Get the daily email that brings 100% Austin news, info, and entertainment direct to your inbox
(Austonia)
This story has been updated as of 10 p.m. Sunday.
Water is in short supply in Austin, and the community is coming together to ensure everyone has access to drinking water.
Along with local businesses providing the water they can, the city of Austin has received 1 million gallons of water in 16-ounce bottles from six states in the Southeastern U.S. The city is following a three-phase distribution plan to bring residents water. The first phase began on Friday and prioritized warming centers and shelters, COVID-19 isolation sites and first responder locations. Phase II took place Saturday and targeted vulnerable populations including seniors and those with certain medical conditions.
As of Sunday at 5 p.m., the city had passed out 17,136 cases of water to critical facilities, 14,448 cases to vulnerable populations through city partners and 19,068 cases to the general public.
Phase III, which started Sunday, will continue into Monday by providing cases of water to the general public in each city council district. Distribution at all 10 locations will begin at 9 a.m. on Monday.
And outside of city distribution, here are 12 places from grocery stores to breweries providing free water.
Meanwhile Brewing, 3901 Promontory Point Drive
Natural Grocers, multiple locations
St. Elmo Brewing Company, 440 E. St. Elmo Road
Hopsquad Brewing, 2307 Kramer Lane
Adelbert's Brewing, 2314 Rutland Drive
Batch Craft Beer and Kolaches, 3220 Manor Road
Infamous Brewing Company, 4602 Weletka Drive
Central District Brewing, 417 Red River St.
Beerburg Brewing, 13476 Fitzhugh Road
Circle Brewing Company, 2340 W. Braker Lane
Whitestone Brewery, 601 E. Whitestone Blvd.
Blue Owl Brewing, 2400 E. Cesar Chavez
- Food, bottled water en route to Austin amid weather crisis - austonia ›
- Austin Water issues citywide boil water notice - austonia ›
- Austin Water investigates water outages in southwest Austin - austonia ›
- Water conservation is now Austin's 'immediate priority' - austonia ›
- One more hard freeze to finish out the wintry week - austonia ›
- City announces three-step water distribution plan - austonia ›
- Drinkable water begins trickling in as the city plans next move - austonia ›
- Austin begins passing out water to the general public - austonia ›
- As reservoirs begin to refill, two zones regain water supply - austonia ›
- As reservoirs begin to refill, two zones regain water supply - austonia ›
- Water and food distribution sites in Austin - austonia ›
- Water and food distribution sites in Austin - austonia ›
- Boil water notice lifted for Central, South, North and Northwest A zones - austonia ›
- Austin Water lifts boil water notice for all customers - austonia ›
Popular
Former UT tennis coach Michael Center told Sports Illustrated he thinks others were involved in the Varsity Blues scandal at UT.
His name dragged through the mud, Center was fired, arrested by the FBI and sentenced to six months in a Central Texas federal prison after pleading guilty to two charges related to mail fraud. And over a year after his release, Center told Sports Illustrated he doubts he was the only one in burnt orange involved.
When the Varsity Blues scandal broke out to the public in 2019, the investigation was a perfect storm for nationwide attention: Hollywood glamour, blue blood conspiracy and faith in the tried-and-true American education system came to a head as 33 movie stars and other elites were found guilty of paying more than $25 million to pave their children’s way into eight colleges, including the University of Texas.
UT was one of eight schools caught in the college admissions scandal. (Laura Figi/Austonia)
Singer's client, private equity executive Chris Schaepe, was looking for a way to bend UT's tight admissions policies for his son, who was seeking a position oddly as a manager on UT’s basketball team. Through a middleman, Singer contacted Center, who eventually agreed.
Schaepe's son hadn't played tennis since his freshman year of high school. It was a detail that Center says passed through plenty of hands before he was admitted, including "academic support staff, the compliance office, the sports supervisor and, ultimately, the athletic director," SI's Jon Wertheim writes.
No one in the entire athletic department, including seven "risk management and compliant services department" employees, was named, implicated or punished. After an internal investigation, Center was the only one named in the Varsity Blues "subterfuge" in a September 2019 UT news release signed by the university president.
He told Austonia he was never contacted by the university during the investigation, and when the NCAA interviewed him for its investigation, he says it cleared him of any violations.
“I almost fell out of my chair,” Center said. “I literally couldn’t breathe. There’s no college coach in America—much less at a state school, much less a coach of a nonrevenue sport—who can admit an athlete without consulting other people in the athletic department. What they were asking people to believe, it’s just impossible.” SI said Center's assertion was backed by multiple UT coaches and administrators at other schools.
But why would the Forty Acres be complicit?
(Matthew/Adobe)
Center said UT’s then newly named athletic director Steve Patterson made clear that Center suddenly was responsible for more than building a successful tennis program. He was to be a "fundraiser first and coach second" and he would need to find donors to fund a new tennis facility. Patterson admitted to SI that he wanted his coaches to find donors and said the department was "$15 million in the red" when he started in 2013, though he denies any knowledge of the false tennis recruitment.
Center said he knew he would be "considered a team player" if he let in the son of a Silicon Valley magnate. And sure enough, Schaepe immediately began pulling out his wallet, donating $100,000 to UT tennis and a six-figure check to the school's communication program.
"I never entered this as a way to profit. This was a fundraising mission where I made a terrible mistake at the end,"
Center said.
Months after Schaepe's son was admitted, Center agreed to meet Singer at the Austin airport and found himself accepting a backpack filled with $60,000 in cash meant for him, personally. He said he immediately knew he had made a mistake. He told SI “I put the money in my basement and gave most of it away.”
“Why did I do it?” Center told Sports Illustrated. "I go to bed and wake up each day asking myself the same question. I had to convince myself that I somehow deserved the money."
Once in court, Center showed texts with UT's compliance official and mentioned Chris Plonsky, a department executive involved in "overseeing men’s tennis, compliance, academic support (which generates letters of intent) and the Longhorn Foundation," according to SI.
“I knew I had to answer for my guilt,” Center said. “But I was like, 'Man, schools are going to get hammered.'"'
But Center was the only Longhorn to go down for the crimes. “I was no rogue actor,” Center said. “And this wasn’t my word against their word. There were signatures that went along with it. That’s the system... There wasn’t one point in the process where I thought people wanted to learn the whole truth.”
Back at home in Austin, Center watched as actress Felicity Huffman served just eleven days for her part in the scandal. Some served up to five months; others simply paid a fine, and others, like Singer, await sentencing.
And because the prosecution chose to blame individual coaches, framing schools as victims in the case, universities like UT have received less than a slap on the wrist for their possible involvement.
“I was always taught that actions have consequences,” Center said. “What I’ve come to realize is that, yes, for some people actions absolutely do have consequences. Serious, heavy ones. For others, actions can have no consequences at all.”
- Excitement, tensions build as Austin expects 18k fans at first Texas ... ›
- $10 million Austin NIL scholarship fund to help Longhorn athletes ... ›
- UT plans on Longhorns football in fall 2020 - austonia ›
- UT is going SEC! Texas board of regents approves move to future ... ›
- Former UT tennis coach Michael Center in halfway house after ... ›
- Former UT tennis coach Michael Center completes 6-month ... ›
