Police in Galveston, Texas have begun reviewing complaints tied to a housing program whose collapse has left a group of local families scrambling for somewhere to live. The development marks a new turn in a story that FOX 26 first reported last month, when tenants said they had paid rent through a housing assistance program only to wind up facing eviction.
According to the station, Galveston police have confirmed that they are now looking into complaints involving Beacons of Lights LLC and its owner, Hilda Tobias. Officers said they had received multiple complaints about the organization, but they stopped short of characterizing the matter as a criminal investigation, leaving its exact status unclear for now even as scrutiny of the program grows.
For the families at the center of the controversy, the renewed attention has done little to ease their immediate uncertainty. Some of the same tenants who were caught up in the original collapse say they are once again unsure of where they will live next, trapped in a cycle of temporary arrangements and looming deadlines that has upended their housing for weeks.
One tenant described the whiplash of being promised stability only to lose it again. She said she had finally moved her belongings into a new apartment that she was told she could keep for 90 days while she searched for a permanent home for her children, only to receive papers indicating that she and her family would have to pack up their few belongings once more and hit the road.
A local advocate, Reverend Timmy Sykes, said he has been working with tenants, property owners and city officials to try to keep families housed while they move through Galveston's housing assistance process. He said he had tried to negotiate an arrangement under which residents could stay for 90 days and then pay a small amount of rent they could afford until they were accepted and credentialed into the city's program, which runs on an application process that takes time.
The property owner involved offered a different account of where things stand. Alex Young told FOX 26 that no 90-day extension was ever finalized, and he said that rights of possession had already been filed, a step that signals landlords are moving to reclaim the units even as advocates push for more time on behalf of the tenants still living in them.
City officials, meanwhile, said efforts to find a lasting solution are ongoing but slow. The city of Galveston said it is currently working with 12 of the 18 affected households through its rental assistance program, but that none of them have yet been placed in housing because they are still moving through the qualification process, leaving the families in limbo as the inquiry into the program unfolds.