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Miers' land had liens

Court nominee had to reimburse Texas city for failing to clear weeds, debris from vacant lots

BY TOM BRUNE | WASHINGTON BUREAU

October 16, 2005

WASHINGTON - The year Harriet Miers began work as a senior presidential aide in the White House, the city of Dallas slapped three liens in three months on a property she controls in a low-income minority Dallas neighborhood, records show.

The city placed the liens in 2001 to force her to reimburse it for clearing the vacant lot of tall grass, weeds and debris after Miers failed to have the work done herself, as required by city law, and after she did not respond to city notices to maintain the property.

It wasn't the first time the city had to take action - records show that since Miers assumed power of attorney for her elderly, ailing mother in 1995, the city has issued seven other liens on vacant lots that Miers controls in the same area around Tipton Park.

All 10 liens, totaling less than $2,000, have been paid off, a city spokesman said.

But the failure of Miers, a former Dallas City Council member, to comply with city law and her slow response in reimbursing the city run counter to her image as a meticulous, detail-oriented attorney who is always well prepared.

That image is undergoing intense scrutiny now that President George W. Bush has nominated Miers, his former personal attorney, to replace Justice Sandra Day O'Connor on the Supreme Court.

Bush's selection of Miers has drawn harsh criticism by many activists on the right, who question her conservative credentials and her legal qualifications to be on the high court.

The White House appeared to be caught off guard by questions about the liens and the properties, initially unaware of Miers' responsibility for them.

After looking into the issue, White House spokeswoman Dana Perino said yesterday that Miers had control of the properties, which technically are owned by her mother Sally, who is in a skilled nursing facility.

"The issues were resolved to the city's satisfaction," Perino said. "She has great respect for the city and its process." She added, "For the last several years they have had a contractor handling the maintenance."

Miers' financial disclosure filings list ownership of only two properties, her home in a fashionable north Dallas neighborhood and a vacant lot in the Tipton Park area.

But records show Miers has been the attorney of record for her mother's properties since 1973 and has held power of attorney for her mother since 1995.

The undeveloped housing lots are among the remnants of the real estate business that her father, Harris W. Miers, built in the 1940s, 1950s and early 1960s in the black and Latino Tipton Park area, where now more than half live in poverty.

In anticipation of a post-World War II real estate boom, Harris Miers bought many of the lots, which range from 55 x 180 feet to 70 x 266 feet, on contract. He bought in the hardscrabble area even before it was a part of Dallas, in the belief that the city would grow west, toward Fort Worth. But it didn't - it grew north.

Harris Miers suffered a debilitating stroke in 1963, and his wife served as his guardian and managed and sold properties to keep the family going. When he died in 1973, he left 36 properties - nearly all of them around Tipton Park - worth $271,500 to his wife, court records show.

Harris Miers' stroke had a deep impact on Harriet Miers, forcing her to become a scholarship student at Southern Memphis University in Dallas and influencing her career choice as an attorney because lawyers helped the family so much.

But the vacant lots he left behind also have created problems for her.

In 1989, as she was preparing to run for Dallas City Council, the city placed a lien on a property she owned in the Tipton Park area. She paid off the lien and later sold the property.

In 1990, as a City Council member, Miers was barred from voting or participating in a $118 million public housing desegregation lawsuit because the city attorney said she had a conflict of interest: she and her mother owned lots near a housing development that would benefit from the proposed settlement.

Since 1995, the city has placed liens on three of Miers' properties: three on 3423 Bernal Dr. in 2001, one on 3552 Toronto St. in 2000 and six on the connected 3439-3443-3447 Bickers St. property in 1996, 1997 and 1999, city and county records show.

The liens on the properties have been paid off, but the city has no record of the dates, amounts, who paid them or how they did it, said Celso Martinez, a spokesman for the city.

Martinez said the city law is necessary for health and safety reasons, to keep vermin from flourishing and to avoid creating hide-outs for crime.

City records show that the city's costs were usually reimbursed within months of the liens being put on the lots. But one 1997 lien was not paid off until 2002, two months after the city turned over the debt to a collection agency.

That debt was for the Bickers Street lots, across the street from an elementary school.

Lewis Simpson, 64, who lives on Bickers Street, said he could not recall anyone cutting the grass before this year. Now, he said, "A guy comes out about every two weeks with a tractor. He started coming out about six months ago."

Lifelong west Dallas resident and former community activist Luis Sepulveda, now a justice of the peace, said he was surprised to hear Miers had not taken care of her properties.

"I'm forced to do that. So is she," he said. "If it's not done, shame on her."

The impact could extend beyond that Dallas neighborhood.

"The Bush administration has been trying to sell Miers as an extremely competent religious conservative," said Jeffrey Segal, a Supreme Court expert at Stony Brook.

"Nobody is buying the religious conservative argument," he said, "so if the super-competent argument doesn't hold, they don't have anything to justify the nomination."