10 OctOber 31 - NOvember 6, 2024 dallasobserver.com DALLAS OBSERVER Classified | MusiC | dish | Culture | unfair Park | Contents doned straightforward calls for censorship, opting instead to disguise their intentions through euphemism and misdirection.” Frank Strong, an Austin-area teacher and author of the school district watchdog Sub- stack Anger & Clarity, agrees that “misdirec- tion” is in play when it comes to how the state government has censored teachers and classrooms, but he doesn’t think it’s all that new. “There has always been a certain amount of deception and misdirection behind book bans and educational gag orders in Texas schools,” he said. “For example, it was al- ways obviously false that HB 900 [the READER Act] is just targeting sexual con- tent. We can see that the books affected by the law are disproportionately about the ex- periences of certain groups of people, and we’ve seen people pushing the law saying that is exactly their intent.” Strong also explains that once a policy is in place, Texas school districts have found ways to use the gray areas in those new rules to extend the reach of its restrictions. “And we are definitely seeing censorship in Texas occurring in ways that can be hard to track,” he says. “We see some districts us- ing ‘weeding,’ the regular process by which librarians remove old or outdated books, to remove controversial books. And other dis- tricts are removing books, sometimes in large numbers, through informal or internal reviews that don’t follow the regular, formal book complaint process.” PEN America’s report ends on a some- what encouraging note, given the subject matter. “Fortunately, several positive trends first identified in 2023 continued to gain steam in 2024,” the report reads. “Legal resistance to gag orders has scored a number of major wins, dealing significant setbacks to would- be censors.” Such may be the case around the country, but Texas, as evidenced in the report, isn’t like most other states, where the classrooms aren’t so easily viewed as social and political battlefields. “I also think a lot of Texas politicians are still comfortable saying they think that cer- tain ideas flat-out don’t belong in schools and public libraries,” Strong says. “... So in that sense, some of what PEN America is describ- ing hasn’t reached Texas yet, even though book-banning candidates haven’t fared well overall in Texas school board elections.” ▼ ENVIRONMENT ‘I FEEL DECEIVED’ REPORTS OF RESIDENTIAL SOLAR PANEL SCAMS PLAGUE DALLAS COUNTY. BY EMMA RUBY E ven if our politicians hate to admit it, green energy is growing in popularity across Texas. The Lone Star State now generates the third-most residential solar power in the country. But a study recently re- leased by the Fair Financial Services Project at Texas Appleseed reveals that a growing statewide interest in residential solar panels could be generating a wave of scams and fraud that disproportionately targets the el- derly and non-English speakers. The Office of the Attorney General re- ported an 818% increase in solar panel-re- lated complaints between 2018 and 2023, and Dallas County is a leading region for claims of fraud. According to data provided to the Observer, since 2018 the attorney gen- eral’s office has received 172 complaints of solar-panel fraud that cite a Dallas County address, putting our area at the top of the leaderboard alongside Tarrant, El Paso, Harris and Bexar counties. Each complaint is accompanied by a written testimony, and many conclude with the same overwhelming sentiment. “I feel scammed and helpless, and I need help,” wrote a Mr. Knight, a resident of Sunnyvale, just north of Mesquite, in 2022. Knight claims he was misled by a door- to-door salesperson who told him the so- lar panels would replace his electric bill payments. Instead, Knight ended up pay- ing elevated prices for both. Other claims warn of individuals who say their signa- ture was forged on contracts, and prom- ises by solar panel companies of federal tax credits to pay for the panels that never materialized. According to Ann Baddour, author of the study and director of the Fair Financial Ser- vices Project, a “perfect storm” of situations has resulted in Texas households being in- creasingly vulnerable to shady solar panel sales pitches. After utility bills spiked across the state following Winter Storm Uri in 2021, solar panel companies began highlighting the potential for reduced utility costs. Solar panel-related tax credits made pos- sible by the Inflation Reduction Act have also been highly publicized, which Baddour believes could contribute to “false asser- tions” to consumers that they might qualify for the credit. And, as Texas experiences a growing number of severe weather events, more homes are being plunged into dark- ness for longer periods of time, which could contribute to homeowners’ desire to be en- ergy-independent. “People living on fixed incomes in par- ticular became financially stressed [after Winter Storm Uri]. When door-to-door salespeople came around telling them these enticing stories of government pro- grams and free solar panels that will make them energy-independent, it’s pretty promising to people,” Baddour said. “And sadly, it turns out to be false in many, many situations.” Dallas-based attorney Chris Arnell took on a handful of solar panel fraud cases in 2022 as a pro bono effort, and after success- fully litigating one of the cases, he suddenly found himself “inundated” with calls from Texans with similar stories. Arnell, who is now on the phone “almost every day” with a client or a potential client in a solar scam case, believes the industry is plagued by an “epidemic of fraud.” “The overwhelming majority of my cases is people who signed up for what they were told was a no-brainer,” Arnell said “The way they pitch these solar panel deals, at least to my clients and what I’m seeing, it’s too good to be true.” Forty-five percent of claims filed by Tex- ans reference false or misleading statements as the reason for their claim, and 37% of claims refer to “unsatisfactory service.” One in 10 Texans claim the solar panel company that approached them failed to deliver any goods or services at all. Some states have taken action against the growing number of solar scams. In Connect- icut earlier this year, Attorney Gen. William Tong filed a lawsuit against several solar en- ergy companies that used deceptive or fraudulent sales practices. Florida Attorney Gen. Ashley Moody issued a similar warning this summer after her office received 700% more complaints from residents. Baddour believes part of the solar scam problem is systemic: The industry is inher- ently commission-focused, leading “uneth- ical” salespeople to offer too-good-to-be-true selling points — like a low interest rate — while hiding exorbitant fees or charges. Holding companies ac- countable that rely on shady business prac- tices is tricky, she adds. Many lending contracts include arbitration clauses that help shield companies from a court process that could provide relief to the homeown- ers who were scammed. Eloi Omella The residential solar industry is rife with complaints of fraud. Unfair Park from p9
