AUSTIN (KXAN) — Austin-Travis County EMS said medics responded to 28 cold-related illness calls during last week’s cold snap. Of those, EMS said they transported 11 people to area hospitals.
“The good news is, is that we haven’t transported anybody in critical, life-threatening condition. Everyone has been awake and talking, so that leads us to believe that they’re probably going to be okay,” Captain Christa Stedman with ATCEMS told KXAN Wednesday.
That remained true through the end of the week, according to EMS.
Austin’s Homeless Strategy Office (HSO) said — with the exception of Monday, when the threshold was not met for the overnight cold weather shelters to be open — the city provided 1,924 shelter beds during last week’s cold snap starting Sunday and ending Saturday morning.
“We had pretty high numbers all week, around 400 plus, most of the nights. And when this was all said and done, we will have about 2,000 shelter beds provided during this time,” Greg McCormack, program manager for Austin’s HSO, said.
HSO said it has seen an uptick in the number of people using their overnight cold weather shelters since they made changes this winter to how those shelters are triggered and operated. Those changes included simplifying the threshold for activation and notifying people earlier of those shelters opening.
“We’ve talked about in April and May, really coming together with the city departments and talking about what worked, what didn’t work, what can we change?” McCormack said. “And then we also really want to bring in the community and hear from them about what they’re seeing, what worked and what didn’t work, and what changes we can make.”
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