Congratulations to outstanding 2024 volunteers and partners

Parks and Recreation Healthy Spaces team and leadership, in the ACEH office on Dec. 11, 2024.

The work of helping our unhoused neighbors along a path to stable housing couldn’t be done without community support. The Anchorage Coalition to End Homelessness is pleased to announce our second annual awards recognizing volunteers and partners for outstanding contributions.

Volunteers of the Year

This year, we zeroed in on volunteers from Project Homeless Connect. Around 500 people experiencing homelessness were connected to services, outfitted with winter gear and provided information on housing resources. Dozens of community members pitched in to volunteer, and we needed all of them. Congratulations to Volunteers of the Year, our Project Homeless Connect Heroes:

  • Sheri Cole, front door greeter who made sure all 500 guests felt welcomed and knew where to go next.

  • Jonathan Cuddy, coat and bag check. The event was on multiple floors at Loussac Library, so these station made sure people could participate without having to haul around their personal items.

  • Alexa Filanowicz, coat and bag check plus she helped unload the U-Hauls.

  • Patrick Kim, volunteered the entire day and helped in every area including cleanup.

  • Rowan Thomas, assembled hundreds of harm reduction kits that our medical partners distributed at the event.

  • Robert Winfree, fourth floor greeter who made sure guests all got bags to collect essentials and were connected to service providers and lunch.

Partners of the Year

In 2024, the Anchorage Coalition to End Homelessness worked with partners to house everyone living in two encampments, one in Midtown and the other downtown just off the Coastal Trail. Part of our Next Step rapid rehousing project, this encampment strategy was a first for Anchorage. We coordinated with the Anchorage Police Department and with Parks and Recreation to make sure no one was displaced and to clean up camp areas. Conversations were not about having to move once again, but about what kind of apartment people were headed to and which personal items they were taking. Congratulations to our Partners of the Year for Next Step Outdoors Implementation:

Meg Zaletel, ACEH executive director, is seen with the Anchorage Community Action Policing team on Dec. 11, 2024.

  • Community Action Policing team. APD’s CAP team posts camps for closure, or abatement, and makes sure everyone clears out when the deadline hits. CAP worked with ACEH to identify camps and provided time for successful navigation to housing. “We're really able to place them into a place where they're able to get stable,” said CAP team Sgt. Kenneth Anglin.

  • Parks and Recreation Healthy Spaces team. Once camps were shut down, Healthy Spaces workers cleaned up the area so that it could be reactivated for the larger community. “This is unusual work in the realm of Parks and Rec, and it takes a different skillset,” Parks and Recreation director Mike Braniff said. “It takes patience, and it takes empathy. It really takes humanity to do the job effectively.”

Thank you to all the volunteers and partners who support the work of the Anchorage Coalition to End Homelessness.

“This has been the year of deep volunteers and partnerships. You let us be more effective. You make us look good. Thank you,” Coalition Executive Director Meg Zaletel told the awardees.

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Current state of homelessness in Anchorage