Suit: Don't rename Manchaca Road

Drive down Manchaca Road these days and you're likely to see some of the many yellow signs with red letters urging to "Leave Manchaca Alone."

They direct readers to a website where an online petition that has already garnered more than 3,300 signatures calls for the Austin City Council to undo the vote it took on Oct. 4 to rename Manchaca Road to Menchaca Road.

If the number of signs or signatures says anything about the matter, it's that Austin residents are far from unified in support of renaming the busy 8-mile road in South Austin.

On Tuesday, a group of property owners along Manchaca Road sued the city in hopes of halting the street name change, which is set to take effect on Thursday.

The nine plaintiffs in the lawsuit say they did not receive any notification prior to the City Council's vote to change the name. Because not all property owners were properly notified, the suit argues, the name change was adopted illegally. It also challenges the belief that the origin of the street's name comes from the misspelled surname of one of the heroes of the Texas Revolution.

They want the city to place the name change on hold, send out a second round of notifications to affected property owners and conduct more public hearings on the matter.

"In kindergarten speak, we are asking for a do-over," their attorney Roger Borgelt told the American-Statesman.

Council Member Sabino "Pio" Renteria, who spearheaded the council's efforts to change the name, said he was aware of the lawsuit but had not had a chance to read it.

"I'm always disappointed when we get a lawsuit against us," Renteria said. "A lot of the historical information came out very clearly that it was named after Menchaca. I'd also like to see what costs they say they're experiencing. They don't have to change the names of their businesses. That's not mandatory."

On Tuesday at the Manchac — a business park on Manchaca Road near the intersection with Old Manchaca Road that happens to be about one mile north of the unincorporated Manchaca village where Menchaca Elementary School resides — the owner of Manchaca Village Veterinary Care, Robert Amoroso, said that stopping the change was not about refuting the origin of the street's name.

"This is about defending against the cost," Amoroso said.

He estimates that the name change would cost him thousands of dollars. Alycen Lucy, an insurance agent with an office on Manchaca Road and a plaintiff in the lawsuit, said the consequences of the name change would be immediate.

"I have to have the proper address on everything I do or else I am out of compliance for my securities licenses," Lucy said. "So I don’t have the luxury of ignoring the address change."

The origin of the street’s name is not a settled matter, but the common theory is that it was named for José Antonio Menchaca, who fought for Texas at the battle of San Jacinto during the Texas Revolution. The origin of the misspelling of Menchaca is believed to have originated from Texas Revolution war annals that listed his surname as Manchaca. The error followed him during his service with the Texian army, including when he camped south of Austin near what would later be named Manchaca Springs, according to biographical information provided to the city.

But others have theorized that the road's name comes from a Choctaw word, though the tribe has little history in this region. It also might have been named for a Louisiana bayou.

Manchaca Road's name is set to change Thursday. However, the attorney in the suit is hoping to have a court hearing on the same day to get an injunction place on the city and halt the change.