Beaumont Chief Says Gilbert Building Fire Impacts Revitalization

BEAUMONT, Texas — It's been more than 24 hours since the Gilbert Building in downtown Beaumont caught fire. Today, city leaders are demanding that property owners take responsibility and be held accountable for dilapidated buildings.

City Councilman Mike Getz told 12News he believes these buildings stand in the way of the vision of a revitalized downtown.

Getz says the Gilbert Building was a key part of what they wanted to see restored downtown. Building owner Tom Flanagan told 12News he wants to turn the building into upscale apartments.

“Waste always makes me angry and it’s pure waste,” Getz said. “I did a survey in March on what we are doing to enforce our codes. This was received with an inventory of about 11 buildings, this was one of those that was on the inventory lists and which were marked as imitating danger.

“We identified that it needed to be closed and secured. And in this case, they were working with the owner,” said Beaumont Mayor Roy West.

Flanagan says the building was boarded up and he believes vandals are to blame for the fire. Mayor West says the building had no electricity, so investigators are still working to find out how it started.

“Protecting property is the city’s primary responsibility and ensuring the safety of our firefighters. This may be the largest and highest structure fire we have had in Beaumont,” the West Mayor said.

Getz believes the city's previous leadership dropped the ball when it comes to enforcing code violations.

“The former city manager didn't think enforcing code violations in downtown buildings wasn't a priority, so these issues went largely unaddressed,” he said.

Getz says building owners need to secure their buildings so they aren't targets for vandals.

“We need to demand that downtown building owners have electricity in their buildings, burglar alarms and cameras. If those things had been in place, this certainly wouldn't have happened last night,” said Getz at 12News.

Getz says the workshop will be held July 2 to further discuss the city's plans for vacant and abandoned buildings downtown.

Flanagan told 12News this was his second building to catch fire. The first was the former Texas Workforce building in 2023.