By Jennifer Dorsett
Field Editor

About 95 percent of Texas land is privately-owned. And the Lone Star State’s long heritage of protecting private property rights is touted by individuals and politicians alike.

But as many landowners have found, eminent domain authority is often used by private companies.

Landowners are often treated unfairly in these situations. Tales of lost production, property damage and deception are rampant.

Harold Pullins
Walker County

It’s mid-March. The pasture should be in prime grazing condition. But instead, it’s a mess of mud, water-filled ruts, piles of mulched trees, railroad ties and cast-off pipes.

“That’s 50 feet right through the middle of my property that’s good for nothing now,” Harold Pullins said, surveying the avenue of mud cutting across his land. “I couldn’t plant anything with this mess out here, and now I’m having to buy hay. And hay’s scarce right now. I’m paying an arm and a leg for it.”

In January 2018, an oil and gas company representative approached Pullins. The company would be building a pipeline through Walker County, he said, and Pullins’ entire property was in the planned construction path. The landman said they’d be in touch.

Then, in March, a letter arrived via certified mail. The oil and gas company said they had “determined it is in the public interest and necessary to acquire certain permanent and temporary access easement rights” to build the pipeline.

The letter concluded with a “final written offer” of $11,682 and vaguely threatened court proceedings if the offer was not accepted.

Pullins was infuriated.

He and his wife feel strongly they were offered such a low sum because of their age.

“I’m 81 years old. My wife is 80 years old,” he said. “They just figured they’d take advantage of you; figured, ‘$11,000, he’ll jump at that.’ Well, I got news for them. It takes a whole lot more zeroes than that.”

It was especially insulting, Pullins said, because the company stands to make substantial money from the petroleum products flowing through the pipeline.

“I’m not against progress. But, you know, be fair about it. They’re going to make millions of dollars off this line,” he said. “They made me a ridiculous $11,000 offer to mess my place up like this. It’s unbelievable.”

They hired an attorney, and negotiations began with the pipeline company. But construction started anyway.

Heavy machinery was operated with a disregard for property, Pullins said. Several deer stands were knocked over, and swaths of old pine trees were clear-cut. Yards of barbed wire cross-fencing were torn down and left lying in a jumbled heap. A large water tank was pumped, killing all the fish.

After pumping out the tank, the company laid down railroad ties to make a roadway for their machinery. They widened the tank without Pullins’ permission, and when it rained and the tank filled up and their roadway was submerged, workers began pumping water off the easement onto other parts of his property.

“They did whatever they wanted to do.They thought it was a joke, I guess, but I worked hard to pay for this place,” Pullins said.

After the right-of-way was constructed, heavy machinery constantly traversed the roadway during the hot, dry summer. Clouds of dust billowed across his property and toward his home.

According to Pullins, the construction company never watered the road to keep dust down, despite driving a large water truck back and forth to where their employees were working.

Pullins, who suffers from emphysema, had to stay inside. The thick, choking dust worsened his breathing problems.

His livestock suffered, too.

Relief only came when the drought broke and rain returned to the area.

But soon, the rain was causing just as many problems as the dust.

“They’ve wrecked my place for … it’s been over a year now. And I don’t know when they’ll get done with it, but it’s just been a mess,” Pullins said. “This summer, when it was dry, it was all dust. Now, it’s all mud.”

The earth, stripped of proper ground cover, is eroded and washed out, pockmarked with tire tracks and gouges from drilling machinery.

A discarded industrial-sized drain hose lies in the field nearby, evidence of the company pumping water away from the easement, a claim they deny.

Pullins said the des