Fires austin news

Ten people staying at the state camp were displaced, said Chris Baker, the executive director of the Other Ones Foundation , a group focused on finding solutions to Austin's homeless crisis. During a virtual news conference Friday, city leaders and advocates discussed the fires and pushed for housing instead of reinstating the city's camping ban.

The fire last night at the governor's encampment in East Austin, Camp Esperanza, was horrible and came closer to having people die," Austin Mayor Steve Adler said. Homeless camps in Austin have become more visible after the city repealed its camping ban two years ago. Since then, the number of calls the fire department receives about burning and fire incidents at homeless camps has increased, Smith said.

Firefighters deal with five or six calls a day about burnings at homeless camps, a number which can increase to 15 calls when the weather is cooler as people try to keep warm, Smith said.

But sometimes, officials end up going back to the same place three or four times a day. Smith compared calls about the camps to other incidents firefighters respond to, like car wrecks. The Fire Department utilized one of its Twitter accounts on Thursday and Friday to share information about the fires at the camps.

But the department does not normally tweet out information about those calls. Smith said the information was shared this week because he was asked multiple times during news conferences about the fires and burn incidents.

The fires and burning incidents provided fodder for some online to speak in favor of Proposition B. But for Austin firefighters, the homeless camps are just a part of the job.

Crews just responded to homeless camps in blk E. Ryan Faircloth, 30, was arrested Friday and faces federal charges of arson and attempted arson, according to court documents. No one was in the Travis County Democratic Party headquarters when it was attacked at around 2 a.

Wednesday and only a small stack of papers caught fire, officials said. The blaze was quickly extinguished by employees of a neighboring business. Investigators received multiple tips after releasing the surveillance video, according to a complaint filed in federal court by FBI task force officer Ryan Metcalf.

Three fires broke out at Austin homeless camps over the span of 24 hours. One of those fires spread and burned the historic Buford Tower in Downtown Austin. The Austin Fire Department said they believe the blaze was arson and are looking for a suspect. AFD said the Thursday night fire started at a nearby homeless camp and drifted to the historic tower. Friday, city crews were washing away the ashes left behind.

No injuries were reported. AFD said the damage was mostly on the outside of the building and windows. Hours after the April 1 fire broke out at the Buford Tower — a bell tower and landmark that used to serve as a drill tower for the Austin Fire Department — firefighters responded to a separate fire at the State homeless camp on the Bastrop Highway.

Damage was reported at four units at the homeless camp, but there were no reported injuries. The third fire broke out at a homeless camp located in the block of S. Interstate Details are limited on that particular fire. In the last 24 hours, the Austin Fire Department has responded 11 times to homeless-camp fires, but eight of those fires were not out of control.

Those eight fires were violating open burning guidelines. A fire is in violation of the City's guidelines when it's within 25 feet of a building or it's happening in a green space or greenbelt. The most recent violations firefighters had to respond to happened at camps in the block of East Riverside Drive and the block of Interstate Fire crews are typically alerted about a fire in violation when passersby see smoke or fire.

It's usually a campfire, cooking fire or a warming fire in the homeless camps. The fires added fuel to the conversation about Proposition B, a proposal on the May 1 ballot that would reinstate the camping ban and make it illegal to camp in public spaces, sitting and lying in the downtown area and panhandling at night. There are people on both sides of this issue. Chris Harris with Homes Not Handcuffs , a grassroots organization against Prop B, said it would put people experiencing homeless into a vicious cycle.