Hospitals, charities and churches all look to lawmakers, he said, in addition to federal agencies.
Doggett, who has represented portions of Austin in Congress since 1994, is a veteran of dealing with bureaucrats through other crises.
“The main problem is the desperation of people about water right now,” he said.
Doggett said he had been in frequent contact with FEMA and Travis County Judge Andy Brown about getting truckloads of bottled water to Austin after he learned Thursday that the supplies were stuck in a staging area in Fort Worth. And he helped get the word out to local officials about the dangers of low water pressure in hospitals.