SCHERTZ — Builder Pulte Homes is facing homeowner complaints of shifting foundations and retaining wall cracks — again. This time, it's in the Fairhaven neighborhood just northeast of San Antonio.

Homeowners say that dozens of homes in the neighborhood have had problems, everything from cracks in the walls to foundations that appear to be splitting horizontally. Some residents say they are noticing cracks starting in a retaining wall that runs along their backyards.

“As we start canvassing the neighborhood, we're finding it's huge, just huge,” resident Faye Touve told the Schertz City Council on Tuesday night. Touve said problems at her home started when it shifted so much that a water supply line broke.

Pulte is the parent company of Centex Homes, which in early 2010 saw a rock-clad retaining wall fail in spectacular fashion between the Rivermist and Hills of Rivermist neighborhoods on the Northwest Side of San Antonio. There, the city evacuated 91 homes initially and suspended the certificates of occupancy for 27 homes for 17 months. The builder eventually purchased 22 of the evacuated homes.

Valerie Dolenga, spokeswoman for Pulte Homes, said in Fairhaven, the builder is working with homeowners and conducting soil testing and third-party engineers are monitoring homes.

“(The area is) pretty notorious for expansive soils, and with the drought, it exacerbated the issue,” Dolenga said.

Some homeowners are concerned that the cracks in the retaining wall that runs along Columbia Drive indicate a problem that goes beyond cosmetic issues.

Pulte says that is not the case.

“After the Rivermist situation, we did have a third-party engineer look at the wall and they gave it an A-OK,” Dolenga said. “There are no problems with the retaining wall.” This summer, additional drainage was added to the bottom of the slope, she said.

Still, Patricia Alperin said she recently counted 28 cracks in the wall, which runs along her backyard and appears to rise more than 16 feet. “This is our first house, and look what happened,” she said.

Ryan Whitehair said he can hear popping noises in his house as it cracks. “It's so loud, I mute the TV because I think someone is in my garage,” he said. “It's been nothing but a nightmare.”

He said Pulte has done cosmetic fixes to cover over cracks — one so large between the wall and floor that he could stick his hand beneath it and his wife could see it from the next room.

Although some homeowners have said they would like the company to repurchase their homes, Dolenga said the company has not considered that. “If there are issues with the home, we're going to totally stand behind it and repair it,” she said.

In San Antonio, the Rivermist wall did not have a permit, but it turned out that was no aberration. The City Council later added retaining wall regulations to the Unified Development Code in response.

Schertz Mayor Hal Baldwin said the city relies on the builders and developers to engineer retaining walls. “Their engineer certified by putting his name and his ... stamp on the drawings that the wall was OK,” he said.

Jessica Lawrence and her mother Brenda Davis moved into their home seven months ago, but can slide a butter knife into a crack in their garage floor. Lawrence said Pulte engineers have told them that the size of the crack is normal.

“Don't undermine our intelligence,” Lawrence said. “This is not normal.”

Fairhaven residents thought they were going to have a chance to meet with Pulte officials Tuesday. But Pulte employees put out flyers in the neighborhood on Tuesday to announce there would be no meeting, and that it would meet one-on-one with people instead. The flyer also said it had established a website, www.fairhaventx.com and a dedicated email address, This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it , to communicate with residents.

Just before Tuesday's council meeting, Baldwin offered up a prayer: “I just ask that you bring resolution to these people as quickly as possible,” he said.