Editor’s Note: This is part one of what will be a two-part series supported by the Pulitzer Center and the Ida B. Wells Society Investigative Reporting Fellowship. (Leer en español aquí.)

For the Gulf Coast oil and gas industry, the mini-region around the 50-mile-long Laguna Madre is the final frontier.

A rare hypersaline lagoon that separates the Padre islands from the deep South Texas mainland, the Laguna Madre is ringed in its southern reach by the small coastal communities of Port Isabel, Laguna Heights, Laguna Vista, Long Island Village, and South Padre Island. This area has long avoided the oil refineries and gas processing plants that dominate cities farther up the Gulf like Corpus Christi, Houston, Freeport, Galveston, and Port Arthur. What little presence the oil and gas industry has had here centered on shipping product out of the Brownsville Ship Channel, which connects the eponymous city to the lagoon, and this activity mostly dried up late last century.

But all that is changing. This summer, two storage tanks for the huge new liquefied natural gas project, Rio Grande LNG, have emerged to towering heights over the state highway that links Brownsville, some 20 miles west, to the 5,000-person town of Port Isabel. The project, set to be the first of its kind in the Rio Grande Valley, will chill gas coming through pipelines—laid over the past decade amid the country’s “shale revolution”—into liquid form 1/600th the substance’s previous size. This liquefied gas will then be exported via massive tanker ships past the jetties of South Padre Island and across the world. The under-construction project has already poured concrete over nearly a thousand acres of ecologically fragile wetlands and lomas, clay dunes formed over thousands of years.

This transformative development has been aggressively touted by NextDecade, the publicly traded Houston-based company behind Rio Grande LNG, as a job creator that will be environmentally sensitive and won’t affect tourism. But locals say it threatens existing ecotourism and fishing industries, and federal regulators have agreed, pointing to the number of LNG tankers coming in and out of the ship channel.

Nearly 100 years ago, Cameron County commissioners initiated the creation of the Brownsville Ship Channel, wanting the Valley to venture into a new phase of global economic engagement by exporting the area’s plentiful citrus and cotton overseas. As decades wore on, companies like Marathon built offshore oil rigs at the Port of Brownsville and employed hundreds before closing in the late 1980s after the country’s oil bust. Union Carbide, a chemical manufacturer, met the same fate as butane prices doubled, leaving workers jobless after the plant closed.

Trade, logistics, rig-building, and shipbreaking haven’t left the port, with the various companies there employing about 3,400 people. But today’s officials in Brownsville—population 190,000—want something bigger: to bring back the oil and gas industry as part of a region-wide attempt to remake the area’s economy into a hub of international corporate investment. To help realize this vision, Rio Grande LNG is fronting the cost of dredging the channel deep enough for some of the largest tankers ever made to traverse.

Though this will be the first such facility in deep South Texas, gas export plants have spread across the Gulf Coast over the past several years. The United States has become the largest gas exporter in the world, thanks to new installations built along the coastal portions of Texas and Louisiana. And LNG firms are further expanding these facilities despite a projected oversupply of gas, some citing vague “growing Asian demand” as a reason. These expansions are also aided by the Trump administration’s attempt to geopolitically leverage gas in striking trade deals.

If NextDecade successfully builds out Rio Grande LNG to the size it’s planning, it will be one of the two largest facilities in the country by export volume. 

While the project is strongly supported by officials in the Brownsville area, it’s been consistently opposed by the leaders of communities much closer to the site such as Port Isabel and South Padre Island, which will bear the brunt of pollution or industrial disaster and live off incompatible industries. “It’s not a plus for tourism. It’s not a plus for the environment. It’s not a plus for our community,” South Padre Island Councilman Joe Ricco told the Texas Observer. “It’s not a plus for residents—unless you’re maybe the pilot boat captain,” he said, referring to the tugboats that will guide incoming tankers.

LNG companies from Texas to Louisiana have pitched themselves as saviors of economically barren lands, and politicians like those in Brownsville have actively joined the PR push—often alongside considerable direct communication with, and campaign donations from, the companies. To measure the distance between this rhetoric and reality, and to essentially peer into the murky future of the Laguna Madre area, the Observer has reported out the impacts of LNG facilities in the industrialized town of Freeport and in Cameron Parish, Louisiana. 

What’s clear on the ground in these Gulf communities is that a second gulf exists between the companies’ rosy promises and their mixed impacts in reality. And many locals believe the projects have yielded more harm than good. As the oil and gas industry further pushes the climate toward irreversible change, LNG export plants are doing the same to the communities where they operate.

About an hour southeast of Houston, Freeport is one of several cities that make up the Brazosport area, the coastal appendage of Brazoria County. The 11,000 people who live in the city are surrounded by a seemingly never-ending stretch of petrochemical facilities—operated by Dow, BASF, and dozens of other corporations—where the smokestacks, machinery, and administration buildings all blend together. Among them are two plants run by Freeport LNG, which has been in the area for some 20 years, first as a gas importer and later as an exporter.

As the company moved toward exports about a decade ago, when the West Texas fracking boom achieved liftoff, Freeport LNG ramped up community relations all over the county, promising plentiful new jobs and billions to be spent on construction. While not as old or big as other corporate giants in this industrial town, Freeport LNG still looms large. Several buildings, including the local theater and the hospital’s intensive care unit, bear the company’s name. Since exporting its first shipment in 2019, the company has regularly sponsored local events, including Port Freeport’s Take-A-Child Fishing Tournament.

Brazosport High School’s baseball field (Gaige Davila)

But local organizers say philanthropy doesn’t excuse the lucrative tax breaks it takes in or the pollution it spews out. “They are not interested in being good neighbors, except for doing things that will put their name on a water tower or school or something and make them look good,” Gary Witt, a retired marketing professor and chair of the Better Brazoria organization, told me in May at Sweet T’s, a downtown diner.

In the streets outside, broken glass, downed fences, and shingles were still littered from last year’s Hurricane Beryl. This part of the city was mostly lifeless, despite being next to Port Freeport and a couple miles from Freeport LNG.

Since 2015, the local school district, Brazoria County, the City of Freeport, and a neighboring city have given Freeport LNG a combined $1 billion in tax abatement deals. The City of Freeport alone is projected to forgo over $321 million in property taxes for Freeport LNG, according to an economic analysis commissioned by Better Brazoria, by the time the agreement ends in 2029. The city has opted for payments in lieu of taxes, receiving about $2 million a year from the company.

Freeport LNG says the tax handouts are well worth the project’s contributions to the local tax base. Company spokesperson Heather Browne told the Observer the corporation will pay “$2.6 billion in taxes to local Brazoria County taxing jurisdictions over the course of the company’s initial 20-year operating life,” on top of generating additional taxable economic activity. In company literature, Freeport LNG has said it employs 230 people in Brazoria County and created 9,000 construction jobs during its build-out, which took about five years. Although the company receives more tax abatements than any other entity in the county, it’s not among the top 10 largest employers in Freeport, last year’s city budget shows. 

Since exports began, Census data shows median income rose and poverty rates fell in Freeport at levels exceeding state and nationwide trends. Donald Payne, an economics professor at Brazosport College, said the gas facility is one part of the explanation: “Since 2019, Freeport LNG, the Port of Freeport, and the petrochemical industry all experienced growth. Together, they created hundreds of high-wage jobs directly and many more indirectly,” Payne told the Observer in an email, though he noted that “Based on personal experience, many Freeport LNG workers appear to live outside the city.”

A short drive from downtown Freeport are Quintana, population 30, and its beaches, where Freeport LNG’s liquefaction plant looms. The facility occupies much of the island town, or what’s left of it. Some of the few people who live there now work for the company or the county beach park on the north end of the island. Most of the town’s annual revenue comes from the roughly $1 million a year Freeport LNG pays directly as part of a property tax break deal. One council member is an employee of the company.

Quintana is a major stopover for migratory birds, with at least 325 species documented there. The island’s observation tower was constructed by Freeport LNG, and some of the land that makes up bird and nature sanctuaries was donated by the company. The hum of nearby tanker ships competes constantly with birdsong.

The beaches are usually well attended in the summer—as they were when the LNG plant exploded in 2022. The explosion, which damaged the LNG facility and caused a toddler on the beach to injure his face on a rock, was caused by trapped gas that burst through a pipe and was ignited by a damaged wire. A contributing cause, a federal investigation found, was an overworked, understaffed crew. Three years before, the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration (PHMSA) had fined Freeport LNG after operators pushed gas at 917 pounds per square inch of pressure through a pipe rated for just 90 pounds, breaking the pipe and releasing 315 million feet of gas.  

Two busloads of kids on a field trip were on the beach during the explosion, two locals who were present told the Observer. People were unsure what to do. Local authorities issued a voluntary evacuation notice. Those who left the island had to drive past the site of the explosion as the company contained the fire. When federal regulators held a public briefing for residents to learn about the explosion, Freeport LNG didn’t attend.

Melanie Oldham, the executive director of Better Brazoria, said the company needs to update its public emergency response plan. “How do people know how or where to evacuate? Do they try to get over this one bridge?” she asked as we drove back to Freeport from Quintana. Browne, the Freeport LNG spokesperson, told the Observer that the safety of its workforce and community is “top priority” for the company. Regarding the explosion, Browne referred to the company’s 2022 Sustainability and Community Investment report, which points to the company fixing and modifying the valves that led to the incident, hiring more employees, and retraining staff. She declined to comment on Oldham’s statement about the response plan.

Quintana (Gaige Davila)

Since the 2022 explosion, Freeport LNG has continued to have “emissions events,” which are unplanned releases of chemicals. The plant and its pretreatment facility have had 98 since the explosion and 134 before that, amounting to hundreds of thousands of pounds of air pollution, including benzene and carbon monoxide. In all, Freeport LNG has paid around $2.6 million in fines to various federal and state agencies. Freeport LNG is now planning to add a fourth “train,” the machines that cool gas into liquid.

Local governments in the area have backed the company through more than just tax breaks. When Freeport LNG needed permission from the Department of Energy (DOE) to export gas to countries that don’t have free trade agreements with the United States, the company ghostwrote letters of support for local elected officials and organizations to submit to the federal department. Public records obtained by the Observer show that Freeport LNG’s public relations team gave a prewritten letter to Brazoria County Judge Matt Sebesta in 2021. Sebesta submitted the letter with minimal edits. Several other organizations and local elected officials also sent the same letter. Two years later, the DOE approved Freeport LNG’s request.

Freeport’s former East End neighborhood, now being developed by the port (Gaige Davila)

In downtown Freeport during my May visit, I took a walk with Manning Rollerson, who has lived in the city most of his life, growing up on the East End. He pointed out long-gone establishments from his youth, where shrimp boats used to dock, and the names of the historic buildings, empty but still standing.

We started at Freeport’s former city hall building, which was vacated last March. There was broken glass around the building, and its drive-through lanes, left over from when the building was a bank, were rotting away. As we continued walking, we saw that—save for a few offices, the Freeport City Museum, and some apartments—downtown was little more than a pass-through for people leaving the nearby port, where several industrial giants operate, including Phillips 66, Chiquita, and Freeport LNG.

“For all the money that is spent on [tax breaks], why is downtown looking like this? This is the heart of the city,” said Rollerson, who founded the Freeport Haven Project, a grassroots group advocating against pollution in Brazoria County, and has traveled all over the world advocating against LNG development and fossil fuels generally.

Rollerson said international leaders are often more receptive to his message than local officials are. “I’m gonna make it plain and simple: They don’t give a damn what we say when it comes to the industry.”

We approached the East End. Separated from downtown by Navigation Boulevard, this was a neighborhood, segregated by the city in the 1930s, where Black and brown people lived for decades. With most of those homes bought and demolished by Port Freeport, the land is being turned into storage lots as the port expands northwest toward downtown. Rollerson pointed to where his grandmother’s home had been, the park he used to go to as a kid, and the homes of family and friends. Now barren land, it will all be part of the port soon. 

Rollerson is a plaintiff in a federal lawsuit alleging that the City of Freeport and Port Freeport violated the civil rights of East End property owners when it bought, some via eminent domain, and demolished homes in the neighborhood after purposefully disinvesting in the area. In 2022, the Department of Homeland Security’s Civil Rights Division agreed to review the lawsuit, but Lone Star Legal Aid, the lead attorneys in the suit, told the Observer that progress has since stalled after the Department of Government Efficiency laid off the DHS staff who were working on it.

“I don’t even see a future for nobody, based on our government,” Rollerson said. “If we don’t die from toxic poisoning, we’re gonna die from being broke and sick. When will we ever see the American dream?” 

Brazoria County has rates of lung and bronchial cancer, which can be caused by particulate matter and benzene, above the national average. A little over 50,000 residents here don’t have health insurance.

As for downtown, Freeport Economic Development Corporation’s executive director Robert Johnson said most building owners are sitting on their properties in hopes that they can sell or lease them for more money in the future. He wants to avoid downtown being totally absorbed: “I would not want to see the downtown eaten up by the port, because they would just raze it,” Johnson said.

Despite his concern, Johnson said the city’s industry is a strength. The various companies here bring in a commuter population that dwarfs the number of local residents, which he said creates a spillover effect benefiting the local economy.

Port Freeport did not respond to the Observer’s questions for this story. Neither did Brazoria County or any Freeport city council member.

When driving from Texas into Louisiana on State Highway 82, after Sabine Pass LNG’s massive trains, the road runs parallel to the coast, but you don’t see any water for half an hour. Instead, you see trees, cow pastures, and gas processing structures—some operating, some abandoned—before finally reaching the coastal prairie and its brown gulf water; the town of Holly Beach, with its homes raised on pilings as high as 15 feet; and the surviving trees stripped of their foliage and gnarled from hurricanes. The few locals can watch LNG tankers from their porches pass into the Calcasieu Ship Channel, which spans from the coast all the way up to Lake Charles. In 1959, the first LNG exported from the United States left through this channel, sent to the United Kingdom as a test run for an industry that would concentrate here decades later.

At Holly Beach’s eastern edge are John Allaire and his 150-acre property. With a clear view from his mobile home’s porch, Allaire, a 69-year-old geologist who worked four decades as an environmental coordinator in the oil and gas industry, has been documenting just about everything related to Calcasieu Pass LNG, a 4-year-old, 432-acre facility owned by Virginia-based Venture Global that sits across the channel. When I met him in May, he spread maps, photos, and reports on a bench to show me the 4,700-person Cameron Parish now being surrounded by LNG facilities on every side but the coast. Starting with Sabine Pass LNG, which received the country’s first license after the Obama administration authorized LNG exports, it took just under a decade for three additional plants to emerge, with four more on the way.

He showed me a photo he took of a ship named Clean Energy in the channel with a stream of fire coming out of the plant’s flare stack. “That’s what clean energy looks like here on the Louisiana coast,” he said.

Within its first year of operating, in 2022, Allaire assessed that Calcasieu Pass LNG had violated its air permit more than 2,000 times by overemitting after accidents and equipment malfunctions. Alongside the Louisiana Bucket Brigade, a statewide environmental justice organization, Allaire found that more than half the time, in 2023, Venture Global was not reporting violations on time or at all. The state environmental regulator sent a compliance order to the company that same year, but nothing has come of it. In 2024, Allaire documented the plant flaring for 95 hours straight when it’s only permitted to do so for 60 hours annually. 

Despite all this, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC), which regulates LNG plant construction, green-lighted a second Venture Global facility farther into the unincorporated hamlet of Cameron last June. Four months later, the corporation successfully asked the state if it could increase its emissions at the first facility by up to 700,000 tons of greenhouse gasses and other pollutants.

Cameron Parish (named after a different Cameron than Cameron County, Texas, where Rio Grande LNG is being built) holds the distinction of having the fastest-shrinking population in Louisiana. But even with fewer locals to take jobs at the plants, Venture Global is now planning yet a third facility.

On Allaire’s side of the ship channel, Commonwealth LNG, developed by the Houston company Catarus, was set to start construction later this year. In October, Louisiana’s state court canceled the project’s construction permit; the court said state regulators did not consider how Commonwealth LNG—along with other established facilities in Cameron Parish—would affect coastal erosion and rising sea levels in Louisiana. But the state reissued the permit in mid-November. Commonwealth LNG did not respond to the Observer’s request for comment.

John Allaire on his property in Holly Beach, Louisiana (Gaige Davila)

At its original Calcasieu Pass facility, Venture Global employs about 300 people, saying a majority of those employees come from Cameron or nearby parishes. In exchange, Cameron Parish and the state lavished the firm with billions in tax abatements.

Cameron Parish Port President Howard Romero said in 2023 that once the company starts paying property taxes, the parish would become the “Riviera of the world.” But the state renewed the first Venture plant’s tax abatements later that same year, meaning the company won’t pay property taxes—about $923 million in all—for another three years. The state also gave Venture Global a tax abatement for its second plant, letting the company off the hook for another $1.67 billion in property taxes, in a parish where the average annual income is $34,000. 

On the main road into Cameron, I passed a mural that depicted a long-gone town—one that used to catch the most seafood in the country. Made in 1975, the artwork states that the town’s population was 2,510 people then. Census data says about 300 people live here now, but locals say it’s likely far fewer. There’s one gas station in town, with a food truck next door that serves po’boys and used to be a brick-and-mortar before Hurricane Laura in 2020 ripped it off its foundation. The remains of the restaurant now lie a block away in front of a church, also destroyed. Even the Catholic church won’t be rebuilding here, as insurers won’t fund this hurricane-prone place anymore. There are no hospitals or grocery stores.

The newest construction in town is the Lighthouse Bend restaurant, market, RV park, and marina, opened by Venture Global in 2024. The upscale establishment is juxtaposed against the LNG facilities just down the road from it and the storm-damaged homes, shrimp yards, and incessant dust that follows every truck. The parish and Venture Global built the marina after the latter had cut off public access to a parish-owned jetty park, which had a fishing pier and camper spaces along the ship channel (similar to Isla Blanca Park on South Padre Island). Mark Daigle, a Cameron Parish Police juror, told local media last year the project was turning Cameron into a place where displaced residents can return after hurricanes: “I truly believe [with] what we’ll be getting off LNG and everything like that, we will be able to put ourself in a place to where we can possibly help the people come back home.”

Cameron, Louisiana (Gaige Davila)

The local shrimping industry, a large part of the area’s culture, has all but disappeared since LNG arrived. Local shrimpers say they can’t catch anything when the ships pass through and drive the shrimp away. They also say constant dredging to deepen the ship channel worsens the problem; research suggests that this dredging kicks up sediment that harms sea life in a variety of ways. FERC acknowledged the same phenomenon in its final environmental impact statement on Venture Global’s second project but said that the effects could be mitigated. 

Some locals say the tankers could help by coming later in the day, but companies won’t do that. Nowadays, Cameron Parish shrimpers drag nets 10 miles away in Vermillion Bay, where there is no tanker traffic. The difference between before and after the gas plants came is hundreds of thousands of dollars and pounds of shrimp.

The shrimpers who’ve stayed are now venturing into other businesses. Captain Anthony “Tad” Theriot, who quit school in 10th grade and has been shrimping ever since, spent the opening day of shrimp season at an oyster farm where he’s been working for extra income.

I met him that night on his boat, which is docked at the last shrimp house in town. He told me of life in Cameron back when there were grocery stores, a movie theater, even a skating rink. Hurricanes destroyed it all, and the LNG companies, despite their promises of prosperity, haven’t brought it back. Theriot put both his sons through college with shrimp money, but just last year, he tied up his boat for the season and had to get financial help from a local nonprofit.

“They got motherfuckers at Walmart making what I make,” Theriot said, adding that he’s ready to sell his boat and leave the industry. ”I can’t even make a living in my own house [where he would sell catches]. So what do I want to be here for?” 

Another shrimper, Melissa Richard, who owns a shop in Hackberry, 30 miles north beside another LNG facility operated by a different company, echoed that she might leave the business that supported three generations of her family. “What else am I supposed to do? To me, I’ve made it to the top,” Richard told the Observer. “My dream was to have my own shrimp house. I’m living my dream, and it’s sinking.”

All this local change, according to companies like Venture Global, comes with a global benefit. The company believes that LNG reduces climate change by displacing coal plants. But, in recent years, coal has been primarily replaced by renewables like solar and wind rather than gas, even as the LNG industry continues expanding. Meanwhile, natural gas facilities, including Venture Global’s, frequently release massive quantities of methane—a powerful accelerant of climate change, the very phenomenon that intensifies the hurricanes that have ravaged this part of southwest Louisiana.

Venture Global did not respond to multiple requests for comment for this story. Neither did Cameron Parish Police Jury President Ronald Nunez, or Police Juror Magnus McGee, whose district covers Cameron. 

On the last day before I left the Louisiana coast, I met 72-year-old Sherry Peshoff, who lives near the planned location of Venture’s second LNG facility and on the same street where she was raised.

Sherry Peshoff (Gaige Davila)

Peshoff can remember 1957’s Hurricane Audrey, which killed at least 500 people—more than live in the town of Cameron today. She remembers being inside a home with hundreds of others as it lifted off its foundation; she lost her paternal grandparents and uncle. Still, she grew up here shrimping with her siblings and dad. “He raised all four of us kids out of the Gulf,” she said. “The same gulf waters that took his family.” 

From her raised porch, the existing Venture Global facility blocks most of the view, and the company is snatching up the properties that surround her. Leaving is becoming less a question of if than when. Once she’s gone, she expects the industry that helped drive her out to face a reckoning. “I have a gut feeling God has got something in store for this place. They’ve taken all the churches out. To me, that plant is causing a lot of trouble, and to me, the Lord’s going to let a big hurricane come and wipe this place out.”

Before leaving, I asked her what she’d tell residents of the Laguna Madre area in deep South Texas, which shares a waning shrimping industry and similar hurricane prone-ness.

“Cameron’s never going to be the same,” Peshoff said of her small patch of the Louisiana coast. “And you can bank on it: Your hometown’s not going to be the same neither.” 

Back in Texas, Rio Grande LNG isn’t expected to export gas for another couple of years, but it’s already changing some aspects of life in Port Isabel, the coastal city where I grew up.

State Highway 48 has a new stoplight, directing trucks and heavy equipment from Rio Grande LNG’s site, piling up traffic in both directions in the morning and at quitting time. Data from the Texas Department of Transportation acquired by the Observer shows that more car accidents are happening near the site than before construction started, two years ago. 

Long Island Village, a tiny golf-course community of mostly retirees, is connected to Port Isabel via a swing bridge. Dredge boats and vessels bringing material to the LNG site have regularly collided with that bridge, and one such incident snapped the cable.

In July, a shrimp boat sank in the channel, throwing two people onboard into the water. The captain was found dead a few days later. It was the first time a shrimper from the area had died on the water in years. Two local shrimpers told the Observer the boat hit a dredge pipe siphoning sediment to expand the channel for LNG. Spokespeople for the Port of Brownsville and the U.S. Coast Guard told the Observer they hadn’t heard of a dredge pipe being the cause. The Guard denied a Freedom of Information Act request, saying the investigation remains open. Great Lakes Dredging, the company expanding the channel, didn’t respond. 

In town, Port Isabel residents are wondering what risks come with Rio Grande LNG being just 3 miles away. One resident, Marta Duran, lives off Port Road in what used to be Port Isabel’s Palangana neighborhood, a five-minute drive from the LNG site. At the end of her street is an abandoned oil refinery, cleared of structures and reclaimed by native flora over decades. Just a few miles away is Rio Grande LNG and, across the channel, Elon Musk’s SpaceX launch site. Duran worries one of SpaceX’s semi-frequent explosions could lead to a secondary explosion at the gas plant. (A consulting firm hired by NextDecade determined in 2017 that this was exceedingly unlikely, but that was based on smaller rockets than the ones Musk is using today.)

She’s heard local officials and NextDecade talk about the advantages LNG will bring but little else. “In my opinion, the community is not being given complete information. It’s more like advertising of benefits,” Duran said. “They are not talking about how to react in case of a catastrophe, a community emergency.” 

A home health worker, Duran is a member of Vecinos para el Bienestar de la Comunidad Costera, a coalition of Port Isabel residents who were part of a lawsuit against FERC and NextDecade that got the company’s federal authorization revoked last August and forced the company to go through another environmental analysis. 

But, this March, the same court that canceled the FERC approval reinstated it—and FERC then published its court-ordered environmental review and approved Rio Grande LNG. Vecinos, along with the City of Port Isabel and other groups, asked FERC for a rehearing in September, saying Rio Grande LNG’s plans to add more trains, and export more gas from them, was not being considered. But FERC never responded, effectively denying the request. 

For the closest communities, Rio Grande LNG will bring carcinogens and particulate matter. FERC has said the emissions pose no “significant” threat, but federal public health agencies say any exposure is unsafe. As for explosions, NextDecade says that it has safeguards in place, but gas companies and FERC keep emergency response plans under wraps, saying release would pose a security risk.

NextDecade says there’ll be up to 5,000 construction jobs at the project’s peak and 250 permanent positions. Those are significant numbers for the Laguna Madre area, but the prospect of a carcinogen-emitting facility just a couple miles from Port Isabel’s only grocery store—and of shrimp or recreational boat traffic being halted routinely for LNG tankers—makes what I saw in Freeport and Cameron Parish seem like a telling omen.

Officials in Brownsville and Cameron County continue to strongly support Rio Grande LNG, while the communities closest to the site remain opposed. Jared Hockema, Port Isabel’s city manager, said the export plants threaten existing tourism and fishing industries and that LNG is a shortsighted economic strategy.

“Regardless of what happens with these plants, we know they’re not going to be there forever. But what will be there forever is the Laguna Madre, the Bahia Grande [a large restored wetland], and the Gulf of Mexico … and they’re huge economic drivers,” he said. “So what’s the right choice to make? Is it short-term money, or is it long-term benefit to your community? Is it short-term money, or is it public safety, public health? To me, it’s an easy call.”

Nevertheless, construction of Rio Grande LNG proceeds as the company rushes to build the plant after years of legal and bureaucratic delays, and as NextDecade tries to secure more international contracts for exporting the gas.

“I think they only care about the economic benefits the investors will gain, without caring about the community,” Duran said. “Because they know the consequences, and, regardless, they continue.”

The post Peering Into the Rio Grande Valley’s Fossil Fuel Future appeared first on The Texas Observer.

A transgender former shelter resident is suing New York, saying city shelters failed to place her in a shelter for women or transgender people, putting her at risk of assault on multiple occasions. Advocates say she is not alone.

A men’s homeless shelter in the Tremont neighborhood in The Bronx. The lawsuit alleges the plaintiff was placed there despite identifying herself as a transgender woman. (Adi Talwar/City Limits)

Content warning: This story includes descriptions of sexual assault. If you need support, contact RAINN’s hotline.

Jane Doe moved from Florida to New York City in 2020 because of its reputation as a safe city for transgender people.

But when she lost her home in the summer of 2022 and entered a homeless shelter, the city repeatedly failed to place her in a shelter that conformed with her gender identity, a lawsuit from Housing Works, Brooklyn Legal Services and Wang Hecker LLP alleges. 

During a two and a half year stay across three city shelters, Doe says shelter staff ignored her requests to be placed in a room with women or in a bed specifically for transgender people. Shelter staff repeatedly placed Doe in rooms with men, her lawyers say, putting her at risk of violence and predation.

Doe was sexually assaulted multiple times by other shelter residents during that period, the lawsuit filed in late October says.

“In the face of a national backlash against trans folks, with the right using transgender folks as a whipping post to whip up a base of prejudice among its base, it was so essential to be in a city that held itself out as a haven,” said Doe’s lawyer Armen Merjian of Housing Works. “It is all the more disappointing and angering to know that in the face of that she has gone through such trans discrimination in our system.”

The ordeal deeply wounded and hurt Doe, who is a Black transgender woman. She received permission from a Supreme Court of New York Judge to proceed anonymously in her case to protect her identity and her safety. Her name is also withheld in this story.

The City Law Department declined to comment on the suit.

In a statement, a spokesperson for the Department of Homeless Services (DHS) said, “While we cannot comment on the specifics of ongoing litigation, we will conduct a thorough investigation to verify the facts, and should we identify any violation of agency policy or staff misconduct, we will hold any and all bad actors accountable.”

The suit alleges that employees of DHS and three city-contracted shelter operators failed “to place her in a safe, secure housing accommodation because she is a transgender woman,” in violation of city human rights laws that protect gender identity and disability.

Doe says in the suit that despite informing multiple staff across shelters about her identity, requesting multiple transfers, and complaining to high-level staff at the city’s Department of Social Services, she was continually misgendered and mistreated.

The suit says she was misinformed about her rights to a gender-consistent bed, placed in facilities that endangered her safety, and retaliated against her for being transgender, jeopardizing her ability to secure permanent housing.

“For everyone that comes forward to me that’s a homeless person suffering something, or a person who is trans and Black and poor and discriminated against, they’re always the tip of the iceberg,” said Merjian.

A ‘beacon’ for transgender people

New York City has, in some ways, been on the cutting edge of policymaking to protect transgender people. But realizing those promises hasn’t always come easy.

Transgender people in the United States experience disproportionate violence compared to cisgender people. In 2019, the American Medical Association recognized it as “an epidemic.”

They are also twice as likely to experience homelessness, according to the Trevor Project. While there is limited data on the prevalence of homelessness and violence on transgender people by race, what researchers do know suggests that Black transgender women like Doe are at the greatest risk of predation.

“To see her be able to articulate the dignity that was stripped from her, the safety and the ability to safely come into her identity and in a city that she expected safety from. It’s heartbreaking,” said Julian Castronovo, a supervising attorney at Brooklyn Legal Services who works in the LGBTQ+ and HIV advocacy unit and also represents Doe.

In 2006, New York City’s DHS put out a first of its kind policy for serving LGBTQ+ New Yorkers, asking providers to assign people to the intake shelters that match their gender identity.

Then, in 2021, the city reached a settlement in Lopez v. NYC Department of Homeless Services, a landmark case that argued the city failed to protect the safety of transgender people in shelters.

The settlement required the city to establish shelter beds to specifically serve trans, nonbinary, and gender nonconforming (TGNC) people. DHS had designated a minimum of 40 units for gender nonconforming clients in five shelters as of earlier this year.

In part due to the Lopez settlement, New York then opened the nation’s first publicly funded homeless shelter for trans people at Ace’s Place earlier this year, with 150 beds specifically set aside for transgender and gender non-conforming clients, bringing the total to 190. In a press release championing the announcement, the department wrote: “the city stands as a beacon of safety, dignity, and empowerment for TGNC community members navigating housing insecurity.”

In a statement to City Limits, a DHS spokesperson added: “We recognize that a safe and affirming environment is absolutely critical to the health and stability of vulnerable New Yorkers looking to get back on their feet in shelter, which is why the agency has taken important steps to strengthen systemwide protections for LGBTQI+ individuals while ensuring trauma-informed service delivery across our network of not-for-profit providers that operate shelters.”

DHS doesn’t report an exact number of transgender people it serves in its shelters, but reports  indicate they served 362 LGBTQ people in its shelters from April through June of this year, with 123 specialty beds available for LGBTQ people.

In addition, the agency says it has implemented comprehensive training for DHS and provider staff on serving transgender and gender non-conforming clients. That includes annual reminders and updates to their policies and systems—like changing forms, data systems, and records to match a client’s preferred name and gender identity.

During that period where the city was rolling out new policies and planning trans-specific shelters, Doe says workers at DHS intake centers and individual shelters routinely discriminated against her, in direct violation of those policies and civil rights and disability rights law. Higher ups who knew about it did not hold those workers accountable, the suit alleges.

“There are policies on the books that say that what happened to Ms. Doe shouldn’t happen,” said Castronovo.

DHS’s policy on placing transgender-identifying individuals entitles them to a placement consistent with their gender identity, expedited placement upon request, a waitlist for TGNC beds, rights to transfer for safety, and other reasonable accommodations, like beds in single occupancy rooms, smaller rooms, or rooms with locking bathroom doors, as available.

But ensuring those policies make it into practice is another matter, advocates say.  

“New York has made important progress, but leadership on paper doesn’t always translate to lived safety for Trans people,” said Sean Ebony Coleman, the founder of Destination Tomorrow, which operates Ace’s Place, in a written statement to City Limits. “The experiences described by many Trans individuals living in New York City reflect what our community has been saying for years: discrimination, misgendering and unsafe conditions remain far too common.”

‘Not trans enough’

When Doe lost her apartment in summer 2022, she did what many New Yorkers do when they need help: she called 311. Relatively new to New York, recently out as trans, and now losing her home, Doe was particularly vulnerable.

“It was scary, because I don’t have any family here, so I had to enter the shelter system,” she said in a written response to questions from City Limits.

DHS intake facilities for single adults are gender-segregated. Men go to a shelter on 30th street in Manhattan. Women go to one of two intake facilities in the Bronx and Brooklyn.

When Doe told the 311 dispatcher that she was a transgender woman, Doe says she was told to go to the men’s intake shelter. Doe says the dispatcher told her that in order to be able to go to a women’s intake shelter, she had to be on Hormone Replacement Therapy for at least one year.

Hormone Replacement Therapy, or HRT, is a treatment that some transgender people undergo to replace or suppress the hormones that their body makes. One need not be on HRT to be transgender. Some cannot get HRT because of its high cost and systemic barriers to its use in many states.

As instructed, Doe went to the men’s intake shelter. There, she said that she repeated that she identifies as a transgender woman during her intake interview and requested a placement in a bed specifically for transgender people or in a women’s shelter. The intake interviewer said that she needed to be on HRT for at least one year.

“She was told that she’s not trans enough. She needs to be more trans by going on hormones, and then she was placed in a men’s shelter,” said Castronovo.

DHS said that it makes appropriate placements based on the client’s gender identity and also considers special accommodations clients need in making placements. The agency declined to comment on the specific circumstances of Doe’s placement, citing the pending litigation.

“There is to our understanding, no such requirement,” said Merjian of the idea that people must be on HRT in order to secure certain shelter placements. “We can only imagine that our client could not have been the only person at several different locations in the homeless system to be so informed.”

DHS confirmed that being on HRT is not and has never been a requirement. The agency said it relies solely on self-reported gender identity to make placements.

Doe was not able to begin HRT until 2023 because she lacked access to a provider, the lawsuit states. It argues the denial of Doe’s gender identity during placement exposed her to risk of assault and constitutes differential treatment, a violation of DHS’ transgender policy and discrimination under the law.

Violence against transgender people is two and a half times higher than against cisgender people in the United States, according to Everytown for Gun Safety.

“That act of coming out to the public is incredibly emotionally vulnerable, but it also incites violence,” said Castronovo.

Sexual assault in shelters

Doe’s lawsuit describes multiple horrific assaults, callous shelter staff, and insufficient response from higher-ups at DHS across two-plus years in shelter.

“You don’t know what’s going to happen to you on a day-to-day basis,” Doe told City Limits in written responses through her attorneys.

After intake in August 2022, Doe was placed at the NAICA East Tremont Shelter, a congregate men’s shelter in the Bronx. She slept in a room with approximately 15 men.

She made multiple requests to staff for a transfer to a women’s shelter or a specialized bed for transgender people, according to the lawsuit.

“In each instance, Ms. Doe’s DHS Case manager informed her that there were no available TGNC Beds and ignored Ms. Doe’s request to be moved to a women’s shelter,” the complaint reads.

To shower at East Tremont, residents have to use one large room with several showerheads. According to Doe, one day while she was showering alone, a man approached her from behind and grabbed her. Another night, Doe awoke to another resident standing next to her bed, masturbating, the lawsuit alleges. In both cases, she reported the incidents to shelter staff and requested a transfer.

When she did eventually transfer to the Second Avenue Men’s Shelter in Brooklyn in December 2022, she was placed in a congregate setting with approximately 15 male roommates. Again, she asserted her transgender identity to shelter staff and asked for a transfer. Again, she was told that she needed to be on HRT for a year, the suit alleges.

“The response from the shelter workers was often to minimize, putting the responsibility back on Ms. Doe for escalation and kind of look the other way,” said Castronovo.

While at The Second Avenue Men’s Shelter, and later at a Long Island City shelter called Pam’s Place, Doe and an advocate she was working with at a homeless services nonprofit sent emails to the director of LGBTQI affairs at DHS and submitted official complaints to DHS’ ombudsman’s office, fearing for her safety. That exhausted the list of escalations available to Doe, according to DHS’ “know your rights” brochure.

In that correspondence Doe’s advocate described repeated assaults, requested transfers, complained about Doe being roomed with cisgender men, and said shelter staff were unresponsive to her pleas.

DHS did not comment on the discrimination and assaults alleged by the lawsuit. The agency also declined to comment on the complaints and escalations surrounding Doe’s case, saying it is working to verify the facts as part of the litigation. The agency has various channels for clients to safely report and escalate concerns, a spokesperson said.

On both occasions, Doe and her advocate’s outreach was not met with appropriate action by DHS, the suit alleges. 

DHS policy entitles shelter residents to request transfers when they are under threat of harm, such as gender-based harassment. Clients with disabilities—like Doe, who is diagnosed with gender dysphoria—are also entitled to additional reasonable accommodations when a facility cannot meet their needs. For transgender clients, that could include being in rooms with people of their own gender identity, single or smaller rooms, or using bathrooms and showers that lock.

Shelter staff, the lawsuit alleges, repeatedly denied Doe those considerations and failed to mediate with her, in violation of laws to protect people with disabilities navigating public systems.

In addition, staff are required to report serious incidents like sexual assaults. Those incidents require follow up by shelter supervisors. Staff are trained on incident reporting once a year, according to DHS policy.

Doe’s advocate did successfully reach DHS’ director of LGBTQI affairs, Brent Woodfield, who put in a transfer request, according to the suit. But it was almost a year later, in September 2023, before Doe left the Second Avenue Men’s Shelter.

This time she was given a “TGNC” placement at Pam’s Place, a women’s shelter in Queens. But her troubles continued, her lawyers said.

“When they finally placed her in a shelter for transgender women, they nonetheless, once again—in small rooms—placed cisgender men in the room, astonishingly,” said Merjian. “Leading, not surprisingly, to yet more assault.”

At Pam’s Place, despite being in a bed set aside for transgender individuals, Doe alleges that she was sexually assaulted by roommates, whom she identified as cisgender men. The lawsuit alleges several assaults by Doe’s roommates: that while she stayed there they inserted their penis into the sleeping Doe’s mouth, masturbated in the room while looking at her, and grabbed her head and pushed it towards their genitals.

DHS said that Pam’s Place is a women’s shelter in a converted hotel with nine beds set aside for TGNC people. They said that the agency relies on self-reported identity when making placements and does not place self-identified cisgender men in TGNC beds.

Neighborhood Association for Inter-Cultural Affairs, Samaritan Dayton Village, and Acacia Network Housing, the operators of the three shelters Doe stayed in, declined to comment, referring requests to DHS.

The plaintiff was eventually given a “TGNC” placement at a women’s shelter in Queens, according to the lawsuit. But her troubles continued, her lawyers said. (Adi Talwar)

Getting out

New York City’s shelter system can be challenging to navigate. 

“You have to be in by a certain time, and out of the shelter by a certain time, and you can’t return to the shelter until later. If you work overnights, it’s very difficult. You have to get permission, to secure passes to return and sleep, and it’s a difficult process,” Doe said.

Transgender people in shelter face increased barriers, and sometimes retaliation when they try to assert their rights, advocates for transgender people in shelter told City Limits. Their clients are often so desperate to get out of shelter that they tolerate daily insults and discrimination from shelter staff and fellow residents, th e advocates said.

“It is rare if our clients are not misgendered by staff and other participants. I mean, that is just par for the course,”said Castronovo.

DHS’ transgender policy specifically prohibits using discriminatory language and misgendering transgender clients. DHS says that it trains all shelter staff on the policies, but declined to comment on the specific accusations in the case.

Castronovo says that violence against transgender people in shelter is so normalized that his clients don’t try to fight it—they just put their head down and try to find housing.

“We ask, ‘Have you experienced violence by other shelter residents?’’ They say, ‘Yeah, of course, that’s why I’m trying to get out,’” Castronovo added.

The best chance to get out is with a housing voucher—and the most common voucher is the City Fighting Homelessness and Eviction Prevention Supplement (CityFHEPS), which serves a record 60,000-plus households, according to DSS.

Doe’s torturous stay in the shelter system was extended by the frustrating process of trying to secure housing with a CityFHEPS voucher, she and her attorneys say.

City Limits has previously reported on the difficulty of finding an apartment with a voucher, due to a tight housing market, discrimination against voucher holders, and delays in processing voucher applications.

“I found multiple apartments, and shelter staff needed to complete paperwork, but they repeatedly made simple mistakes, or took too long, or did not respond for weeks, and as a result I lost apartments,” said Doe.

Application processing times, the city’s Human Resources Administration says, have improved in recent months. At a hearing before City Council’s Oversight committee last week, officials said the application processing time is now down to 23 days, from a high of 33 days in 2024.

Currently, 11,000 people in DHS shelters have voucher shopping letters that allow them to search for housing, according to officials. 100,000 people in total were living in DHS shelters in September 2025, according to City Limits’ shelter tracker. Transgender voucher holders face additional discrimination because of run-of-the-mill transphobia from landlords.

Working, searching for housing, and rooming with strangers all at once took its toll on Doe.

At that time in 2022, residents had to be in shelter for 90 days in order to receive the voucher shopping letter that enables them to start applying for apartments, a rule that complicated transfers for residents like Doe who need reasonable accommodations.

“There are many rules to follow—don’t lose your bed, keep all appointments with your counselor—and when I asked to be transferred to a women’s shelter or a TGNC shelter for my safety, I was repeatedly told that this would restart the 90-day waiting period to receive the voucher,” Doe said.

Mayor Eric Adams removed the 90 day waiting period for CityFHEPS vouchers in mid-2023.

Navigating shelter as a transgender person, advocates say, takes remarkable persistence and a consistent declaring of one’s rights. Being more vulnerable to assault, they are more likely to require accommodations, transfers, and assistance—and more time from case managers who are already stretched thin.

“What we often see is that when folks advocate for themselves in these shelters, staff get annoyed at [transgender residents] because they’re too much work, they’re a burden,” said Castronovo.

Providers at the shelters Doe lived did not respond to the specific accusations.

‘Tip of the iceberg’

DHS says that it is leading the way in the country on transgender policies in shelter and that it is committed to addressing any violation of agency policy across the system.

But Doe’s lawyers allege that the discrimination against her was not an isolated incident. “It rings hollow here, given the number of people and the number of shelters and the number of times my client was told illegal things,” said Merjian.

Merjian said that recounting traumatic experiences over and over again—which pursuing a legal remedy requires—can be triggering.

“[Doe] cares very deeply about her community. She has talked constantly to other people in the system, and has let us know in no uncertain terms, that this is a systemic problem, that there are many others that have had terrifying and horribly frustrating experiences as trans individuals in the New York City homeless system,” he said. 

Advocates told City Limits that some of that just means making sure DHS lives up to its policies. 

“There is absolutely more work to do. The city must invest in mandatory, ongoing, Trans-specific training led by Trans experts; enforce clear accountability measures for discriminatory behavior; expand access to Trans-affirming, community-based housing models and ensure that policies protecting Trans people are actually implemented at the staff level,” Destination Tomorrow’s Coleman said in a statement.

With a limited but growing supply of beds for transgender-identifying people, “that means in many, many cases, single rooms, private showers,” said Castronovo.

Ace’s Place, the city’s dedicated TGNC shelter, has single-stalled toilets and showers and bathrooms. And in general, DHS has made efforts to move towards individual rather than congregate settings as it builds out a network of “safe haven” shelters that include individual rooms.

DHS says it’s committed to building on the work it’s already done to increase protections and resources for transgender New Yorkers.

“The Department of Homeless Services opened the nation’s first publicly funded shelter for transgender individuals at a time when their rights are roundly under attack—reflecting our firm commitment to protecting and supporting marginalized communities,” a spokesperson for the agency said in a statement.

Doe moved into an apartment on Feb. 6, 2025 with her CityFHEPS voucher after two and a half years in the shelter system.

“She’s come forward, above all else, to sound the alarm and in the hopes that we can rectify this and correct all that is wrong with the current system,” said Merjian.

To reach the reporter behind this story, contact Patrick@citylimits.org. To reach the editor, contact Jeanmarie@citylimits.org.

Want to republish this story? Find City Limits’ reprint policy here.

The post Transgender Resident Faced Discrimination, Assault In City Homeless Shelters: Lawsuit appeared first on City Limits.

By CHRISTOPHER WEBER and MIKE BALSAMO

LOS ANGELES — Investigators were questioning a family member of director-actor Rob Reiner Rob Reiner and his wife Michele after they were found dead at their home in Los Angeles, according to a law enforcement official briefed on the investigation.

Investigators believe they suffered stab wounds, said the official, who could not publicly discuss details of the investigation and spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity.

Los Angeles Police had not identified a suspect, Deputy Chief Alan Hamilton, the chief of detectives, said at a briefing on Sunday night.

“We are going to try to speak to every family member that we can to get to the facts of this investigation,” Hamilton said.

The Los Angeles Fire Department said it responded to a medical aid request shortly after 3:30 p.m. and found a 78-year-old man and 68-year-old woman dead inside. Reiner turned 78 in March.

Detectives with the Robbery Homicide Division were investigating an “apparent homicide” at Reiner’s home, said Capt. Mike Bland with the Los Angeles Police Department.

Los Angeles authorities have not confirmed the identities of the people found dead at the residence in the upscale Brentwood neighborhood on the city’s west side that’s home to many celebrities.

Reiner was long one of the most prolific directors in Hollywood, and his work included some of the most memorable movies of the 1980s and ’90s, including “This is Spinal Tap,” “A Few Good Men,” “When Harry Met Sally” and “The Princess Bride.”

His role as Meathead in Norman Lear’s 1970s TV classic “All in the Family,” as a liberal foil to O’Connor’s Archie Bunker, catapulted him to fame and won him two Emmy Awards.

Relatives of Lear, the legendary producer who died in 2023, said the deaths left them bereft.

“Norman often referred to Rob as a son, and their close relationship was extraordinary, to us and the world,” said a Lear family statement. “Norman would have wanted to remind us that Rob and Michele spent every breath trying to make this country a better place, and they pursued that through their art, their activism, their philanthropy, and their love for family and friends.”

Messages to Reiner’s representatives were not immediately returned Sunday night.

Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass called it a devastating loss for the city.

“Rob Reiner’s contributions reverberate throughout American culture and society, and he has improved countless lives through his creative work and advocacy fighting for social and economic justice,” Bass said in a statement. “An acclaimed actor, director, producer, writer, and engaged political activist, he always used his gifts in service of others.”

The son of comedy legend Carl Reiner, Rob Reiner was married to photographer Michele Singer Reiner since 1989. The two met while he was directing “When Harry Met Sally” and have three children together.

Reiner was previously married to actor-director Penny Marshall from 1971 to 1981. He adopted her daughter, Tracy Reiner. Carl Reiner died in 2020 at age 98 and Marshall died in 2018.

Killings are rare in the Brentwood neighborhood. The scene is about a mile from the home where O.J. Simpson’s wife Nicole Brown Simpson and her friend Ron Goldman were killed in 1994.

__

Balsamo reported from Washington. Associated Press Entertainment Writer Andrew Dalton in Los Angeles contributed.

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Stewartville Superintendent Belinda Selfors says she and her staff are focused on supporting students and staff after a Friday morning shooting at the high school’s parking lot left one student in critical condition and the alleged adult shooter dead.

“Our focus is on the safety and well-being of our staff, our students and our families,” Selfors said during a news conference Friday morning.

“As soon as we learned about the situation this morning, we canceled all classes for students across the district to prioritize their safety and the safety of our staff and to give law enforcement full access to the scene,” she added.

The Olmsted County Sheriff’s Office is investigating the shooting. Details about what led up to the incident, as well as the names and ages of those involved, have not been released as of early Friday afternoon.

The sheriff’s office says the student was taken to Mayo Clinic Hospital-Saint Marys for immediate surgery. He remained in critical, but stable condition. The adult male was found with a rifle in his hand and an apparent self-inflicted gunshot wound. He was pronounced dead at the scene.

Selfors said response plans were being finalized Friday morning and would be sent to families as soon as they are completed.

“Care and support will be available for students and staff over the weekend, and when school resumes on Monday,” she said.

Sheriff Kevin Torgerson, who lives in Stewartville, said his department is leaving the planning of resuming classes to the school district, but said there are benefits to bringing students together as soon as possible.

“From my experience, being around the schools for a number of years, it’s also good to have the kids together,” he said. “They can support each other, too.”

The shooting happened around 5 a.m. Friday, as the Stewartville wrestling team was preparing to head to a two-day meet in Grand Forks, North Dakota.

With roughly 40 teammates and school staff at the scene, Torgerson said many of the students on the bus were initially unaware of the shooting. He also noted that because it happened before school hours, there was not a need to lock down the school building.

Still, he said, community support quickly arrived at the scene as students were held until they could be reconnected with their families on Friday morning.

“We had our chaplaincy group, and I know there were some other pastoral folks that were here already,” he said. “School counselors were deployed immediately to the school to be with the team.

“I feel really comfortable and confident in saying the school district has done a phenomenal job in supporting the students and the coaches.”

With support expected to continue as plans for next week are being made, Selfors asked community members to pray for those touched by the tragedy.

“I ask that we show grace and kindness, avoid speculation and keep supporting one another,” she said.

Selfors and Torgerson urged the community to refrain from spreading rumors about the incident and wait for details to emerge as the investigation continues.

“I know that’s a big ask in the world of social media,” the sheriff said.

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