As most Austin homes had regained access to water and electrical power by Monday, the focus in responding to last week s winter storm crisis shifted to restocking refrigerators and pantries.
Four City Council members sent a letter to City Manager Spencer Cronk over the weekend asking what his plan is to help feed lower-income residents who lost perishable items in the power outage and now can t pay for groceries because they missed work and haven t been paid.
The four Natasha Harper-Madison, Vanessa Fuentes, Sabino Pio Renteria and Greg Casar said in the letter that they did not get a response to phone calls and emails to Cronk on Friday and Saturday.
City of Austin offices will be closed due to severe weather
Austin, TX – The City of Austin will be closed Tuesday, Feb. 16 and Wednesday, Feb. 17 due to the severe weather that has impacted the region. The Austin-Travis County Emergency Operations and essential public safety services will continue coordinating and managing the City and County response.
Temperatures and weather conditions in the region for the next few days are still hazardous. With temperatures not expecting to rise above freezing, the public is urged to continue remaining weather aware and emergency prepared by monitoring the weather throughout the week.
Residents are also urged to stay off the roadways unless absolutely necessary. First responders are working to respond to calls as quick as possible, however they are also impacted by the same travel conditions. To help free up demand on 9-1-1 operations, Austin Police Department has asked the public to not call 9-1-1 to report power outages and only call 9-1-