Many Hurricane Ike evacuees have little left after the storm and some are left with just a few bags of clothes.

Some Austin crews are heading to the coast to help clean up and rebuild. Police officers will drive out on Thursday to also help out.

"We didn't want to lose anything," said Roger Smith, Brazoria County evacuee.

"It's like a nightmare. You look at your house when you pack up to leave and you're like 'Am I going to see this again'?" said Patty Smith, Brazoria County evacuee.

Smith doesn't know whether her home in Brazoria is still there or if it’s in good enough shape to live in. It's still unknown how home insurance rates will be affected. For now Smith's concern is making it through each day.

"We don't even know if we're going to have the money to pay our bills. It's that bad. My husband hasn't been able to work since we left," said Smith

Smith, like many others, now relies on donations like these and on the generosity of others.

"It's about five boxes worth of food, diapers, peanut butter, granola bars," said Pam Atkins, Austin resident.

The Capital Area Food Bank is sorting through bags of donations; loading them up into boxes and carting them off to distribute to evacuees.

"I have kids and I know how horrible it is to not have diapers so I decided to bring some diapers," said Sarah Rimel, Austin resident.

"We all need to share what we can," said Austinite, Jan Spotts.

Food donations aren't all hurricane evacuees need though. Many are in need of monetary donations too. KVUE has teamed up with Randall's Food and Pharmacy to collect those donations. More than $10,000 has already been collected.

One hundred percent of the donations will go to evacuees in need.

"I don't know what we're going to do," said Cheryl Harrison, Port Arthur evacuee.

Harrison needs money now; not when she gets back home.

“Mostly we're looking for somewhere to live. We went from one shelter to another,” said Harrison.

She's hoping to find a hotel room in Austin until she can go back home. The Texas Attorney General's Office, however, warns evacuees about price gouging. Nearly a dozen complaints have been reported in Austin; most about hotels and a few about gas stations.

It's a problem these evacuees, who are already left with so little, now have to worry about too.

Along the coastline, repairs are picking up speed. The City of Austin sent 50 employees in a convoy of dump trucks, cranes and forklifts to help clear the debris along roads in the storm ravaged areas. On Tuesday, 25 Austin Energy employees headed south to help make repairs to lines and on Thursday a group of Austin Police officers will leave in their patrol cars to assist law enforcement.

Until all the repairs are made, thousands of evacuees will likely continue to call Austin home.