Raised as one of 11 children in a sharecropper's family in Mississippi, Dexter Batie encountered a literal life-changing storm when he was only seven years old. Several years after his mother passed away he dropped out of school, and as a teenager found himself on a path of crime and drugs. Dexter was in prison by the age of 17, and eventually wound up homeless on the streets of Austin for two decades. After living in Community First! Village for more than a year, he takes pride in defending his new neighborhood as a place that has him closer to the path he desires in life.