An anti-displacement sign made by tenants stands near the Soap Factory Apartments’ pool on Monday. Credit: Adam Doe

Some tenants who moved out of the Soap Factory Apartments — the low-cost downtown complex that could be razed to make way for a new minor league baseball stadium — say they haven’t received a $2,500 relocation stipend promised by the city.

As part of a memorandum of understanding between the city, real estate developer Weston Urban and the owners of the San Antonio Missions baseball team, tenants who leave the apartments are promised $2,500 if they vacate by September 2025.

However, three tenants who moved out in the last couple of weeks told the Current they haven’t received a dime to cover their relocation costs. What’s more, they have received mixed messages about the status of the money they expected to receive.

“I wanted to renew my lease because I loved living there,” former tenant Robert Laurence said. “Obviously, the whole issue of them tearing it down caused me to leave.”

Laurence is lucky enough to have a friend that allowed him to crash at their place while he waits for his check. He’s now worried the money may never come.

“If it wasn’t for my friend, it would have been very easy for me to end up on the street,” said Laurence, who lost his job earlier this year.

Laurence said it’s been difficult to find housing in San Antonio as affordable as the Soap Factory.

Responding to the Current‘s inquiries about the promised payments, San Antonio Missions board member Bruce Hill in November said tenants who didn’t receive relocation checks “didn’t pay their rent for months.”

However, on Friday, city officials said checks haven’t gone out because money isn’t yet available to make payments to relocating tenants. The disbursement of funds depends on whether a baseball stadium will actually be built, according to a statement provided by the city.

The fate of the Missions’ proposed 4,500-seat arena currently lies with the San Antonio Independent School District, which owns a 2.3-acre plot needed to construct the facility. The land is currently used as a parking lot for Fox Tech High School.

SAISD’s Board of Trustees is expected to vote during a Monday afternoon meeting whether to sell the property.

“The funding for the $2,500 stipend is conditioned upon the development of a baseball stadium,” the city said in an emailed statement. “Unless the property is secured, the stadium will not be built. The City, Weston Urban, and SAISD are working together to address some items identified by SAISD and hope to resolve before SAISD’s December Board meeting. If resolved and the SAISD Board approves the terms for the land transaction, the stipends will be disbursed.”

The prospect that a failure by SAISD to approve the land sale could scuttle the whole deal wasn’t made clear in the memorandum of understanding approved Sept. 12 on a 9-2 City Council vote. District 2 Councilman Jalen McKee-Rodriguez and District 5 Councilwoman Teri Castillo voted against the project.

Former Soap Factory tenant Laurence and others who moved out of the complex said they were unaware of the condition the city now says applies to them receiving their stipend. They said they feel like they’re getting screwed.

“It just feels like they’re going to keep the money instead of it going to the residents,” Laurence said. “It all seems very shady. I want to ascribe the best intentions, but it seems like they just want to push everyone out. It’s really frustrating.”

Land Sale

Designated Bidders LLC, the entity that owns the San Antonio Missions baseball team, has until Dec. 9 to respond to SAISD’s list of demands approved last month if the district is going to sell the Fox Tech land.

During a Nov. 18 meeting, SAISD’s board imposed conditions for the land sale including that the district receive $45 million to build an Advanced Learning Academy, guarantees the city construct at least 1,250 affordable housing units inside the district and $400,000 in annual compensation.

If Designated Bidders LLC and Weston Urban refuse to meet those demands, they may be forced to relocate the stadium development to another part of town.

Even if the baseball stadium isn’t built on Fox Tech’s parking lot, that doesn’t necessarily save the Soap Factory Apartments, SAISD Superintendent Jaime Aquino cautioned during November’s board meeting.

Weston Urban bought the complex in August 2023, meaning that even if the development firm doesn’t get its baseball stadium, it can still do whatever it wants with the complex.

“Even if we were not to sell the land, that is not going to solve the issue of displacement [at the Soap Factory],” Aquino said.

New Guidelines

The fact that the disbursement of funds to Soap Factory tenants was contingent upon the Missions and SAISD striking a land deal wasn’t made clear during the Sept. 12 meeting at which City Council approved moving ahead on the project.

According to the project’s memorandum of understanding, Weston Urban would pay tenants $2,500 as long as they executed their lease prior to Oct. 1. Meanwhile, the city would be on the hook for the payout for tenants earning below 80% of the neighborhood’s Average Median Income who also lived at the Soap Factory for at least one year and relocate within Bexar County.

Relocating tenants said Building Brighter Communities, the nonprofit contracted by Weston Urban to help with Soap Factory relocations, has so far been unable to clarify when they’ll receive their $2,500 stipends.

In a Dec. 3 exchange of text messages between Building Brighter Communities CEO Brandon Johnson and a Soap Factory tenant inquiring about the money, Johnson said, “Westen Urban [sic] and the City are both working to finalize their agreement.”

In another text message from Nov. 13, Johnson told a tenant, “The apartments said they are in the process of finalizing the funds to have available; however, no concrete date as of yet.”

Johnson didn’t respond to multiple requests for comment from the Current.

With a question mark still hovering over the fate of the promised relocation stipends, a former Soap Factory tenant who identified himself as Stephen said he isn’t getting his hopes up.

“I’m very doubtful,” said Stephen, who declined to give his full name out of fear of retaliation. “I think they’re making it extremely hard for people to get their money, and the ambiguity of when it’s coming and where it’s coming from. And [those] should have been day-one things.”

Stephen was able to buy a home in New Braunfels with his girlfriend after his lease at the Soap Factory expired. Even so, he’d like to be reimbursed for moving costs, which he paid out of pocket.

“I’m fortunate enough to be position where that didn’t really hurt me too much, but for a lot of tenants, I know that’s not the case for them.”

The Monday meeting at which SAISD’s board could approve the land sale to the Missions’ owners will start at 2:10 p.m. at the district’s headquarters, 514 W. Quincy St.

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This article appears in Nov 28-29, 2024.

Michael Karlis is a multimedia journalist at the San Antonio Current, whose coverage in print and on social media focuses on local and state politics. He is a graduate of American University in Washington,...