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Helping fellow Alaskans who are unhoused takes coordination by public officials for funding and services, but it also takes compassionate volunteers who want to help their vulnerable neighbors.

We love a dialog with individuals that want to help, groups that want to help and just really get, you know, like I said, bold and creative on how we provide service for those for this marginalized population.

We'll learn more about the layered approach to assist Alaskans in crisis right now on Alaska Insight.

Being without safe shelter in Alaska can mean facing extreme, cold, wild animals assault, hunger and illness.

The test of a healthy community is how in how it treats its most vulnerable residents.

Tonight, we'll hear about what efforts are underway in both an official capacity and acreage and also through direct assistance and action, all in an effort to help improve lives.

But before we get to that discussion, we'll start out with some of the top stories of the week from Alaska's Public Media's collaborative statewide news network.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has effectively killed the controversial Pebble Mine project in southwest Alaska by banning certain mining activities at the proposed mine site.

This caps a decades long battle over a region that is not only home to one of the largest the world's largest deposits of copper and gold, but also the world's largest wild remaining salmon run.

Environmental groups have praised the decision, while Pebble CEO John Shively called the action unlawful and unprecedented.

While this is the EPA's final decision on the issue, the battle over the mine is likely to continue in court.

Meanwhile, the US Bureau of Land Management announced Wednesday that it is inclined to allow ConocoPhillips to develop Willow.

The company's proposal for oil drilling on federal land in the Arctic near the village of No Exit.

However, the agency suggested trimming the proposal from five drill sites down to three, resulting in roughly 30 fewer wells than the company had asked for.

The Department of Interior now has 30 days to issue a decision on allowing the project.

Interior issued a statement suggesting it could still block Willow.

The statement says Interior has substantial concerns, even with the limits BLM proposes.

Alaska's congressional delegation, the governor and many North Slope leaders support Willow, saying it will bring needed jobs and revenue.

Environmental groups call the project a climate bomb.

The city and tribe of no exit also oppose the development.

The State Senate Education Committee introduced a bill Wednesday to increase Alaska's base student allocation by $1,000.

The allocation, known as the BSA, is the amount of money per student that school districts get from the state.

The allocation has been the same since 2017, although Governor Dunleavy's proposed budget included a $30 increase.

Education advocates have voiced support for the bill, although the increase falls short of matching the effects of inflation since the last increase.

You can find the full versions of these stories and many more on our website, Alaska Public Gorg, or by downloading the Alaska Public Media app on your phone.

Now on to our topic for this evening.

Helping vulnerable Alaskans find stability activists, nonprofits and government officials and communities across the state have invested millions of dollars and untold hours identifying who needs a roof over their head, getting them into stable housing and addressing their other unmet needs.

For some people, knowing experts are working on it is enough, but others can't look away.

Alaska Public Media's Jeremy Shea reports.

A small crew of volunteers has repurposed this concession stand in the Sullivan Arena into a pop up soup kitchen.

On the menu this morning.

Hot oatmeal with brown sugar, butter and cream.

Yummy.

I am so grateful for the food.

The Sullivan Arena has been repurposed to to serve as an emergency cold weather shelter for hundreds of people in Anchorage who don't have anywhere else to go to.

Duke Russell went from handing out 50 burritos at a time off his scooter to serving hundreds of meals, sometimes twice a day, Monday through Friday.

I started in June and just kind of just felt my way through and I just ended up here.

I didn't really plan any of it and it's just kind of turned into a thing.

Russell put together this crew of volunteers and lined up the donations he needed to prep meals.

He isn't a professional cook or really a professional anything in the social services world.

He's a sponsored artist best known for his paintings of urban Anchorage.

Last summer, he spent a lot of time at Centennial Park, where many people relocated after city officials shuttered a mass shelter.

There were numerous police calls and bear encounters.

It inspired this painting.

It's sort of a commentary on how the haves may consider something unacceptable for themselves, but not for the have nots.

You would not put yourself in that place.

So they're asking these people to go, Oh, that's just you unsheltered person, ain't.

They're lucky to have it.

Inside the Sullivan Arena, the conditions are Spartan and institutional.

The municipality of Anchorage hired a contractor to run it as a shelter.

They cover free meal service for the clients here.

That's not what this is.

I just stare.

That's what makes a great soup.

You got to stir it.

If you don't stir it, the magic doesn't happen.

Russell says his unofficial meal service is about more than basic nutrition.

But it is also about just the human contact and the respect given to someone.

He says those interactions won't save the world, but they are baby steps.

A little normalcy in a very unusual living situation.

Duke is great.

You know, he's a very passionate about this community.

Rob C works for the contractor that manages the Sullivan Arena and other shelters around Anchorage.

We're breaking bread with neighbors and friends.

You know what I mean?

There's a lot of therapeutic value over conversations, over meals, he says.

Duke Russell isn't the only one stepping up.

We love a dialog with individuals that want to help, groups that want to help and just really get, you know, like I said, bold and creative on how we provide service for those for this marginalized population.

When it comes to homelessness, Russell says, a lot of us compartmentalize bits of our humanity.

Volunteering changes that.

Once you see stuff happen, you just can't walk away anymore, you know?

And I was I was asleep, you know, and I, you know, a lot of people that volunteer with me, the first thing they ask after service is like, when can I do this again?

The Anchorage Coalition to End Homelessness maintains a list of volunteer opportunities on its website in Anchorage.

I'm Jeremy Shea from.

There's been a lot of attention on the need to end homelessness for the well-being of all community members.

But in the past, there was more heat than light in these emotional debates, and progress was difficult.

Our guests tonight will help us better understand where there is improvement and where the biggest needs still exist.

Robin Dempsey is the chief executive officer of Catholic Social Services in Anchorage, and Owen Hutchinson is the director of External Relations for the Anchorage Coalition to End Homelessness.

Thanks, both of you for being here.

I want to start with the annual point in time count that just happened on January 30th.

It's mandated by the federal government.

It's an effort across the nation to sort of get a snapshot in time of of who is without shelter on a single night.

Our reporting on this Alaska Public Media is reporting on this included a quote from Assembly member and executive director of the Anchorage Anchorage Coalition to End Homelessness, Maxwell Patel, and Meg said that is probably one of the most unreliable numbers we have in all the data.

What are your thoughts here?

Is this effort worth it?

I think it's absolutely worth it, but it only captures a single night or a few days.

And really, we want to see overall system utilization over the course of a month or a week or from month to month.

And there's also other kind of things, factors such as whether a point in time, how in July would look really different than in January.

Absolutely right.

A follow up there, Robin.

Totally agree with everything Owen just said.

I think that the time of year would make a significant difference.

And I think it's just it's really difficult when you're trying to look for people who are camping, getting to those camps, knowing where those camps are, and some of them are are you know, we know where they're and they're obvious.

But there's there's a lot of hidden homelessness.

And I think that's one of the pieces, too, that the head count has a little bit of trouble identifying.

And it has that been message to the federal government about, hey, this isn't as effective as it could be if you change the program.

Is there any movement in that respect?

We participate in regional HUD conversations with every S.O.S.

and I think every continuum of care, at least in our region, has expressed kind of the frustrations with the count.

During COVID, they allowed for multiple day counts, and everyone said this allowed us to knock on car doors to to approach people and cover more territory that we might not have been able to.

And so there has been some progress, and I think there's still more.

Oh, good.

So there is some movement toward better addressing what what you're identifying there.

The story that we watched about Citizen volunteers stepping up to help.

Do you get a sense that there may be more understanding and compassion to help, especially after the effects of the pandemic on our community?

I think that COVID has really forced our community into a conversation, a higher level conversation than we've ever had in the past.

So I think there's a lot of renewed interest in this particular issue.

And I definitely think that, you know, having any kind of volunteerism around this is is really important and really essential.

But I think we're seeing a lot of a kind of on both sides.

I mean, I think that there is a lot of compassion for for folks.

And I think that there's also some frustration as well.

So I think just trying to to help people, educate them around what really some of the causes of homelessness are and the real situations that people are in.

This is a really important piece that we can continue to to work on in order to to bring that compassion to the people that really need it.

Mm hmm.

Thank you.

Oh, and you mentioned that using the Sullivan Arena made clear a larger need in the community for more emergency shelter beds on a continuing basis.

Describe what you learned from this.

I think we realized with the decompression of other emergency shelters that smaller numbers were better for both clients and providers and that also Anchorage probably has an unmet need of about 200 shelter beds, emergency shelter beds year round.

And our recent gap analysis, which looks at the demand and then subtracts the capacity within the community and you get the gap shows about a need for 150 to 200 emergency shelter beds year round in the Anchorage area.

Were you surprised by that amount?

No, and I don't think any of the service providers would be surprised by that number either.

I think there are not enough workers, there's not enough space, there's not enough facilities and resources to accommodate the number of clients that we see.

Mm hmm.

Robin, the Third Avenue Navigation Center is expected to open later this month.

Tell us more about what the center is and what it will provide.

Yeah, absolutely.

You know, when we think about really having a robust response to homelessness, there's there's so many so many pieces on that spectrum.

So we think about, you know, outreach, emergency shelter, case management, housing.

But one of the biggest barriers that folks have is that when they go to access resources, they have to travel to several different places to actually get to those providers.

So one of the things that this particular resource and navigation center will do is it brings the providers on site so that people will have sort of a one, one place to go to really access those services.

But there's also the piece, I think, just around engagement.

So we want to make sure that there are a lot of folks who are experiencing homelessness that maybe aren't even ready for those services yet.

But this facility will also offer a place to just get a shower.

Charge your cell phone.

And that gives us an opportunity to start creating those kind of trusting, supportive relationships that can help people feel more comfortable to come in and actually access the services there.

How big of a change is this to have?

It sounds like everything will be in one place, and I anticipate or expect that they will see the same folks there.

And how big of a change is that and what does that mean for people that may have those issues?

As you mentioned, building trust?

Oh, absolutely.

And to say that everything will be there, there will be quite a bit there will have a lot of there's a lot of community partners that have committed to being in this space.

But I think there's also some services, like even some governmental services that won't be there that people need to access.

But one of the other things that we are providing there is transportation.

So we had a van, donated a shuttle bus.

So if somebody comes to us and they need to get to the EPA or they need to get to the DMV, we'll be able to coordinate some services around that, too.

A lot of times it's just a transportation issue for folks to get to the services that they need.

So we're trying to cover all of those all of those aspects.

Mm hmm.

As far as the trust piece, too, I'll just say that that that's always that's just such an important part of the work that we do.

You know, engagement is just so essential.

So when somebody comes in, they just want to get a shower, you know, we'll allow them to do that.

But it does give us that opportunity to have some conversations.

Let's talk about what happened during COVID.

And you said that Anchorage didn't see a spike in homeless numbers during COVID.

I was surprised by that.

What do you know about the why there?

I think there's a lot of factors, something that isn't counted in the federal definition of homelessness as couchsurfing or overcrowding or doubling up.

And Alaska has very high rates of all of these things.

Some of the highest in the nation, correct.

The highest in the nation, especially in western Alaska.

But that spills over into Anchorage as well.

And I think a lot of the folks who were in these kind of scenarios maybe then became unsheltered or also there was a kind of growth of visible homelessness, which is a kind of really obvious form of homelessness that affects everyone in the community.

And the increase of that would kind of indicate an overall increase.

But if you look at the data month over month, it stayed fairly stable.

I will say that was because of kind of initiatives from service providers, the municipality and the state to stand up a lot of other options very quickly.

And following up there, Robin, you mentioned in an earlier interview that COVID changed the face of homelessness in the community.

Talk about those changes and how that increased the challenge to help people.

Yeah, absolutely.

I think one of the biggest ways that COVID has changed the face is that we've had to really talk about solutions for shelter.

And I think that that is one of those places where you see a lot of visibility in homelessness, and we will see that a lot done on our Third Avenue campus.

So we were forced as an agency to reduce the number of folks we were serving Brother Francis shelter and the municipality was really forced to engage in in a new way.

So opening up that Sullivan Arena.

So now as we're kind of moving forward, I think that some of the challenges that we have, I'd say there were winds and there were challenges.

Some of the wins, something like the complex care shelter.

I mean, that's been a huge win for our community.

But I think some of the challenges we still have ahead of us are where will those low barrier walk up shelters be permanently moving forward?

And COVID was bad, as we know, but it sounds like some of the lessons that came out of of that pandemic are aimed at the need to reduce the number of people in shelter.

Talk about what you learned when you had to do that because of social distance needs and and other things.

And what you were able to determine about why it's important to lower the numbers of people in one place?

Absolutely.

I think there are a couple I think really good learnings from that.

Certainly the biggest one is that we really do believe that helping people move out of homelessness, especially for people that have been homeless for a long time, really does require trusting, supportive relationships.

This is a group of people that often don't don't trust.

So why would they want then to trust us to say, well, you know, let's do this?

Yeah.

What's the path moving forward?

So reducing those numbers, I think reduced I mean, definitely increased our ability to have the support of relationships.

The other thing, when I think about like the complex care shelter, which is our shelter for folks who are medically fragile, this is a group of people who were high utilizers of emergency services, but they were just in kind of a general shelter space.

Now their needs are being looked at very specifically, and we're able to get them to the services that they need.

And that is just one more way to really help them kind of move towards permanent stability.

A recent story from our partners at Keto and Juno focused on a program through the Alaska Housing Finance Corporation that pays rent for a year for people to help them get back on their feet.

And it's a less rigid program as far as what it will pay for.

It's kind of broadened the concept, the notion of what housing is.

And the story profiled a woman who's living on a sailboat.

What are your thoughts about this and is it being implemented here in Anchorage?

And but is it having success here?

I loved that article.

I grew up in Juneau and I'm familiar with the harbor where that person is staying.

Emergency rental assistance programs were deployed quickly in our state by HFC.

The funds were managed well and they identified people who needed them the most.

Emergency rental assistance programs, I believe, also contributed to why we didn't see an enormous spike in homelessness.

We know people lost work.

We know families with low income earners, heads of households lost work.

And those are the people most at risk of becoming homeless.

And emergency rental assistance really prohibited a large influx into our community.

We would love to see ongoing emergency rental assistance in our state because we know it works.

Sometimes a person or a family just needs six months or a year to get back on their feet, to get in a regular pattern with their employment, and to get some stability in their life or their kid's life.

And when you talk to the public about these measures to help someone, sometimes it's a car repair bill or just one medical expense and they just can't.

Bridget and pay the rent that month.

How do you put it in terms of what saved if you help somebody stay in place rather than if they fall into homelessness?

And then you have to go through the process of getting them back.

I mean, what's the ratio of expense there?

The longer somebody is homeless, the more expensive it is to get them into housing.

And if we can prevent them coming into the shelter with services, yes, we can save an enormous amount of money.

Absolutely.

I mean, when you even think about the fact that if it was just a car repair, that could have helped and they didn't get that money, they went into homelessness.

Now they have to come up with a security deposit, first month's rent.

I mean, those expenses just become sometimes insurmountable for people.

And then just the emotional weight of of going through that, the the idea of trauma informed service for people, for folks that are unfamiliar with that term.

Describe what that is and why it's important for people who have experienced violence or maybe just the stress of not knowing where they're going to be staying.

Absolutely.

You know, we trauma informed care and trauma and for our service models are so essential.

And it really starts with this with compassion.

It starts with treating people with dignity and respect.

But it's also really about helping people feel safe, empowered, giving them choice.

You know, all of those things that homelessness can take away from people, it can be, like you said, homelessness is a very traumatic experience.

And I think as long is, the more we can do to help shore people up, provide them with that, give them the hope that goes a long way to helping people move out of homelessness.

There's a great analogy about a plant when a plant is dying, you don't say, What did you do wrong plant?

You say, Oh, did you give it enough light?

Did I water it enough?

Is there something wrong in the soil?

And you start looking at all these factors around the plant to try and get the plant, be well and not just say, Oh, you're an awful plant.

That that's such an important point because as we know, there is a perception by some folks that if you are without shelter, without a home, you must have done something wrong, your suspect.

There's, you know, concerns about are you just lazy or are is there criminality involved?

How do you help the public understand that the vast majority of people who find themselves in these vulnerable situations are really trying the best they can to just stay above water?

Absolutely.

I think that, you know, some of the things that we really look at our connection to community, where a lot of people who fall into homelessness don't have a really robust support system.

And so even as we are helping people move out of homelessness, that's one of the things we focus on.

So we kind of couch it as social emotional well-being, but it's really about connection to community.

Knowing where your support systems lie.

Who can you count on in their time of need?

And when people can build those pieces out, that can go a long way to helping them not fall back into homelessness.

But you're so right.

You know, people many people are just a paycheck away.

And we, especially in our complex care shelter, we see so many folks who it was a medical condition that they were hospitalized.

Now they're paying high medical bills.

They weren't able to do that.

And then, you know, they ended up becoming homeless and now with the medical condition on top of it, it's just one more layer that they have to get through to move out of that situation.

When we think about who becomes homeless, we're looking at low income and extremely low income households.

And that includes seniors, people living on Social Security, disability students, or other people who have jobs, but they're minimum wage jobs.

And unfortunately, you cannot afford rent in Anchorage, working a minimum wage job you need to or two and a half jobs to afford rent in our city.

And that's just rent.

That's not all the other expenses that go with it.

In our final minute here, tell us about the gap analysis that you have that looks at available housing program and the need here and how big the gap is.

Anchorage needs about 2000 more permanent housing units to meet just the needs of our unsheltered population.

You know what we'll see, though, is that there's also these low income and extremely low income families who also need affordable housing.

So I think that number is really focused on shelter and people experiencing homelessness.

And I would say every kind of housing type is needed right now.

Workforce housing, low income housing, supportive housing.

You also said the safety net system is really taxed.

What's needed here to help shore that up and how would you prioritize addressing it?

Yeah, I think, you know, we've just seen so much success in having smaller, scattered shelters.

So even with the reduction of numbers of Brother Francis shelter, the complex care and even clear house, all of those shelters are now smaller and they have some specialization to them.

I think moving forward, the most important thing is we need low barrier shelter.

We need shelter that anybody can access, that they can just walk up to the door and know that they have a bed.

So I think addressing that issue.

But I do think that the more we can look at smaller scattered shelters, you know, smaller scattered emergency shelters, the better off our community will be.

All right.

Well, thank you both so much for the work you're doing on behalf of all Alaskans.

Thanks for being here tonight.

Helping people who are struggling sometimes in small ways, a car repair or medical bill and in large ways the death or illness of a family member.

That means lost income helps all of us.

Safety, stability, healthy food and a warm, dry place to stay elevates overall community well-being.

Any one of us may at some point need help in our lives, ensuring there is a social safety net that can get people back on their feet and stable again is a win for all of us.

That's it for this edition of Alaska Insight.

Visit our website, Alaska Public dot org for breaking news and reports from our partner stations across the state.

While you're there, sign up for our Free Daily Digest so you won't miss any of Alaska's top stories of the day.

Thanks for joining us this evening.

I'm Laurie Townsend.

Good night.