Although traditionally a Salvadoran and Mexican neighborhood, many immigrants began coming from different Latin-American countries, particularly from Venezuela, Honduras, Cuba, Guatemala and Colombia.

These apartments catered to young, predominantly Caucasian workers from the Rust Belt regions of the Northeastern and Midwestern United States employed in the burgeoning oil industry.

The complexes also housed some individuals from western and eastern Europe, Iran, Japan, Jordan, Lebanon, Saudi Arabia, Mexico, South America, Philippines, and Vietnam.

There was often little interest in building a quality product as developers were primarily concerned with generating quick revenue and capitalizing on the deregulation of financial institutions, tax laws favoring apartment construction, inflation, and a housing shortage in the Houston metropolitan area.

[7] According to Gaines, complexes in Gulfton began to cater to illegal immigrants and landlords allowed renters to "double-up" housing (several individuals and/or families living in a unit).

[16] The HRCPC members argued that the original "Community Development Targets" were not fully served prior to the service areas expanding and budgets shrinking.

Rose Mary Garza, then the principal of Cunningham Elementary School, stated that some government officials were reluctant to expand services to Gulfton as they believed the low-income apartments would be bulldozed.

[7] Robert Fisher, professor and chair of Political Social Work at the Graduate School of Social Work at the University of Houston, and Lisa Taaffe, a project manager for Houston's "Communities in Schools," stated in "Public Life in Gulfton: Multiple Publics and Models of Organization," a 1997 article,[17] that the development and decline of Gulfton originated from a, "purely short term, relatively spontaneous speculative process."

They state that the process focused on building apartment complexes, clubs, and warehouses for short-term profit without providing supporting infrastructure such as parks, libraries, recreation centers, small blocks, and sidewalks.

[21] The GAAC was made up of business owners who advocated the reduction of recreational drug use, local crime, and the improvement of the neighborhood, in an effort to restore property values.

[citation needed] On July 11, 1998, Houston Police Department officers acting on a tip regarding drug-related activities entered a Gulfton apartment complex and shot and killed Pedro Oregon Navarro.

[25] Lori Rodriguez of the Houston Chronicle said that Gulfton, "with its rows of down-at-the-heels apartments that still bear jaunty names from their swinging-singles days, makes an incongruous gateway for the newest waves of immigrants and their many children.

[3] The 2000 census identifies Gulfton as a "hard to enumerate" tract[52] with the densest neighborhood in the City of Houston, estimated at 45,000 people in approximately 3 square miles (7.8 km2).

[34] In a 2006 National Center for School Engagement report, Susana Herrera, the program coordinator for Houston's Truancy Reduction Demonstration Project, indicated that social service agencies and government officials estimated Gulfton's population to be 60,000, with 20,000 juveniles.

[61] This station, originally located near the Napoleon Square Apartments,[62] opened in the summer of 1990 with the City of Houston paying one dollar a month to the real estate company managing the complex.

[70] Robert Jara, a political consultant of the group Campaign Strategies, drew the boundaries of District J in order to ensure that Gulfton and Sharpstown were together in one area.

[83] The Mayor of Houston, Bill White and Council Member Khan dedicated the center on Monday February 19, 2007, which cost an estimated $4.1 million (2007 rates).

[103] A May 15, 1991 Houston Chronicle article reported that some people did not want to see Gulfton included in a mostly Hispanic Texas Senate district citing fears that the residents might not vote.

[118][119][120] In a 2007 Houston Chronicle questions and answers page regarding the proposed line, Daphne Scarbrough and Christof Spieler asked why METRO did not include a station to serve Gulfton.

"[65] Susan Rogers of the Rice Design Alliance said that Gulfton's "affordable housing, shops, language, food, and culture all help to provide a familiar environment that eases the residents' transition to life in America.

"[45] In 2007, the group announced that it would build the Gulfton Neighborhood Campus at the intersection of Rookin Street and High Star Drive, once it raises the $20 million ($29388541.17 in today's money) needed.

Harry Hurt III of the Texas Monthly said "while being one of the most integrated neighborhoods in Houston with its rainbow of human kinds and colors, Napoleon Square seemed to be one of the most factionalized, hardly a melting pot.

[168] Rose Mary Garza, the principal of Benavidez Elementary School in 1995, stated that she hated hearing the term "Gulfton Ghetto," which was still in common use at the time, as the community was trying to move away from that stereotype.

Adrian Garcia, the anti-gang office director of the Mayor of Houston, said in 2002 that the "Weed and Seed" program restored a sense of community and safety to Gulfton, which "was never engineered for family life," without "heavy-handed police tactics.

Williams said that U.S. federal government agents began working with the Houston Police Department to arrest serious gang criminals in Gulfton, including Mara Salvatrucha (MS-13) members who were operating in the neighborhood.

A community mural was completed by at-risk youth on the side of Kroger's in 1999 as part of a collaborative effort between the Orange Show, Gulfton Weed & Seed and the United States Attorney's Office.

Many of the children arrived from Central American countries experiencing civil strife, and therefore many had received an inadequate education prior to coming to the United States.

In October 2006, Michael Marquez, president of the Hispanic Housing and Education Corporation, which operated Las Américas, announced to HISD in a letter that the organization would terminate the lease agreement because of issues related to maintenance and management.

"[53][241] A publication by the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention stated that parental characteristics complicated their support of education, including low socioeconomic status, "language and cultural barriers," and "limited opportunities for acculturation.

[2] Scott Van Beck, the head of HISD's West Region, in a keynote address to the Rotary Club of Bellaire that urban education needs "social capital" or frequent adult contact with children.