'We're all people': Homeless Austinites face potentially deadly conditions this week
AUSTIN (KXAN) -- This cold snap may be inconvenient and unnerving for many Texans -- Texans have earned every right to be weary of incoming weather -- but standing on the street downtown, getting video of wet roads and jacketed Austinites, a man named Michael Evans gave me a healthy dose of perspective.
While concerns about power outages, wading through a very busy H-E-B or losing my daily dog walks to cold rain may seem like an inconvenience, Evans is one of the thousands of Austinites who won't have the option to sleep inside this week. That's more than inconvenient. In fact, Austin-Travis County EMS told me this week that it's downright dangerous.
I found Evans outside of a downtown church, he usually camps near there but said "it's getting cold so that's becoming a problem."
This week, that problem reared its ugly head, and Thursday night, Evans is likely to get the worst of it. Rain, he knows, does not mix well with sleeping in the cold.
"If you don't have a sleeping bag, a tent, you could possibly really get hurt, badly…or die. I had an experience where I went to sleep and overnight it froze and I didn't have my feet covered property and I almost got frost bite. I couldn't move my toes for two days. Very scary, very scary," Evans said.
ATCEMS said it's very much on the lookout for that.
"This is absolutely dangerous enough to be deadly," said Wesley Hopkins, chief of staff for ATCEMS. "We're looking for folks that are sleeping out in medians or bus stops. And then just looking for their general attire, what they're wearing, hats and gloves and shoes and things like that."
We Can Now, a homelessness outreach group, was preparing Thursday afternoon to pass out warm clothes and potentially life-saving supplies to people who couldn't or wouldn't make it to overnight shelter as rain poured down Thursday. I met them at their new headquarters near North Lamar and West Koenig.
"The worst things we've seen here at We Can Now is fatalities, actually people passing away because of the weather conditions, no one got to them soon enough," Antony Jackson, the CEO and founder of We Can Now, said.
The outreach groups could use donations, or your time, but at the very least, Evans asks that you consider changing your perspective.
"There's a lot of real people out here, good individuals who just need help. You know, things happen in life, circumstances, and there's a lot of people out here…we're all people," Evans said.