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For Austinites experiencing homelessness in the northern half of the city, accessing food, shelter or even a shower can mean taking the bus to downtown, or even South Austin. But a new center opening this summer will bring those services closer to many folks.
A group of activists gathered outside the Travis County Administrative building this morning to protest U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement. Community members say ICE activity has ramped up in recent weeks.
People in Austin’s Bryker Woods neighborhood have lodged concerns about a dilapidated home that’s attracted rodents of all shapes and sizes. The owner hasn’t lived there in years but says the home still holds sentimental value. Andrea Ball from Austin Current, gives us an overview of the battle to address problems that go beyond eyesores.
After emerging from years spent as a caregiver, one woman wanted to process the experience by swimming in 50 bodies of water for her 50th birthday — including Barton Springs Pool. “Midstream” author Kate Washington shares her story.
Plus a Few Headlines mentions in the show today:
- The Austin Community College Board of Trustees has approved the system’s $583 million dollar budget for the next fiscal year.
- Two former Travis County Tax office employees have been indicted on charges of engaging in organized criminal activity.
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The full transcript of this episode of Austin Signal is available on the KUT & KUTX Studio website. The transcript is also available as subtitles or captions on some podcast apps.
Jerry Quijano [00:00:08] For Austinites experiencing homelessness in the northern half of the city, accessing food or even a shower can mean taking the bus to downtown or even South Austin. But a new center opening this summer will bring those services closer to many folks. And people in Austin’s Breiker Woods neighborhood have lodged concerns about a dilapidated home that’s attracted rodents of all shapes and sizes. The owner hasn’t lived there in years but says the home still holds sentimental value. The battle to address problems that go beyond eyesores that’s coming up on today’s show.
KUT Announcer: Laurie Gallardo [00:00:39] The Austin Signal is a production of KUT News, hosted by Jerry Quijano.
Jerry Quijano [00:00:44] And after emerging from years spent as a caregiver, one woman wanted to process the experience by swimming in 50 bodies of water. That includes Barton Springs Pool. We’re gonna have more about her journey up next on Austin Signal. Howdy out there. This is Austin Signal. I’m your host Jerry Kikano. Thank you for tuning in. It is Wednesday, July 8th. This community-powered public radio, KUT News. Right now, unhoused people in North Austin often have to take a bus across town to access resources like food and shelter. A new center that’s set to open this summer is looking to change that. KUT’s Luz Moreno Lozano reports on the project and the organization behind it.
Luz Moreno-Lozano [00:01:40] On a recent afternoon, things were quiet outside the unassuming two-story building at 611 Carpenter Avenue in North Austin, but soon it’s expected to be buzzing with hundreds of people, mainly those who are experiencing homelessness or on the verge of becoming homeless. Antony Jackson says the building will open as a homeless navigation center.
Antony Jackson [00:02:00] A true testament to like the power of God if you ask me and so like to be able to get a piece of real estate in the city that you grew up in homeless and and be able to you know provide services for people in that that that same circumstance like what
Luz Moreno-Lozano [00:02:18] Jackson is a founder and CEO of We Can Now. The organization focuses on helping people experiencing homelessness. It’s a situation he knows well after spending much of his youth in and out of shelters and living in his car.
Antony Jackson [00:02:31] And so like in my life, I’ve just experienced many experiences of homelessness. And I always was like, man, once I get out of this circumstance, I want to do something for the people who are in the circumstance in the city. Because when I went through it, there wasn’t any resources or organizations like this that existed.
Luz Moreno-Lozano [00:02:51] He means groups that offer a one-stop shop for help, including access to showers, meals, medical and mental health services, and a place to sleep. Jackson says the new center will serve a long unmet need for people in North Austin.
Antony Jackson [00:03:04] While we’re doing street outreach, building relationships with the people that we serve that are homeless and out there on the streets, we’re asking them, like, who else comes out here? Where else do you get resources from?
Luz Moreno-Lozano [00:03:14] He quickly learned that for many people, one of the only options was to ride a bus downtown to get the help they need.
Antony Jackson [00:03:20] That’s already an added barrier to homelessness. You gotta have money, you gotta have bus passes, you gotta know where you’re going, you gotta be in the right state of mind, you gotta mental health. And so out here in this area, there’s a lot of people who are just kinda out here on the streets, just kinda hopeless.
Luz Moreno-Lozano [00:03:34] After finding his footing, Jackson launched We Can Now in March 2020, focusing on street outreach in East Austin. Each Sunday morning, a group of volunteers sets up at the corner of San Marcos and East Cesar Chavez streets, serving anywhere between 50 and 75 people. Volunteers set out a variety of food, drinks and other supplies, like hygiene products and clothes and shoes. Nathan Jones has been volunteering with the organization for years.
Nathan Jones [00:04:00] The work is so impactful, both ways. It’s not just us to them, it’s these people are impacting us. And so it’s a gift, it is a privilege really to be out here.
Luz Moreno-Lozano [00:04:12] Before getting in line for a plate of food and a sack of supplies, the group says a prayer. They pray for comfort, they pray for help, and they pray each other.
Nathan Jones [00:04:20] In our fellowship today as we fellowship with you together. In Jesus’ name we pray, amen.
Luz Moreno-Lozano [00:04:29] Among the dozens of people in line for food was Joanne Cozzi. She’s been living in her truck with her dog for quite some time. Her mission each day is to find herself and her dog food in a shower. On Sundays, when weekend now sets up, she fills up her plate and stocks up on supplies. But finding a place to rinse off within walking distance of where her truck is parked is a tougher challenge.
Joanne Chozzi [00:04:49] I’ll just go to like an abandoned house with a spigot, just hose off, or go down to the lake. They got a spick in the bathroom, I got a hose in my truck. I don’t drive my truck as much as I can help it.
Luz Moreno-Lozano [00:04:58] She says a navigation center in another part of Austin that could provide food, showers, and other resources would go a long way.
Joanne Chozzi [00:05:05] Because you can see this is like the rut. There’s nothing that way and nothing that way. But yeah, absolutely. There’s no way to do it without help.
Luz Moreno-Lozano [00:05:11] Given night, there are nearly 5,000 people experiencing homelessness in Travis County. That’s according to the latest data from the Ending Community Homelessness Coalition, or ECHO. Matt Molika, the executive director for ECH O, says more help is needed, especially in areas outside of downtown.
Matt Molika [00:05:28] It’s really critical to get a lot of these different services set up geographically. We have a lot to do on that. As you know, our West Austin and sort of West Central Austin is still kind of a desert for folks who are experiencing homelessness in our community.
Luz Moreno-Lozano [00:05:42] We Can Now plans to open its new center by the end of July. I’m Luz Moreno Lozano in Austin.
Jerry Quijano [00:05:56] A group of activists gathered outside the Travis County Administrative Building this morning to protest U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement. As KUT’s Katie McAfee reports, community members say ICE activity has ramped up in recent weeks.
Katy McAfee [00:06:12] Austin Sanctuary Network runs a hotline where people can report ICE activity, like arrests or raids, happening in the area. Peggy Morton with the group says in recent weeks, they’ve seen an uptick in calls. She’s also seeing more demand for the group’s accompaniment program, which provides immigrants with rides to mandatory check-in appointments at the ICE office in San Antonio.
Peggy Morton [00:06:30] I used to give rides, I mean I’d gotten to where I was given maybe two a month or three a month. Now it’s like four a week and San Antonio is a long way off.
Katy McAfee [00:06:40] Protests came a day after an ICE agent fatally shot a Mexican man without legal status in Houston during what the agency called a, quote, targeted enforcement operation. Morton says activists in Austin are particularly concerned with how and where ICE agents are making arrests. The group’s hotline received a call last week about a woman named Asalia Martinez, who is originally from Mexico. Morton said Martinez was detained in the parking lot of a community care health clinic, and she’s since been deported to an unfamiliar city in Mexico. Alejandro Caseras with the Austin Sanctuary Network says Travis County leaders should do more to protect residents from ICE while they’re seeking medical care.
Alejandro Caseras [00:07:16] Isalia was detained at Community Care, that is a county funded clinic. We have been coming to the same court for about two years now telling Andy Brown, hey, this is happening in your community, this is happening Austin, this happening in the streets and it has felt that we’ve been speaking to OWA this whole time.
Katy McAfee [00:07:32] It’s unclear exactly how the county could intervene with ICE enforcement. Counties in Texas are required to follow all federal and state laws, and they don’t have the power to pass ordinances like cities do. Casera says the group still plans to formally ask the county to look into how it can protect the immigrant community at its next Commissioner’s Court meeting on Tuesday. I’m Katie McAfee in Austin.
Jerry Quijano [00:08:01] Chances are you’ve seen a home in your neighborhood or possibly passed by one on your commute that’s seen better days. It might be an eyesore at first glance, but when you look longer, hazards might start to appear that make you thankful that you don’t live right next door. But for the folks living next to them, it’s more than just appearance. For them, it’s a safety issue. One way to address this, code enforcement. It’s how, after years of red tape, neighbors in the Bricker Woods area were able to get the city to vote to demolish a vacant house on their street. But the owner of the house says the city didn’t try hard enough to contact her. For more about that, we are talking with Andrea Ball, Growth Development Reporter at Austin Current. Hi, Andrea. Hello. So first, I want to hear about the neighbors in the area who originally brought up the problem with the city. What were they seeing and how long had they been seeing it?
Andrea Ball [00:08:48] So one of the neighbors told me that when she had bought her property about 19 years ago, she went to the house to look at stuff and talk to her contractor and she parked in front of this rundown house. And when she did, a big rat ran from that yard to like across the street. That was one bold rat because it was flat out daylight.
Jerry Quijano [00:09:13] Okay, and what do we know about the owner of the house?
Andrea Ball [00:09:17] Her name is Polly Nance. She’s owned the home since the 70s. She lives six hours away in West Texas. She’s living in a family home right now because she had gone back to that area to care for a family member and just stayed there. She’s in her late 70s and says she has a disability. When I spoke to her, she said that she moved out of the home around 2008 or so, and her son lived there for a while. And she also said that she paid people to take care of the property, you know, in terms of like mowing the lawn and stuff like that.
Jerry Quijano [00:09:54] Okay, so the city reached out to the owner, what were those communications like?
Andrea Ball [00:09:58] So I read a very, very big file on this that had documented basically monthly visits over four years from the city code compliance folks. And there were many documented attempts to call, to email, they sent certified letters that would be returned and executed. I think at some point they didn’t know exactly where her address was. There were conversations between them that were documented and that Ms. Nance said they did speak but she felt like she had questions that she said were not answered and that she couldn’t make repairs until she had more information and that the city didn’t reach out and that she says I wasn’t hiding from anybody the records tell a different story you know it was Very different.
Jerry Quijano [00:10:53] And from what you found in your reporting, what all was going on with Ms. Nance?
Andrea Ball [00:10:58] So because the home had not been lived in for a while, she was living elsewhere, it was not taken care of. And inside the home were, it essentially looked like a hoarding situation. And so during the conversations with the city, she would express dismay. I can’t believe it’s that way, but there would be conversations. With her and then they would be silenced. And then they couldn’t get, they did not get in touch. So she said she hasn’t been to the property in at least 10 years.
Jerry Quijano [00:11:37] Is there a reason that-
Andrea Ball [00:11:38] And she hasn’t sold it? She says it has sentimental value. And you know what? I do want to say this, Jerry. The city has lots of pictures of the home in its just terrible state of disrepair boxes like very close to the ceiling and animal waste and, you know, ceiling degraded. But when they took all that stuff out, you could see signs of a home. It doesn’t start out this way. And it gives you a different perspective. It’s not just, ew, ugly, awful house where rats and, you know, raccoons and possum come from. That was someone’s life.
Jerry Quijano [00:12:16] I know from your reporting that Mrs. Nance is elderly and disabled. She still says she has plans for the house. Does the city have a responsibility to make sure that she is able to understand the entire process before that home is leveled?
Andrea Ball [00:12:27] I believe that they, the process is they contact Mrs. Nance, I believe she said they did, and tell her you have time to contest this. And the city says that she has not officially contested it. She said that she had some medical problems that kept her from doing that on time. So she didn’t want to speak publicly about her plans, but she has an interest in the home.
Jerry Quijano [00:12:56] Okay, sounds like this comes down to property rights versus neighborhood safety. The neighbors that you’ve spoken with ultimately view this as a win, but they still have to wait months for anything to happen. What is the condition of the property currently and what have the neighbors had to say about this?
Andrea Ball [00:13:10] Their biggest concern was they felt like the home had become a hotspot for animals. And so they’re concerned, that’s mostly what they talked about, honestly, was that. Now, like, we’re in Austin and there are critters around, right? That’s always going to happen, and, you know, I had a rat in my barbecue one time, and I was like, what? And a house had been like leveled and so he came to visit. Um, so things happen, right? But to them, it’s like, they say it’s never ending. So yeah, there’s a longer process that needs to play out here. There are other steps they have to jump through, you know, in terms of, um, getting permits and getting the budget, you know, there are a lot of things that people in the city have to demolish or take care of and exactly. They got to basically get online, you know, In terms of who’s next in it. The neighbors were very happy with the decision. To demolish it. In fact, the city staffers had not recommended demolition. They had come forth saying, we can recommend repair. And the neighbors were like, we have been doing this for many, many years now. We’re just going to come back and keep doing this. So they were very, they being the neighbors, were very excited, but they also know, okay, Well, it’s not happening tomorrow, but we’ll stay on top of it.
Jerry Quijano [00:14:37] Okay, we’ve been speaking with Andrea Ball. She is the growth development reporter at Austin Current. We’re gonna have a link to her reporting in today’s show notes. Thank you, Andrea. Thank you and I would like to note we did not barbecue the rat. Good to know, a very important detail. Only stuff you can get right here on Austin Signal. We got more of that right after this break. This is Austin Signal, welcome back. Here are a few headlines for your Wednesday. The Austin Community College Board of Trustees has approved the system’s $583 million budget for the next fiscal year. Tuition will remain the same for the 13th year in a row and the college will continue its free tuition pilot program. And two former Travis County Tax Office employees have been indicted on charges of engaging in organized criminal activity. The Travis County DA’s office announced this week that the indictments stem from an alleged fraudulent vehicle registration scheme carried out late last year. This is Austin Signal, welcome back. Here are a few headlines for your Wednesday. The Austin Community College Board of Trustees has approved the system’s $583 million budget for the next fiscal year. Tuition will remain the same for the 13th year in a row, and the college will continue its free tuition pilot program. And two former Travis County Tax Office employees have been indicted on charges of engaging in organized criminal activity. The Travis County DA’s office announced this week that the indictments stem from an alleged fraudulent vehicle registration scheme carried out late last year. When Kate Washington emerged from years spent as a full-time caregiver, she found herself changed. She was a woman in middle age, processing grief and fatigue, and looking for herself in a world that had been about fulfilling the needs of others for most of her adult life. 2021 marked the beginning of a project Washington intended as a renewal in her life. In almost literal cleansing. Her goal was to accomplish 50 swims before her 50th birthday, and one of these was in Austin’s beloved swimming hole, Barton Springs Pool. Washington spoke with Texas standards David Brown about how that swim, along with the 49 others, reshaped her life.
David Brown [00:16:54] Tell us a little bit more about your life and caregiving journey. What happened?
Kate Washington [00:16:58] Sure. Well, my husband at the time was diagnosed with a very aggressive, very rare form of lymphoma in 2015 and progressed through an extremely difficult stem cell transplant. He almost died, was in the hospital for four and a half months, came home blind, immune compromised. It was really a miracle that he survived and we had two young children at the same time. And so I was stretched really thin, caring for his needs, caring for their needs and. You know, fortunately he did recover enough to be able to live independently. He recovered his vision, but it really sapped the marriage. It changed us both in so many ways due to lots of different kinds of trauma. And by 2021, as you mentioned, our marriage was struggling. He was doing better, but we’d also been affected by the pandemic. And I found myself looking around, thinking, what have I done? I was 48 turning 49 and was like. Who am I and where have I come to in my life?
David Brown [00:17:57] In my life. Right, right. So what did you decide to do and why?
Kate Washington [00:18:03] Well, I’m from Northern California. I’ve always loved the water and our wild spaces here, our rivers. I grew up in a town with a lot of swimming holes and actually a public swimming pool that’s a dammed creek that looks strangely like a mini version of Barton Springs. And I’ve loved getting in the water, especially natural bodies of water. And I thought, what can I do that would actually be fun and something for me? And I decided to almost on a whim, tried to make a project out of getting into 50 different natural bodies of water. As long as I could submerge hot springs, the ocean, most of them were in Northern California, but whenever I traveled and had an opportunity to jump in somewhere, as I was lucky to do one time in Texas, that’s what I did.
David Brown [00:18:49] Let me ask you about one of those moments. It’s listed in your book as dunk number 20, I believe. Barton Springs in Austin. Now that’s a swim. Pretty cold. 68 degrees year round and I gather you just plunged straight in. What was that like?
Kate Washington [00:19:08] Yeah, I was in Austin to give a talk about caregiving, actually, in November, and a longtime friend lives in Austin. And so we met up, I stayed on a couple of extra days, and she took me to Barton Springs. And to be honest with you, you say it’s cold year round, but if you’ve ever been to the Sierra Nevada in California, that’s not cold for the water that I’m used to out here. But… It was absolutely beautiful. And my friend said, no, I’m not sure I’ll go in. It’s too cold. And then I jumped in and she was like, okay, I’ll do it. And it was actually a warm November day. There were quite a number of people out, but it wasn’t crowded like it is in a summertime. And it just a great swim. We took selfies and had a really fun time. And actually that same friend recently got married. And I came out to her wedding and went to Barton Springs again with a group of girlfriends and took them all. So it was fun.
David Brown [00:20:07] Reunion swim was there anything else that you personally took away from Barton Springs, or was it pretty much just a fun outing with with friend?
Kate Washington [00:20:16] You know, it was a fun outing with a friend, but she had had a difficult first marriage and was really remaking her life at the time that we went to that swim together. And we had such a happy, wonderful time. And I really admired how she’d rebuilt her life and found a lot of joy, eventually new partnership. But that moment and seeing her and connecting with her around the swim and around this kind of joyful, fun experience. Gave me some inspiration.
David Brown [00:20:47] Along the way, was there a swim or two that comes to mind when you think about, wow, that was memorable, that’s something that will stay with me for a lifetime? Any special swims, I suppose I should ask?
Kate Washington [00:21:00] I took a solo trip to France toward the end of the whole project and there was a very memorable one underneath a 2,000 year old Roman structure that crossed the river and that was incredibly memorable to see. It was also a place that my grandparents had taken me when I was a young girl and so returning to that spot kind of brought some things full circle. And there was one just in a tiny little, very cold… Whole in a creek that runs through my hometown, but this spot was up in the mountains. And I was with my older daughter and she was hesitating to go in because it was so cold. And she looked at me and she said, I’ve never seen you come out of the water without a smile on your face. And the fact that she saw that and kind of knew me as a person and not just as mom. And then she jumped in as soon as she said that. Really made me feel like, okay, I’m modeling something besides duty and obligation to my daughters.
David Brown [00:22:02] For sure. Yeah, I guess you had an idea that these 50 swims would would help you Heal, but were there things that you discovered about yourself that you didn’t expect to
Kate Washington [00:22:15] Oh, absolutely. And it really helped me break out of some creative blocks. I wrote about every one of these swims and kept a little blog that I didn’t really publicize. And so just the joy of writing about something that was just for me and that I enjoyed and then having a few people connect with it was a wonderful way to reopen my creative self. And just taking that time and really learning to be in the moment for myself. So, you know, I had kind of pursued a more intellectual path through college and graduate school and had kind pushed aside some of the physicality that I enjoyed as a little girl. And to return to that really helped me feel like I was reintegrating a self that I had lost leading into midlife.
David Brown [00:23:07] Let me ask you a sort of an odd question because I know I’ve talked to people who have set out to do something and write about it memorialize it in a book and sometimes I’m tempted to ask well what do you hope that listeners will take away from from what you’ve written and over the years I realized that sometimes it’s not about what the reader will will take way and I’m wondering what what that was like for you were you thinking ultimately about the reader or were you were very much sort of thinking about This is going to help me get to that next step.
Kate Washington [00:23:41] You know, I do really hope that the reader will kind of take away not necessarily an idea that they themselves have to go jump in cold water, but that everyone has some equivalent to this. There’s something that would bring you joy that would be for yourself, and that if you feel burnt out, tapped out through family obligations or work obligations, or simply having gotten caught up in. You know, all of the stressors of daily life, there’s something out there that can give you that same feeling, that rush that I got, you know jumping off a rock into a deep swimming hole. And it’s worth it to take the time to go and find it.
Jerry Quijano [00:24:24] That was Kate Washington speaking with Texas Standard’s David Brown about her new book, Midstream, A Life Remade in 50 Swims. That’s it for us today on Austin’s Signal, we’re going to have more about the stories we shared with you in the podcast show notes, and there’s always more from us at KUT.org slash Signal. Today’s team is Rayna Sevilla, Alexandra Hart, Kristin Cabrera, and I’m your host Jerry Quijano. Austin’s signal will be back at the same time tomorrow, we’ll talk to you then.
This transcript was transcribed by AI, and lightly edited by a human. Accuracy may vary. This text may be revised in the future.
