AUSTIN, Texas — More than a year after Austin city leaders decriminalized public camping, sitting and lying down, there are still strong emotions about how to best handle the city’s response to homelessness--especially amid a pandemic and an unrelenting heat wave.

“We have 1,000 unsheltered homeless, over 2,000 homeless, at least. That’s not that many people when you consider how much money we have and how many resources the city has,” said Bobby Cooper of Austin Mutual Aid.

Cooper, along with a coalition of other volunteers and organizations fundraise and deliver supplies to some of the encampments. Among the most immediate needs are meals and cooled water, but that's just scratching the surface.

“Some personal fans. We’ve got some popsicles today,” he adds.

Austin Mutual Aid's Beat the Heat program has been helping address gaps in resources for this vulnerable population. Still, individuals experiencing homelessness around the East Austin area feel abandoned by civic leaders, and the scope of the work done by volunteers is limited.

“I shouldn’t be needed, you know? We need social workers out here. We need mental health professionals. I don’t see them out here,” said Cooper.

Cooper usually stops at several encampments in one afternoon a few times a week. Supplies are already low at the first encampment, located along East Riverside Drive and South Pleasant Valley.

Another encampment is located near Longhorn Dam. This one has the added benefit of tree coverage, a real estate upgrade, so to speak.

“This is where I sleep out here—to keep away from the sun. A little shade,” said Sam Perez, an unhoused resident living in a makeshift tent made up of boards, tarp and pieces of stone.

Perez lost his job and housing in Round Rock seven months ago. He qualifies for pandemic relief but without a physical address he's having to navigate other ways to get the help which could put him on a path out of poverty.

“I don’t know what a stimulus check is or what it’s for. I don’t even know why I’m wearing this mask. I don’t know why I can’t shake hands like the old times,” he said.

Perez, like many other people across the encampments, wasn't immediately privy to the severity of the coronavirus. All he knows is that for some reason things changed in March: fewer people were out, Texans suddenly wore masks, and the sense of abandonment grew deeper.

“I have to make do with whatever is left over,” he said.

Yet, remarkably, at the height of the pandemic it was volunteers, like Cooper and his network of good Samaritans, who stepped up and offered people like Perez something more than just water and a meal--a small glimpse of hope.

For Perez, it's those acts of kindness that go a long way.

“Anything is possible,” he said.