Stuart and Tonya Junker lived in a quiet neighborhood near the Black Hills of South Dakota. When the earth began to crumble around them, Tonya and Stuart Junker wondered if their home could fall into a large hole.
Since sinkholes began appearing, they and 150 neighbors have sued to recover the value and legal costs of their home.
“Let’s just say it’s changed our lives a lot,” Tonya Junker said. “The worry, the not sleeping, the ‘what if’ something happens. It’s all of it, all of the above.”
Sinkholes are caused by cave collapses, dissolving material, or old mines. According to Paul Santi of the Colorado School of Mines, the South Dakota situation is unique. The large sinkholes in Hideaway Hills threaten many homes.
Santi said, “I’m sure that this case will end up in textbooks because I teach classes about case studies involving geologic problems. ”
Between 2002 and 2004, workers constructed Hideaway Hills, a state-owned region where gypsum was mined for use at a nearby state-owned facility.
Kathy Barrow is the attorney for 94 subdivisions. She claimed that the state only sold the surface but retained the subsurface and didn’t disclose that they had removed the soil’s capacity to support the top surface.
Residents contacted Barrow, and tests revealed a large mine that had been improperly sealed beneath the northeastern portion of the subdivision. A second 40-foot deep pit mine was also found at another corner of this neighborhood. Barrow received a call from residents, and the tests revealed a mine that had been improperly closed beneath the northeastern area of the subdivision.
Barrow said that “too many holes and sinkholes have appeared since the first collapse” and there are now “too few for counting”. Unstabilized ground caused damage to 158 homes, along with destabilized roads and utilities.
Barrow said that an old pickup truck was discovered in a small cavern under the porch of a home after it had been pushed there by a landowner during the 1940s.
Although many of the homes in the vicinity of the 2020 collapse are gated, people still live there, usually because they can’t afford to leave.
Barrow claims that residents in Barrow are not only panicked but also stuck.
The homes of these people are not only unsafe to live in, but they have also lost their value. The homes of these people are no longer safe to live in and have lost value.
The state attorney declined to comment. The state did ask the judge to dismiss this lawsuit.
In court documents, the state entities being sued expressed “sincere sympathy for many of these homeowners” and called sinkholes “tragic.”
The State still maintained that it was not their fault.
The state said that “the real parties liable in this case are the developer, realtor hired at the beginning, and all builders who deliberately chose to hide the existence of a mine abandoned from Hideaway Hills homebuyers. ”
In court documents, the state traced the history of mining in the area back to the early 1900s. In court documents, the state traced back mining history to the 1900s.
According to the state, a horse farmer bought the land in 1994. He later sold it on to a developer who found a large hole.
The State claimed that it couldn’t have known that the county, the developer, and the builders would continue with the development despite being aware of past mining.
In 2000, the South Dakota Legislature approved the sale of its cement plant. Proceeds from the sale were placed into a trust approved by the voters. The plant is worth more than $371 million.
The lawsuit will help the Junkers escape from their nightmare.
Tonya Junker’s husband planned to retire within the year. He is now working more hours and doing two jobs to save money for an emergency evacuation.
“That is hard to believe,” she said.
The Junkers renovated and gutted the 1929 house, which was the first home in the subdivision. They planned to retire there.
Stuart Junker said that he wants only to receive the home’s value.
“It’s just kind of disappointing that the state won’t take care of us,” he said. “I mean, this is their problem.”
