Statesman: Cold Weather Supplies

When you live outside, you pay close attention to the arrival of winter. You prepare for it. You stock up on blankets and coats and extra socks. You gather propane tanks and, if you’re lucky, a small generator.

The homeless encampment where Ann Marler lived with about 20 people last fall had amassed all of those things — then lost them, she said, when city crews bulldozed the camp off Bluff Springs Road about two months ago.

“They came at 7 a.m. one morning and told us we had 5 minutes to get our stuff. I lost everything,” Marler, 60, told me Sunday afternoon, thinking of the extra clothing and blankets that would have come in handy as this week’s arctic blast rolled over Texas.

“We had cold weather stuff ready,” she said, shaking her head. “They took it all.”