Coy Featherston

Gofundme asked me to update this story for Transparency Purposes:

I'm Patrick Judd. I grew up in Corpus Christi Texas and have known Coy Featherston since going to both Jr High and High School with him in Corpus Christi, Texas in the mid 1960's. Besides myself, Coy is an old friend to a lot of Corpus folks who went to Sundeen Jr. High and also King High School (1971 graduate) who live in both Austin and Corpus Christi, Texas. Up until a few weeks ago he was living on the street in Austin as a homeless person. He had no food, no shelter, no friends, no hope and no love. How all this started is that a newspaper article last week by the Austin American Statesman on the homeless used a photo of Coy and identified him in the caption. That alerted a number of us to his plight and within a day or so Leea Meckling went and found him and offered her home to Coy for a number of days. For most of us we haven't seen or heard from Coy in over 20+ years!! A lot of us discussed what to do next and that finally led to me suggest starting this GoFundMe campaign to get him back on his feet again. Here are a few particulars: Coy has lived on the streets for an indeterminate number of years in both Atlanta Georgia and Austin Texas (Coy says since 1995!!!). He is 66 years old and definitely eligible for Social Security and Medicare however he doesn't have a proper identification that shows citizenship (he was actually born in 1953 in the Philippines while his Dad was in the Navy stationed at Subic Bay). All of his identity documents have been lost on the streets. His older brother was Ken Featherston a highly regard artist for the Armadillo World Headquarters (see his album cover for Over the Rainbow by The Marshall Tucker Band). Ken was killed some years back in a senseless murder. Coy's other two siblings, Mikiel and Cindi, are also helping with this project to get Coy permanently off the street and back into a productive lifestyle. Basically, I'm asking everyone who knows and loves Coy to pitch in and contribute to this GoFundMe campaign. Some steps I've recently taken for Coy's are: opened up another savings account in my name at A+ Federal Teacher's Credit Union where the funds from this campaign will be transferred; payed Coy's rent and food bill ($400 a month for two months); paid his nearly expired Medicare bill ($833); and finally, the $66 needed for an application for a copy of his Consular Born Abroad Certificate, so that he can prove he is an American citizen and thus get his Social Security payments released. The funds for this campaign will be transferred into my savings account and then used to continue paying Coy's rent, food, clothing and medical needs. Leea and I will both be managing these funds. Once his Social Security is established Leea and I will be working together to help him buy some needed essentials (clothes for winter comes to mind right off the bat), get some proper ID reestablished and get some counseling underway. Ultimately we'd like to see Coy move into Community First here in Austin. As of last week, Coy has moved in with a great friend, Don Vanderburg out at Lago Vista (northwest of Austin) and is off the street. However, he still has no source of income. Luckily, Coy has no drug or alcohol issues. He is extremely grateful for the outpouring of love and help that has come from this campaign. Coy, as you are aware, is a smart guy with a real gift for art and music. He still has his great sense of humor intact but he's also been through a tough 20+ year struggle to survive on the streets of Atlanta and Austin. The Austin American Statesman just featured Coy on a front page story today (Oct 14, 2019) and I've just chatted with a Washington Post reporter who is working on a story about all of you donors who've dug deep to help an old friend which should be out tomorrow-- Oct 15th. In addition, KRIS/NBC in Corpus did a story on Coy's plight and all of the friends from 30-40 years ago who've come to his rescue which can be seen on their website. Personally, I can't tell you how awesome it's been to watch all this unfold. Coy very much deserve this after all he's been through. He's still a strong guy who's definitely a survivor. What were doing here is to show him he's still deep in our heart of hearts... always. Thanks again.