The Dignowity Hill Neighborhood Association has called an emergency meeting for 6 p.m. Monday on a series of fires at properties under construction on the East Side.
The meeting will be held at the Ella Austin Community Center after several new homes and townhomes near North Pine and Potomac and Center and North Swiss were damaged by fire.
The neighborhood association urges property developments to surround their construction sites with fencing and cameras.
District 2 San Antonio City Councilman Jalen McKee-Rodriguez released a statement concerning the fires.
"We are aware of the string of fires that have been reported in our District," the statement read. "We have been in contact with the San Antonio Arson Division, as well as the Fire Investigation Division, they are actively investigating the string of fires that have broken out on the East Side as of late. These investigations are continual and ongoing. If any residents have tips, or potential footage that can assist these investigations please contact the SAFD Arson Division at 210-207-7678."
The San Antonio Fire Department told Texas Public Radio on Monday
afternoon the fires had not been officially connected.
The East Side neighborhood has been the site of gentrification in recent years, prompting some heated rhetoric on social media.
Eduardo Martinez, the president of the neighborhood association, took to the association's Facebook page to write:
"The insinuations and intimations that these types of incidents are laughable, warranted, or are somehow acceptable retribution to a changing neighborhood are grotesque and reprehensible. Putting aside the property damage, the danger to human life that these fires posed is quite real. At best, this type of dismissive and flippant rhetoric has no place in our neighborhood discourse and at worst, this sometimes heated and highly antagonistic rhetoric, emboldens those who might be prone to act in destructive ways. Let us all reflect on how we can elevate our discourse to positively impact our neighborhood."
