Letter to Austin Water

I wrote several letters like this one, which I sent to a liaison assigned to ANW in the hopes that the efforts of my organization, The South Austin Guerrilla Plumber Corps, could be coordinated with state agencies or other volunteers. I also wrote the City, FEMA, and Austin Water itself. I did not receive a response.

Hello ******,

Organizations like Austin Guerilla Plumber Corps and Austin Needs Water operate on the front lines of this crisis and we need some specific information:

• How many households that had water disrupted by the freeze still do not have functional running water in their house (not just service to the curb)?

• Where are they?

• Is there a plan in place to restore functional service? 

• If so, do city agencies still need our help?

We have done our best to collect this information piecemeal through online forms, cold calling residents, and physically visiting areas of town. The published multiplex data from Austin Water is useful, but it's not clear how much of the water access problems it represents. We need better data, and Austin Water seems like the most likely organization to have data about water access. 

Is there a report Austin Water can produce that would infer this? Perhaps using wastewater metrics? Or a report on addresses that lost service during the freeze and have not started consuming water again? What data does the EOC use to get a picture of the crisis?

This seems like a request that we need to make to the EOC. I've been told you are the liaison between these two organizations, as well as with ANW, so it seems like you are the person to talk to about this. I apologize for bothering you with this again if that’s not the case. 

It's late in this crisis to be getting this information, but it makes sense to get more granular as the numbers go down. It will be useful to be able to say definitively when the crisis is over. As spontaneous volunteer organizations, our participation was unplanned, but our demobilization should be. I also hope that sharing data and streamlining coordination with community groups can be part of a resiliency plan that comes out of this. Feel free to loop in any other roles you think are relevant.

Thanks for your attention, please let me know what you think is the next step.

-Ryan Gossen

This essay series is part of a project to document Texan’s experiences during the 2021 freeze. Do you have a story to share about the 2021 Texas freeze? Share it with my publication, Freeze Stories, on Medium. If its not filled with filth, I’ll publish it. Ok, I’ll publish it even if its filled with filth.