expressed frustration with the processes in place that allowed builders to start — and in some cases, complete — construction on homes that don’t meet zoning criteria approved in October 2022. 

CandysDirt.com was copied in on a series of email exchanges between Perez and his wife Mimi — who founded the advocacy group Save Elm Thicket — and representatives of the two builders who appealed their stop-work orders. Dallas Cothrum of land consultancy firm Masterplan is representing Meghani; broker Clay Stapp has attempted to negotiate on Le’s behalf. 

Cothrum has argued that Meghani’s violations are minor — a 26-foot, 6-inch building height where 25 feet is maximum and 45.7% lot coverage where 40% is allowed. But it’s also a duplex and the zoning calls for single-family detached homes (depending on who you ask).

In an email to Gus and Mimi Perez dated Oct. 10, Stapp suggested options for how to resolve the matter. 

“Option No. 1 is to punish the builders and make them change a portion of their builds to comply with the new City code,” Stapp wrote. “Personally, I think this is a waste of everyone’s time and money. Changing a roof structure from a 2/12 pitch to a 4/12 pitch doesn’t make much of a difference. No one will be able to tell from the street that a builder lowered a roof 1.5’ to comply with the code. It is visually impossible to see the difference without the previous reference point. So why are we even talking about ripping off a completely functional roof that is compliant with everything for the last 50 years to make minor, minor changes?”

Option No. 2, the broker suggested, is to put the money toward improving housing in the neighborhood. 

“There are TONS of aging owners who have lived in the neighborhood for 50 to 60 years,” Stapp said. “Many of them have rundown houses in major disrepair. Why not put that money into improving their homes? Painting, new windows, new front doors, new siding, new roofing, etc. This is money very well spent and is what the neighborhood really needs and I think Gus and Mimi are the perfect people to make this proposal to the Board of Adjustment and neighborhood.”

Gus Perez balked at the advice, saying in a reply email that “Mr. Stapp’s suggestion that we, Mimi and I, seek to be ‘heroes’ in the Elm Thicket/Northpark neighborhood by accepting in-kind construction services for ‘rundown houses in major disrepair’ is unbelievably insulting and tantamount to a quid-pro-quo bribe to allow the law to be broken.”

“At this point, there is nothing left to discuss,” Gus Perez wrote in an Oct. 14 email. “Our position is clear. We want the law to be followed. Anything less is illegal. We’ll see you on October 22.”

After a Hard-Fought Battle, Dallas City Council Approves Elm Thicket/Northpark Rezoning

View Gus Perez’s Oct. 22 slide presentation here and Mimi Perez’s public comments here. Mimi Perez is a photographer and weekly columnist for CandysDirt.com.

“The soul-crushing and immoral secret that my neighbors live with on a daily basis is that we all know that if these same structures had been built in Preston Hollow under the same circumstances those stop-work orders would have been upheld at the very first BOA meeting,” Mimi Perez told the Board on Tuesday. “But this is what always happens to Black and Brown, to systematically marginalized, neighborhoods like Elm Thicket.”

Builder Offers Compromise

Cothrum offered to adjust Meghani’s building height at a cost of $88,000, “which ensures my guy loses money on the project no matter what,” the consultant told CandysDirt.com. The builder already has reportedly spent about $700,000 on his duplex. If the Board were to affirm the stop-work order, Meghani would go out of business and have difficulty securing another loan in the future, Cothrum said.

“This matter has taken longer than the U.S. involvement in World War I and far more time than it took to build the Pentagon,” continued Cothrum, who incidentally is a doctorate and former tenured professor in the UT System. “There are a lot of instances where the city could have intervened. I’m very interested and I hope you’ll ask the city attorney and staff, when did they know they were using the wrong ordinance? Every day the city delayed in issuing a stop-work order cost him.” 

At Tuesday’s hearing, Meghani admitted he was at the 2022 City Council meeting when zoning changes to Elm Thicket/Northpark’s Planned Development 67 were approved. Cothrum argued that it doesn’t matter what builders knew or when they knew it; the city shouldn’t have issued building permits based on the wrong zoning. 

Board members suggested after taking action on Meghani’s case that Cothrum could still make good on his offer that the builder would change the roof by submitting a variance, but it was unclear whether he would do so.

There’s more to come on this story. Stay tuned to CandysDirt.com for a follow-up.