Grantee's Stories

Proyecto Azteca

Empower and Defend: Scam Awareness for Low-Income Homeowners in South Texas

Proyecto Azteca empowers low-income families in Texas’s Rio Grande Valley by providing affordable housing and promoting home ownership. It particularly emphasizes assisting the underserved populations in South Texas. The Texas Bar Foundation awarded a $20,000 grant to their project Empower and Defend: Scam Awareness for Low-Income Homeowners in South Texas. Proyecto Azteca used the grant funding for an educational program to empower low-income homeowners in South Texas against fraudulent solar panel scammers. This initiative will focus on preventing fraud and helping members of the public understand their legal rights and responsibilities.

Attendees sit in a classroom setting at the Proyecto Azteca workshop, listening to a presenter displaying a slide about Scam Awareness related to solar energy.

“Proyecto Azteca’s initiative, Empower and Defend: Scam Awareness for Low-Income Homeowners in South Texas, was made possible through the generous support of the Texas Bar Foundation. Over the past year, this program has delivered much-needed education to vulnerable communities about solar energy and the risks of predatory practices associated with solar panel sales. One inspiring success story involves a family who purchased solar panels but discovered their system wasn’t delivering the promised savings. After attending our workshop, they learned that their system was undersized, poorly maintained, and provided by an unreliable company. Armed with this knowledge, they sought legal help and are now pursuing action for fraud. Their experience has empowered them to seek justice and inspired others in their community to attend our workshops, helping to avoid similar pitfalls.”

– Amber Arriaga-Salinas, Assistant Executive Director of Proyecto Azteca