There's some history about the namesake worth knowing about.
March 25, 2023 update: I posted my emails with Barnett described below on this post, Two March Anniversaries.
Now in its third year, the “Billy Barnett Holiday Hoops Basketball Classic” is a basketball tournament sponsored by Irion County ISD every year between Christmas and New Years. The tournament was posthumously named for Billy Barnett, former coach and IC superintendent.
Local sports fans apparently revered Barnett. But, I did not know him in that way. I knew him as the first ICISD superintendent that I contacted to request that the school district do something about the flooding originating from the campus that was invading my property. That exchange started on April 21, 2016, as Barnett was completing the construction of the new tennis courts between 4th and 5th streets on Juanita Street. Those tennis courts were paid for through the District’s 2013 bond package.
The gist of my emails with Barnett in 2016 boil down to this: the tennis courts were already constructed, and, according to the architect and engineer (who later I learned designed the courts so that the stormwater from the courts would empty onto the then newly paved Juanita street) there was nothing that could be done. I should take my flooding complaint to the City of Mertzon, he said.
In other words, tough luck, fella, is how Barnett responded to me. Get used to the District’s water. He even acknowledged that he knew the flooding was a problem, but accepted no responsibility for the 2013 bond funds being used to direct water into the City of Mertzon streets and flooding those streets and private property like mine. And, he also took no responsibility for the fact that the stormwater runoff from the tennis courts flood the football field further downstream, which was known even at that time.
Barnett left the District as its superintendent in 2018. To be precise, he left in May 2018. Importantly, as he was literally walking out the door, according to Board minutes he secured the Athletic Director position for Jacob Conner in April and May, 2018. No doubt the loyalty Conner feels for Barnett originates in part from this 12th hour promotion.
In Barnett’s place came Superintendent Brian Gray, who was named in May, 2018. Barnett died in late 2019.
I’ve credited Superintendent Gray elsewhere as the person who brought his prior relationship with architect Jeff Potter to the table to build out the 2019 bond projects. Potter borrowed from the stormwater distribution concepts approved during Barnett’s 2013 bond efforts. Specifically, Potter designed stormwater output from the new gym to dump directly into Juanita and 4th streets, just as Barnett did with the stormwaters from the new tennis courts paid for with the 2013 bonds. So, Barnett’s impact on the flooding of our streets, private property and football field continues to this day and allowed Potter to do the same. This also means that three ICISD superintendents, Billy Barnett, Brian Gray and Ray DeSpain, all share in passing along these problems to their successor superintendents.
Thus, without any meaningful public oversight, each superintendent’s bond package, along with its different architect and engineers, built upon the mistakes of the earlier one. Even the build out of the earlier built Estes Gym had design flaws that to this day allow the dumping of stormwater directly into the city street.
All the while, the City of Mertzon accepts that stormwater without protest. Indeed, depending on the mayor, the City even encourages and makes it possible for the District to dump stormwater into our streets. (Mayor Bill Taylor, and Mayor Lisa Hight before him, paved the way, pun intended, for the water to be directed into the streets.) The chickens have come home to roost though, as now both the District’s and City’s independent surveys in 2019 and 2023 confirm that all the stormwater runoff ends up at City Park and the District’s football stadium in the park. This is irrefutable. (And, the role Conner played to locate the gym where it is is also irrefutable.)
So, both the City and the District are literally flooding themselves with stormwater runoff.
Billy Barnett, though not entirely to blame, was one among many of our local leaders and public employees who looked the other way on the terrible flooding issues our community faces today.
With all this in context, it perhaps makes more sense why in 2021, as construction of the new gym was in full swing, Athletic Director Jacob Conner recommended to the school board that the new gym be named in honor of Billy Barnett. Barnett gave Conner his job, which landed him a new gym. That recommendation failed, as evidenced by the fact the gym is not named after any individual, but known by the District as Hornet Gym. (I call it City Gym.)
Today, there is no Billy Barnett Gym, but there is the “Billy Barnett Holiday Hoops Basketball Classic,” so named by Athletic Director Conner under the leadership of former superintendent Ray DeSpain and Board President Vicente Flores, Jr. as soon as the gym was available. This certainly leaves one to wonder why, according to Board minutes back on January 16, 2017, Mr. Flores was the sole vote against the extension of Billy Barnett’s superintendent contract for that year…
Swish! The floodwaters from the new gym hit nothing but net…at least until it ends up at the football field. Then that basketball bounces crazily off the football goal post and the whole community, under water, loses. That’s probably not what Billy Barnett would want to be remembered for.
Copyright 2023 G Noelke