Volunteer center at Melvin Park receives additional support, including a visit from crisis canines

A volunteer center led by Juneau community members and the Salvation Army has garnered more support from a multitude of agencies and individuals since opening Aug. 7 at Melvin Park. Among the newest helpers are three certified working dogs from the National Crisis Response Canines who arrived from Anchorage on Wednesday.

The dogs are Jack, a 3½-year-old German Shepherd, Tia, an 8-year-old English labrador, and Smarty Pants, a 5-year-old Keeshond, who will be in Juneau until Aug. 21, according to city officials. They are trained to prepare for critical incidents and stressful situations for people such as trauma and disasters.

“They’re not maybe ready to talk about things, or they don’t know have the words,” Jill Ramsey, Jack’s handler, said. “They find comfort in the connection with the animals and then they’re able to talk about what’s going on with them.”

The dogs stopped by the Mendenhall Valley Public Library, and Tlingit and Haida’s Generations Southeast Community Learning Center, before visiting the volunteers at Melvin Park. The dogs are also scheduled to visit schools, disaster centers and the affected neighborhoods to offer their support.

Margaret Griffo, a police fire chaplain based in Anchorage, said her dog Smarty Pants is the niece to Cupid, a Keeshond who visited Wrangell with Tia following the November 2023 landslide. She said Smarty Pants is a show dog who became certified in crisis response just this February. Griffo said her dog has a gift of recognizing when people are stressed.

“You can’t train a heart,” she said while stroking her dog’s soft fur.

In addition, the Alaska National Guard, Southeast Alaska Regional Health Consortium, Team Rubicon, and Central Council of the Tlingit and Haida Indian Tribes of Alaska have joined the volunteer center’s efforts over the course of the last week.

Two more disaster assistance centers have also been set up at the Mendenhall Valley library and the Generations Southeast Community Learning Center. They will remain open until Friday with hours from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m.

Ryan O’Shaughnessy, the volunteer center coordinator for Melvin Park, said the City and Borough of Juneau has stepped in by donating fans and dehumidifiers. There were questions on Aug. 10 if the volunteer center would continue through the week as volunteers transitioned back to work on Monday.

[Juneau comes together to help residents recover from the Mendenhall River flood]

But O’Shaughnessy said staff from Parks and Recreation were deployed to fill the gaps beginning Aug. 11. He said CBJ also stood up its Mobile Incident Command at Melvin Park which has been helpful.

“The data entry and making sure everything we’ve been doing is logged is very labor intensive,” O’Shaughnessy said. “If you’re sitting there at a table and trying to do the data entry, someone is going to come up to you. So it’s a quiet place to work.”

Rosa Spaeth has been a vital volunteer in managing the data of water-damaged homes, O’Shaughnessy said. Spaeth said the center had about 120 homes logged into their database needing help as of Aug. 10. But volunteers were receiving tips from impacted neighbors that there were more homes in need of assistance.

“One volunteer activity is to go to Emily Way, for example, we know there’s a ton of damage on Emily Way, so let’s go and knock on every single door, and let’s try and make contact with the homeowners on Emily Way,” Spaeth said. “Through that process, we were able to connect with residents who didn’t know about our resources and who either didn’t know that they had damage in their crawl space or didn’t know what they should be concerned about, like having wet insulation or wet drywall.”

Through their canvassing effort, the Melvin Park volunteer center was able to connect more residents to resources. Each day they have expanded their area of focus to be able to bridge the gaps. Volunteers compare their list of people who have come to their tent or who have filled out the United Way of Southeast Alaska online form to reach homes still in need.

Over 300 homes were contacted by volunteers knocking on doors, but not all of them had water damage. Since starting the door-to-door outreach, volunteers have contacted about 295 homes in need as of Wednesday, when on Aug. 11, that number was 120.

“Neighbors have been so, so helpful in looking out for their neighbors,” Spaeth said.

[Juneau residents impacted by the Mendenhall River flood begin recovery step by step]

Carl Weimer and Sharilee Weimer stopped by the center to pick up more cleaning supplies for their flood-damaged residence on Lakeview Court on Wednesday afternoon.

Last year the Weimers’ home didn’t get damaged, but the water came close. In the early morning of Aug. 6, a foot and five inches of water invaded their garage and living room. They said their home insurance won’t cover the damage and they are looking into flood insurance.

Gov. Mike Dunleavy declared a state disaster on Aug. 6 and applications for the State of Alaska Individual Assistance will be open through Oct. 9. People can also call (844) 445-7131 Monday through Friday.

The Weimers said they are concerned that financial assistance will come too late for them.

Sharilee Weimer said she came to the volunteer center when it first opened a week ago. She and her husband said the volunteer support has been amazing in their steps toward flood recovery, but they want to see more long-term assistance offered by the state and CBJ in the future.

An emergency cellphone notification made her feel prepared for this year’s flood, Sharilee Weimer said, but she knows some of her neighbors don’t own cellphones.

“Maybe they could go door to door and give a notice and say, ‘Hey, your street is known to flood out, and this is going to happen’ or have one of the cars that go by that have the speakers,” she said. “If it changes — like our time did change from one to four — go through and have one of the cars go through a neighborhood with your loudspeaker and just warn everybody ahead of time.”

A “worst-case” river level of about 15 feet by the early morning hours of Aug. 6 was initially forecast by the National Weather Service Juneau. That was revised upward the afternoon of Aug. 5 to a 15.7-foot crest at 1 a.m. and then revised again after midnight Aug. 6 to a 16.3-foot crest at about 4 a.m.

The river crested at a record-high level of 15.99 feet shortly after 3 a.m. on Aug. 6.

Sharilee Weimer said when she lived in Ketchikan there were speakers on top of telephone poles that blared emergency alerts and she’d like to see that in Juneau. She also suggested digging deeper ditches alongside the threatened houses in preparation for next year.

She was home alone when the flood occurred as her husband works for the Alaska Marine Highway System. She said she lost her son’s car in the flood, which was significant because he passed away five years ago.

“And under the house it looked like a bomb went off,” Carl Weimer said. “Wires, just everywhere all over the bottom. Just puddles of water.”

Volunteers from Tlingit and Haida, the Melvin Park center and the Alaska National Guard helped the Weimers remove their wet insultation and living room flooring. Eight to ten volunteers in 13 different groups came by to help the two seniors.

The Weimers said they still need new insulation added to their home and they do not think their house will be ready in time for this fall’s cold weather.

That concern was a prominent topic during a meeting of the CBJ Local Emergency Planning Committee at midday Wednesday.

Tom Mattice, CBJ’s emergency programs manager, said local contractors are already overwhelmed by requests for work. Others at the meeting said getting out-of-state contractors to work here temporarily may be difficult due to high short-term housing costs and a lack of building materials to meet the enormous demand means many severely damaged living spaces won’t be habitable by the time harsh fall weather arrives.

“It’s going to be a long haul for a lot of people,” Mattice said.

Tiara Ward, a resident affected by the flood, asked the committee what efforts are being made by the city to obtain materials and services from elsewhere.

“We have a need to get people warm and insulated by the fall,” she said. There’s only two or three local sheet rock vendors, she added, and getting more is “going to take months and winter’s coming quick.”

The state, under Dunleavy’s emergency declaration, is allowing waivers of certain construction and licensing requirements, according to committee members responding to Ward’s question. Assembly member Paul Kelly said such issues are something he will bring to the full Assembly for consideration.

Flood resources

For complete and up-to-date flood recovery resources and information, visit juneau.org/manager/flood-response.

A press release issued by CBJ on Wednesday states the city is interested in hearing from individuals or organizations, especially those with expertise in civil engineering or hydrology, who have ideas to prevent or mitigate future glacier lake outburst at floodresponse@juneau.gov.

The Juneau Community Foundation has reestablished the Mendenhall Flood Relief Fund to provide support to those affected by flooding.

The American Red Cross is offering damage-based financial assistance for those whose primary residences sustained eligible damage as a result of the recent glacial outburst flooding in Juneau.

To sign up for assistance or to volunteer at the Melvin Park center, visit here or stop by Melvin Park between 10 a.m. and 6 p.m. on Thursday and Friday.

• Contact Jasz Garrett at jasz.garrett@juneauempire.com or (907) 723-9356.