Good morning, the joint hearing of the House Tribal Affairs and House Community and Regional Affairs Committee will now come to order.
The time is 8.03 a.m. Tuesday, February 3rd, 2026 and Capital Room 106.
Members present for the house tribal affairs are representative Underwood,
Chair Dibert and
Representative Carrick. Good morning
Co-chair him shoot will you please call the roll for house community and regional fairs happy to we have representative St
Claire representative g Nelson representative Holland representative Hall co-chare mirrors and myself co chair him shoe
Alright wonderful
Thank you, co-chair Hymshoot.
Let the record reflect that we have a quorum
to conduct business.
A quick reminder to please silence your phones.
I would like to thank Sophia Tenney,
the Community and Regional Affairs Secretary from Records,
and Susan Quickly from the Juneau LIO
for Staffing Committee today.
and let the record reflect that we have been joined
by Representative Prox at 8.05.
Good morning.
I would also recognize in the audience,
we had Representative Jimmy in The Audience.
Thank you for being here.
We have one item on the agenda today.
We will continue the presentation from last Thursday,
January 29th of the Alaska State Emergency Operations Center.
Our presenter is Director Brian Fisher, again,
from the Division of Homeland Security
and Emergency Management, or DMVA.
And he will be joining us virtually on Teams today,
Brian Fisher, Director, ICU,
Director Division of Homeland Security
and Emergency Management,
Alaska Military and Veterans Affair Department.
Welcome, good morning.
Can you hear us okay?
Yes ma'am, Kim.
Welcome back to the joint hearing.
Please put yourself on the record
and proceed with your presentation from last week.
Good morning, Chair Dibert.
Co-chairs and members of the joint committees for the record, Brian Fisher, the Director of
the Alaska Division of Homeland Security and Emergency Management, and I'm calling in today
from Joint Base Elman Dorf Richardson, where the State Emergency Operations Center is located.
I appreciate the opportunity to call in virtually today.
Well, at the end of our presentation last week, we left off just beginning to speak about typhoon
I'll just say, although many of us refer to this disaster on the West Coast in October
2025 as typhoon along, it really was three separate storms that impacted the entirety
of the west coast beginning with a storm that caused substantial flooding in the city of
There was a storm immediately following that, and then the remnants of extra tropical cyclone,
the remnant of typhoon-halong severely impacted the Yukon-Kusuke-Quim Delta and catastrophically
impacted southwest portion of the lower-kusukwim delta.
So the photo that's up there is just representative of some of
The two communities that received the most damage by far were Kip Nuck and Quigilla Guck,
although there are upwards more than 30 communities in the YK Delta that had very
degrees of impact from minor to moderate to severe. But Kipp and Quinn certainly
very, very catastrophic. And I think I said this to the committees last week.
this disaster, you know, I've been here doing this 31 years and this by far is the most most
catastrophic that I have seen in my whole career here. I'll just note the picture on the right
where you see some of the homes that are elevated on pilings there. With all of
the damage and tragedy, the trauma that has come from the disaster while we move into the recovery
That's an important key to see those homes that have remained in place on pilings that
that is a good news story and I'll refer to that a little bit later in the presentation.
If we could go to the next slide please.
I did mention this last week and i think it's worth repeating
that the rescue efforts that were made through the Alaska Department of Public Safety and the
and the Alaska Army and Alaska Air National Guard's truly, truly heroic. There were 51 saves
recorded as a result of rescues that happened immediately following the impacts of the typhoon
remnant, primarily in Kipnock and Quigilla Gook. You can see the picture on the right,
I said this last week, you know, I didn't think in my lifetime I would see a flooding
disaster, a coastal storm disaster in Alaska.
That looked very similar to Hurricane Katrina with the military and Coast Guard helicopters
doing voice dress cues.
What made this different than Katrina was some of those homes that you can see in the
picture on the right.
Some of the homes had survivors and then that required rescue had floated away from the
I was in a meeting yesterday at the Alaska Forum with representatives from Kip Nuck and
Quigilly Guttkin.
Both reported that homes were displaced from their foundations and washed away upwards
of 10 or 12 miles away from the community.
And some of those homes had residents in them that required rescue, so...
As always, our thanks to the brave men and women and soldiers and sailors and airmen of the Coast Guard and the Alaska Army Guard
and Air Guard, and our troopers for the heroic efforts that they provided in that rescue.
I also want to say a special thank you to The Search and Rescue, the volunteer members of
the communities that coordinated throughout the night when the storm waters came in to get good
to go rescue folks and transport them to the schools before the helicopters were able to get out there.
Truly an incredible effort and a testimony to
the resilience and the pre-planning and rescue work that volunteers in the communities do
for their neighbors. Next slide please.
I think this is one of the most impactful images, the lasting images of
the response to typhoon hollong that we have all seen outside of
the damage to the communities itself.
When I saw this photo in near real time from one
of our loadmasters that night bringing this flight of survivors
into Anchorage, I immediately thought of
the noncombatant evacuation operations that occurred in Afghanistan.
Never in my life again would I have thought that we would have conducted the largest domestic
air evacuation from rural Alaska into Anchorage. We're pretty sure in the state's entire history.
We don't think there was anything greater even in World War II where folks were evacuated.
In the communities themselves, as per usual, members all relocated, evacuated to their schools.
The schools in these communities, like most of our communities are built on pilings that
were elevated and protected from the flood waters.
Local evacuations occurred throughout the night when the storm came in, and it was clear
Folks, we're not going to be able to stay in those communities.
So, with the Alaska State Troopers and with
the Association of Village Council Presidents and
Yukon Cusquim Health Corporation,
the Department of Military Veterans Affairs,
the State Emergency Operations Center conducted a very,
very robust, further evacuation,
first out of the communities via helicopter.
There was some concern initially for the integrity of the runways in the communities
due to flood impact.
So we used our very large helicopters, our CH-47 Chinooks, and our Black Hawk helicopters
to evacuate folks first from the community into Bethel.
And after a time, just because of a sheer number of folks we had to bring in to Bethele,
it was clear we were going to have to move them even further away from region.
And that's a picture here, one of the flights that we conducted on our C-17 aircraft, bringing folks in to join base Elmondor, Richardson.
And move further on from there to congregate shelters.
And I want to thank the University of Alaska Anchorage for providing the Alaska Airline Center for one
of our initial congregated shelters and the municipality of Anchorage
So more than a thousand people were evacuated from the region,
primarily into Anchorage. Some did remain in neighboring communities and some remain
in Bethel. But by far one of the largest evacuations that the state has conducted
Following the evacuation as we were taking care of folks in our congregate sheltering,
there was of course a huge concern for pets and animals in the community.
And I have nothing but praise for the Alaska Department of Environmental Conservation,
the Office of the State Vet, petful friends of pets, the ASPCA,
the municipality of Anchorage,
evacuate pets from the destroyed or damaged communities first again into
Bethel and then pretty robust reunification effort with all the partners
that I had mentioned earlier to you know reunify pets with survivors that
were displaced from community. That happened for a very long time and the
Next slide, please.
Just some additional photos from the early early response.
Our teams out there, you can see, and we typically see this in our flood disasters along our riverine communities and our coastal communities.
One of the biggest impacts initially with flood waters reaching up under homes is is pretty severe damage to.
to the board that bellyboard that protects the homes and insulation throughout homes.
And I think I mentioned this previously I'll just say it again one of the exacerbating factors of
this catastrophic disaster was we were really right on the cusp of winter. The response to
winter coming to the community, so or to
the entire region. So there was a very,
very large effort on behalf of the communities
to try to do emergency repairs to homes
to get people back home before winter
set in if we could. I want to thank the
Department of Natural Resources, the
Division of Forestry and Fire Protection,
the Alaska Army and Air National Guard, and the
Alaska State Defense Force and Naval
Team Rubicon and the Alaska Department of Transportation and Public Facilities and their contractors
As well as the Association of Village Council Presidents the AVCP Regional Housing Authority
all of those partners throughout the entire YK Delta region immediately following the storm
mobilized, divided the labor, if you will, and made attempts to repair homes to get them put back
on their foundations to replace insulation as much as practical before winter,
before hard winter really set in. The logistics effort was absolutely incredible.
There's just a picture of one of our many warehouses we utilized with donations that
came in from around the state.
I will say that's always a complex issue for us.
The well-intentioned donating and transporting materials.
A lot of this went to Bethel, and Bethemel was pretty full for a while with donated materials,
even when we had many survivors that were in Anchorage and in need of that.
material donations following a disaster like this. So I want to thank everybody that was involved in that as well.
Next slide please.
So, I mentioned we opened up to congregate shelters in partnership with the university
municipality and of course the Red Cross of Alaska, the Salvation Army, all of our partners
but we knew early on that that congregate shelter setting was not going to be appropriate
for very long at all. So at the governor's direction, we
removed into the next phase of this response, and that was to get folks out of the congregates
shelter settings and into hotels, essentially, in primarily in the Anchorage area,
but also in Bethel and Fairbanks and some other places around the state.
As we were doing that, it was very important to all of us in a priority of the governor's
and mine to make sure that we are being respectful and treating our neighbors appropriately
with a mind towards being culturally appropriate.
So donations from communities across the state coordinated through entities like the Alaska
We're able to bring in the hunt-ditter,
subsisted food sources from around the state to make sure
that folks that were staying in our shelters
or staying at our hotels in Anchorage
had opportunities to meet as community,
to take part in pollaches and with traditional preparation
of food and service of foods to folks.
We've done a number of community-wide events.
uh for that to continue to happen um can't thank all of the communities in the state that donated
and went and made extra hunts. The Alaska Department of Fish and Game authorized them
additional hunts uh to collect subsistence foods to bring in to support the survivors as they were
displaced from the community. Um I will say this I mentioned this to the Community of Kipnuk at a
Just because of the sheer impact, particularly to those two communities,
it's unlikely that every survivor that was impacted by this disaster
and displaced from their home is going to be able to get back there this summer.
I will talk about some statistics here in a little bit.
But with that in mind.
You know, there's roughly 200, a little more than 200 homes that we have categorized as destroyed
just in those two communities. And then, as I said,
there are varying degrees of damage and destruction to homes and infrastructure across the YK Delta.
Because of the severity of that, the impacts to Kip Duck and Quigilla Guck,
the tribal councils, both past resolutions requesting that survivors and residents not return home.
Until we can get to this next summer and really restart and complete what will be a very significant cleanup
mission
collecting home heating oil tanks
It's collecting contaminated soil from both petroleum products and household hazardous waste
The water systems in the communities were compromised
Including with saltwater intrusion
which is going to take a significant time to get a reverse osmosis water purification unit
to scale out in the community to start reproducing safe drinking water. So there are a whole lot of
things that need to happen that we're able to be done before winter came and freeze up came in
southwest Alaska. But you know because of the scope of, the sheer number of homes that have
That is not an effort that's going to take a single summer construction season to occur.
So we are moving very, very deliberately with housing partners in the region and throughout
the state with the Federal Emergency Management Agency.
The plan for that, the housing mission, we have made a number of requests to FEMA, including
that they have in the Stafford Act, which is the federal law that guides disaster assistance.
A specific request we've made was for what's called permanent housing construction authority.
That's been utilized in a couple of disasters in my career here. If approved,
that it hasn't been approved yet by FEMA, but if approved that will allow us to rebuild homes,
provide labor and shipping support and material support,
financial support to repair homes above what is the traditional maximum amount of financial assistance a homeowner can receive.
I think I said this at the last hearing this year, the maximum
amount financial assistants from FEMA that a survivor can get is $44,800 for.
the replacement of personal property, including subsistence gear, homeowners are also eligible
for up to another $44,800 for housing repair. And many of you and your constituents, your
districts, you understand that $40,000 is not even a drop in the bucket for building materials,
particularly when it comes to the cost of shipping and transportation of those materials out there.
So, this permanent housing construction authority, if approved, one of the biggest benefits and we've seen this in previous disasters where I've used that authority is that FEMA would help defray, offset, and cover the cost of shipping and transporting building materials into the community.
That's really going to be a game changer if that is approved.
We are working on the business case analysis of that with FEMA right now.
There are many folks still at FEMA both in their headquarters in D.C. and in the region
that understand the nature of Alaska. The acting administrator for FEMA, Karen Evans,
was here immediately following the storm in October. She went to get knuck in Quingilly
good with the governor. she saw the reality of the time, space and distance and geography,
weather challenges that we have. So I feel like we are optimistic that
authority approved, but we're not waiting for that. So in the interim, we have been meeting in
Avastema to coordinate directly with AVCP Regional Housing Authority in rural cap and HUD and BIA up
here. The Alaska Department of Transportation and Public Facilities in Yukon Cusquim Health
Corporation to get that holistic understanding of what it takes to build a new home in southwest
things that can be done or would need to be
done in the winter to prepare to
to rebuild a house or reset a
house on a foundation come summer time.
So all of that work is continuing as we're
having this hearing, I'll refer back to
that picture of the the homes that were
on pilings to begin with and I will say
the home that we elevated on piling foundations
They survived this flood largely intact.
There was some flood damage, water damage
to the lower portions of those homes
and the insulation under the floors,
but they stayed in place and they survived largely in tact.
In both of these communities and other communities
that have boardwalks or boardroads,
those boardwoks that were secured with pilings
drilled into the ground survived, largely, intact again.
That's a testament we know how to engineer and design and build both infrastructure and homes in the area that are resilient to flooding disasters and it has certainly been our commitment moving forward.
Um, as infrastructure is repaired and the public infrastructure work will really happen in earnest starting the summer when the snow is gone.
We're looking at all of the options with the housing authority to make sure we can elevate homes above the new
Base flood elevation if you will the kind of a flood of record and that they are secured with technology like pilings or helical piles
Or there's there there is a brand name called triodetic, which is
A different type of steel foundation that can elevates secure homes to makes them more resilient for future disasters
There's been lots to talk about community relocation.
The state disaster programs and FEMA's disaster
programs do not relocate entire communities.
That's not what they were designed for.
They were design to repair, rebuild, rehabilitate in place,
damaged infrastructure in homes from a disaster.
So what I have communicated to the communities,
all the households and the tribal councils is that
We will do everything we can to, as we're repairing and rebuilding, restoring infrastructure
at homes in the communities to elevate them, to put them on these pilings,
to make sure they are more survivable for future storms, which we know will occur.
And really that is in order to buy the community's time to have that longer discussion
if they choose about whole community relocation.
Like I said, our programs don't do that.
We do the disaster, the immediate recovery programs.
But we want to do everything we can to make sure the communities are safe.
Moving forward is they have that much more complicated discussion
about wholesale community relocation.
Thank you, Mr. Fisher.
I think this is a good time to pause.
That was a lot of wonderful information as we understand this very complex.
event. And I would like to, we were able to reorganize up here at the dais, and I
would to invite Representative Jimmy up to the, the dias, so we'll take a brief
at ease, I think we have a couple of questions. I know I have
a few questions on what you've presented thus far. So I'll
take brief at his and then we will get back online, Mr. Fisher. Brief at
We're back on the record here in tribal affairs
discussing the typhoon hollong impacts and we are back with mr. Fisher who has
done an amazing job with a lot of facts a
lot
of just coordination across the state to deal with this
catastrophe out in the in The West
I'd also like to recognize that we have
Representative Jimmy here at the front of the dais.
These are her communities, constituents.
She's been to these places and I just welcome her thoughts
and thank you for joining us and anything.
Anytime you'd like add and take the mic, please do.
I would like offer that to you.
We have a couple of questions.
It has a question on what you've presented, Mr. Fisher.
Good morning, thank you,
Mr Fisher, and through the chair.
I know I was listening to you talk about FEMA 44,800 that an individual can receive,
plus another 44800 for building materials, if it's applicable.
So I wanted to confirm that that was the right information.
And then I missed where you said what specific.
fund from FEMA that those come from.
I just wanted to get clarification on that.
For the record, Brian Fisher, Director of the Alaska Division of Homeland Security and Emergency Management through the chair, Representative Carrick, that is correct.
The benefit under FEMA's individual assistance program.
The maximum allowed by law and regulation is 44,800 for personal property and an additional 44.800.
for housing assistance, then I would be to repair and replace the structure of the home itself.
That funding comes from the federal disaster relief fund, which the funds are appropriated
into that particular fund by Congress. Similar in nature to the state's disaster
relief funds authorized in the Alaska Disaster Act, I will say the funding that comes for
That $44,800 does not have a federal, a non-federal cost share to it, but the personal property one
does. It's called ONA, Other Needs Assistance, $4,400. There is a 75-25 percent, 75 percent federal
25 percent state cost-share to that fund. So through the state DRF, we're going to be picking
for the personal property funding that is being provided to our survivors.
Follow up. Thank you, Mr. Fisher, and through the chair, the
the individual assistance and is that something that each individual in a
family could potentially receive? So if you have, say, a family of five with
three minors, could they potentially received, you know, that
that amount or something up to it five times over or is it just per adult
individual or per family or a little bit more about how that works? Through the
chair representative Carrick it's per household so regardless of the size of
the household it is really one one amount of funding per the entire
In both of those areas for property and for housing assistance
Okay, thank you
Thank you, mr. Fisher. I'd like to go to representative Holland
Great, Thank You through the chair to
Director Fisher, I have two items I wanted to ask about right now.
The first one relates to any insights you have to gaps in the funding and
programs that we have or policies related to kind of the unique situation here.
But to get to that question,
I'm really interested in this notion of
the flood of record that is helping us define some criteria for what I assume
And I'm curious, you know, what we may be doing to not only use that to guide work
within the current recovery communities, but also looking out and assessing other communities
that might be exposed to the next storm and using that flood of record experience to help
where work needs to be done in the future, including the assessment of schools that are so essential for the community to have a place to go.
to have supplies, food, water, shelter, and whatnot.
So going back then, what are you seeing in terms of gaps
that may exist in funding, programs,
and policies that would help us leverage what you've learned
from Merbock and Halong and,
what we know about this flood of record notion
and the exposure of other communities
that perhaps may be facing this same type of threat
in the years to come?
Mr. Fisher through the chair representative Holland. I'd appreciate those questions. So I would say one of the you know prior to the storm and this really impacts every community in in Alaska, but probably more more substantially to our communities in rural Alaska is the fact that it it's darn near impossible for either homeowners or municipalities or tribes to obtain and maintain insurance.
Federal Emergency Management Agency assistance through the individual assistance program,
our state programs are not intended to be a replacement for insurance.
So, you know, we characterize that as the disaster assistance that comes for individuals
and families is not in tended to make somebody whole, it's not a
replacement of insurance, however, a huge gap that I've always seen in my career is that
The ability, they don't have access to insurance.
It's either unaffordable or it's unavailable.
It is entirety.
Many of our communities don' have fire departments
so they can't get general, you know,
basic homeowner hazard insurance,
there are some communities that do participate
in FEMA's National Flood Insurance Program,
but not all communities partake of that.
And so I think a huge gap is insurance coverage.
So when we come in following a declared disaster,
the assistance we provide is really minimal, if you will.
It's not intended to replace insurance.
So there's a very large gap there.
The programs that are in place,
particularly the FEMA programs and the maximums
and then the Stafford Act, the federal law,
because they're not in tended to to replaced insurance,
I would say they've never adequately kept up with the cost of inflation.
So that's a minimal amount of funding.
I think to rectify that though, and a good thing for our perspective is the Stafford Act
does anticipate and recognize some unusual and unique characteristics of states and territories
that have large insular population.
this permanent housing construction authority that couldn't come to play if approved really
takes into consideration the extraordinary costs for our supply chain, for shipping,
for what it takes to repair and rebuild communities following a disaster in insular,
remote, and rural America, if you will. So although there are gaps to the regular program that are
out there because there're financial caps that there there, there ARE some programs that can come
I think one of the other big gaps that I see, and I've seen it in every disaster,
is there are many, many federal agencies that all have a piece to play in this.
Housing and urban development, the Bureau of Indian Affairs,
and the U.S. Department of Agriculture,
the Small Business Administration, there's many many entities that can provide varying amounts
of assistance following a disaster.
At this point, they all take individual connections and applications and all very, very confusing for a survivor who is experiencing
the worst incident in their life to navigate the federal bureaucracy, if you will, to take advantage of those,
the myriad of programs that are out there and potentially available for this disaster and for others.
and tremendous amount of work conducted by the National Oceanic Atmospheric Administration,
NOAA, the Department of Natural Resources, Division of Geological Geophysical Surveys,
the U.S. Geological Survey on conducting modeling and mapping of our coastline to really have that
inland run up of a potential sea storm would be how high that storm surge could get based on
the land, the data available via LIDAR and all of our mapping efforts on the coast as well as
utilizing what bathymetric data that we have, which is kind of the survey of
the the sea floor along along the coast, to try to model and estimate how high, how
big, and how far inland a storm could potentially impact the community. And that
data is the most important data when we're talking about building schools, building
new homes, build new infrastructure to have that understanding that you spoke
on how high to build, how far inland would need to be built to make sure that the homes
and infrastructure are survivable based on the best available data that we have and the
modeling that's out there now.
Hello.
Uh, follow up, Rob Polland.
Great.
Thank you for that.
Um, the second part that I wanted to just touch on and this, um, I think relates to
To what degree do the funds that you have available, whether they're state or federal,
specifically provide support for regional and local businesses to be supported,
to created for job training to occur, so that to the degree that this is a multi-year recovery
in these specific communities, but there will be other communities in the future,
Able to take advantage of the funding and the work that's to be done.
Again, kind of same question, what are the gaps and
the policy issues that would allow us to ensure that more of this money that comes
in for community recovery is going into support and build up the local economy in the process?
Great question.
Mr. Fisher.
So just a couple of pieces there. First of all, the state and federal disaster assistance through my agency, through FEMA does not is not available to private for profit businesses.
There is disaster systems available in the form of low interest long term loans by the US Small Business Administration for those private, for-profit businesses,
However, we do provide assistance to certain nonprofit organizations and communities that
provide essential government services.
So if it's a nonprofit or a cooperative that runs a utility, say they're eligible for repair
and restoration funding through our infrastructure program.
That said, always look and work very hard with our state agencies and with FEMA and the
U.S. Department of Labor, working with the Alaska Department and Labor and Workforce
Development.
and working with our local contractor construction community to make sure we are making available.
First of all, training things like hazardous waste operator has whopper training.
It could be flagger training for contractors that support the Department of Transportation.
But try to get some of that training and certification in place knowing there will be a need for that type of work in the community for the rebuilding effort.
Just last week or two weeks ago, we had a pretty large meeting with FEMA and all the housing.
uh authority folks and people who build houses in western Alaska to discuss just that um the
communities have been very loud and clear they want to be part of their own recovery
and a great way to do that and then to increase the the uh the funding coming in for the economy
a local community is to hire local or have our contractors that will be a part
directly for them. So that's a cash infusion of the community. But in my mind, more importantly,
it's to give the Community members a place in the recovery. They're going to rebuild their
community and while they're doing that, they will be, you know, higher, be hired locally.
FEMA does a pretty good job of looking at hiring locally themselves, whether it is in
the communities impacted or in region as well as where their big offices and their temporary
have the ability to do some local hires directly for that. But our key is really relying on
how homes are built, who builds them traditionally in the region and making sure that we connect
the communities, the tribal councils and the municipal governments,
the residents with those entities to make sure they're available for hire
to help facilitate an assist in recovery and rebuilding process.
All right, thank you, Mr. Fisher.
Yeah, I'm just looking at these photographs,
and it's overwhelming, like, even where to begin.
Do you begin with the boardwalks,
or the housing, or boardwoks to get to housing
and the plots of land, and I am sure
that it is very overwhelming
and just how to rebuild an entire community?
So, great question, Rep. Holland, as we
possibly might prepare for another incident like this.
Mr. Fisher, we have a question from Rep Underwood.
Thank you, Chair Diverum.
Thank You, Mr Fisher for being here,
and you may have covered this,
so I'm sorry if I am asking you already addressed it,
but I just saw yesterday a headline
about the Federal Administration
denying full disaster.
funding for Alaska Western Alaska storms and that Alaska had filed an appeal and it just
seemed like a big unknown and I'm not sure if you're familiar with where we're at in
the process or you know the nuances as to why sometimes it's obviously not going to
be in an article but if any of those details that would be great.
You know from my perspective that's actually I'm not sure why it's in the headlines right now
That's kind of old news, but I from perspective. It's been mischaracterized
We were not denied assistance the state of Alaska when the president declared
federal disaster for this
Is providing us the same amount of assistance that they provide to every state
when a disaster is declared.
So the catastrophic floods in Texas
and the hurricanes on the east coast
were getting the same amount of federal assistance
that everybody across the nation gets
when federal disaster has declared
what the governor had requested
in his initial request for assistance back in October
was a deviation from that,
was asked for an increased federal cost share.
I did mention the cost here we have
That is not wave-able and the law the president cannot wave that, but he can
provide a waiver for a period of time for certain categories of assistance that
is coming to the state. You know, the housing of systems that is authorized by
the President's Declaration is already outside of the personal property is 100%
federal funding.
There is no cost share there to the state at all.
Most of the, the cost-share is on our infrastructure side,
whether it's repairing boardwalks in schools
and power plants as well as offsetting the costs
of emergency response actions at the communities
and the regional entities and state-took.
So the governor requested a waiver to that
and an adjustment to cost of share.
That resides solely with the president of United States.
That's not something that FEMA does.
It's the President.
He denied the initial request.
Um, we didn't hear that until December, I think it was December 19th where we were officially notified of that request being denied.
Um this, this disaster was declared a little unusual. I'd think most of you can recall there was a truth social post that said we're here to help $25 million.
Um we don't.
We don't know. We know what that means. That's not the normal way that federal disasters are
declared. It usually is listed in the federal register and it describes the
federal and non-federal share for the disaster.
That just didn't happen this time, so there was some confusion up front.
But what I can say is the governor has requested
Which would mean 10% state local funding for the first 90 days for all of the emergency actions that were taken the rescue work the evacuation
It's sheltering work. The the Emergency repairs that we're completed prior to winter. So and I can just say status of that as it's pending
That was submitted a couple of weeks ago now
To the president and we are just waiting to hear back from the from president from The administration on the governor's request
Thank you. I appreciate that clarification
Yes, thank you
Mr. Fisher for breaking that down for us very helpful. We have a question from representative Mears
Thank you through the chair to mr. Fischer so
as
often happens I have some similar thoughts as
representative Holland
And I'm interested if you have anything off the top of your hat about
What is the scale difference between the flood levels here
than have been before or even more generally how much our
disasters escalating from where we were previously seeing
natural disasters?
I would defer to folks in the region,
but I can tell you I was on a panel yesterday
with residents of Kipnuk and quick-going book.
And both the tested and I think Representative Jimmy
has heard this from everybody.
This flood in particular was higher,
went further inland than anybody can remember
in that community.
So I certainly would rely on the testimony
of members of the community and elders
to say as far back as they can recall, this is higher.
and more extensive than they have ever seen.
So I'm not a scientist, so I can't talk to the patterns,
but you know, Typhoon Murbok,
there was some record flooding, if you will,
in some of the communities on the West Coast
and in Norton Sound, in this particular disaster,
clearly, what we call floods of record, the new high flood.
in Kipnuk and Gillingook, maybe a couple of other communities.
So I can't really speak to the trends.
I just know that these coastal floods as well as riverine
floods, it just depends on how big the storm is,
how much energy is in it, and the most significant factor
as a layperson, not as the scientist in my mind,
is the direction of the wind.
and how that wind carries all that energy into the communities.
I think I said in the previous briefing, we were expecting initially for this storm to
take this typhoon remnant to take the same track as Murbok. So we thought it was going to go up
and critically impact communities in Norton Sound, just like Murmok did.
And then fairly unexpectedly, it kind of hooked right.
It went pretty quickly to the east, which
caused the devastating impacts in the extreme southwest
portion of the Casket Quim Delta.
And so the amount of water that came in on
and the height of that really had a lot
to do with the wind associated with that entire storm
and pushing it up into the Bering Sea
and towards the Vering Strait.
So don't have a great answer for that, I apologize.
Thank you, Mr. Fisher, and I would just like to add on to that question.
When I was going to AFN this fall,
just about the same time that this was happening in Alaska,
I arrived into Anchorage and took a taxi to the AFM building.
And the taxi driver happened to be from Kipnik.
Kind of what was going on. I hadn't really heard because I was so busy with interior things and he was mentioning that you they're used
They're use to about four I think four feet of water went on big storms big fall storm
fall events and
This he said was just incredible. They've never seen anything like that and that was from that
Quick taxi drive conversation, but he I didn't realize there there were about 400 people
living in Kipnik and I learned a lot just from that quick drive and
Then I learn more at AFN, But if that helps
I have the next question from representative Prox
Yes
But these events, it's hard to get your arms around them,
but is Department of Military and Veterans Affairs
kind of the central planning agency for the state?
You were doing a response, but are you doing planning as well?
For the chair, Representative Prox, yes, we are.
In our quote unquote blue sky days,
you know, were always very busy
responding and recovering from disasters.
But the Division of Homeland Security
and Emergency Management has an entire planning section
that works, that's broken down into a couple of areas.
They do mitigation planning to help communities
identify hazards and threats and strategies
to mitigate against those.
They have an entirely resiliency section.
a rural resiliency section that works directly with communities and regional entities
to do things like building small community emergency response plans to work on developing
community-emergency response teams to look at, you know, planning for recovery if a disaster
does happen. So we are one of the main disaster planning elements and preparedness elements in the
Um, we partner with agencies like the Division of Forestry and Fire Protection, who does the Community Wildfire Protection Plans, um, to make sure that they're in line and they synchronize with our overall kind of all hazards, all natural disaster mitigation planning, and then we do a lot of the
the support for building community emergency response plans, so the schools and the clinics
and councils and municipalities are prepared to take care of their citizens
in the initial hours and days following a disaster,
so we do a lot of planning and preparedness work, sir.
Okay, thank you. Follow up.
And do they like this event in insurance jargon would be classified as a 500-year event?
It's a little bit hard to say whether that event's going to happen tomorrow or 500 years from now.
And therein the challenge lies is how do we focus the funds and the efforts spent on this
in planning?
Do you plan for 100-year events?
Do we have folks that are thinking kind of on that?
scale like a
well in insurance company
They try to if they're big enough they
Think about hundred five hundred year events
Smaller ones think about getting
Reinsurance and all that do we think do? We have folks that are thinking about it from that perspective
Through the chair represented Brock we do
The Department of Commerce Community Economic Development within the Division of Community
and Regional Affairs runs the state's flood and plane program.
So they coordinate the National Flood Insurance Program and work directly with FEMA
for the NFIP program as well as a program called RiskMap, which does some of these
study, these flood studies and elevation studies in 100, 500 year flood assessments, those types of
For this particular disaster, FEMA and their technological assessment branch is working with
the other federal and state agencies to look at this new, you know, how high the flood was from
what they call mean high, high water. And using that specific information, I believe FEMA just
published some recommendations in the federal register for this disaster on
what that flood height from
sea level average sea
level is in these communities to inform all of the work we do moving forward
FEMA
has some very
big programs that look at severe repetitive loss based on flooding
disasters with the goal of making communities and homes more resilient so
they don't have to come to the table for future flooding events so a lot of
that work is completed partially with and with my division partially
with community and regional affairs and and then with our our resource our land
and the federal land agencies to do all of that research and assessment.
We also work, you know, we work with the Division of Insurance
and in the Department of Commerce as well.
But DCRA is really the entity that does the flood mapping piece
and flood insurance coordination with FEMA.
Okay. Thank you.
Follow-up?
Thank You.
Quick follow-ups.
Representative Prox.
I'm just trying to get rough orders of magnitude.
I have you come up with, for instance, on this particular event.
Have you came up a rough order of magnitude of what it's going to take to recover to some
level of repair?
It's very, very early on in the disaster. I know we'll be working with the finance committees
in both bodies. To talk about that, the governor has some proposals in his budget for does that
state disaster relief fund funding. What I will say is it's one degree it is too early to know.
Like I said, this storm happened. The impacts occurred. We evacuated folks and then winter came.
So unfortunately, the kind of the nature of these fall disasters we have is it's going to take us
largely through the summer of 2026 to get a full understanding of all of
the impacts and costs that will be out there. As of this morning or as of yesterday morning,
FEMA is estimating what they call the cost life of disaster cost to be $125 million.
I would suspect, just based on my experience doing this for a long time, that dollar figure
is going to go up.
That estimate is based upon what we know today.
And there's a whole lot we don't know.
We're going have to get out there and see what the cleanup effort is gonna take, what
it's really gonna cost to repair infrastructure and mitigate it and make it more resilient
from future floods.
through the life of this disaster and our disaster stay open very long and and it's
due to our construction seasons and all of that. I think that number will probably go up.
We're somewhere around 170, I
think 160, 170 million dollars for Typhoon Merbok. This was similar but different to that disaster.
So that's kind of the scope of what we're looking at there and then as of today in general that
Not everything but roughly 75% of that will come from the federal government and 25% from us to support that rebuilding effort
Think thank you, mr. Farley hoggett this related questions
If you have a representative, yes, thank, you through the chair if do you
have
kind of a rough estimate of
Where we are as the state of Alaska
in evaluating the risks and et cetera.
Are we 75% towards the goal of figuring out
what the actual risk is?
Or are we 10% toward that goal?
Mr. Fisher?
Through the Chair, Representative Prox.
When it comes to statewide risk,
we have a very detailed state hazard mitigation plan.
which for the record is available at ready.alaska.gov, that's my agency's website, and that statewide
plan which is updated at a minimum every five years, we updated annually and kind of read,
read look at all the science every 5 years takes into account all of the threats and hazards in
So I think we understand the risks but disasters do what they do right like so this flood there
were some homes that were survived in wildfires you see evidence all the time of homes destroyed
and and next door neighbors where the homes were untouched so it's very very difficult
What the impacts of these hazards and threats may be?
So we work with all of the agencies to try to characterize that as well as we can in our hazard mitigation plan
But there's just too much variability and uncertainty in in disasters and weather and man-made events
to accurately forecast that
Okay, thank you. Thank you, Mr. Fisher, and I'm really glad that you brought in the comparison with Merbock
I was thinking about that, just the difference, and I'm sure that you were there for Merbock as well with all of your experience and learned a lot.
We have the next question from what's been presented, what has been present from Rep. Hymshoot.
Thank you, Chair Diber.
Through the Chair, Mr. Fisher, I have a couple of questions, so I might need a few follow-ups as we get going.
I think I want to start with the question about the truth social post.
I just want confirm with you that the other channels that you mentioned have been followed
as well.
There was the post you mention, but the standard process has also been follow.
I Just want make sure that what normally happens is happening because you've mentioned this
sort of anomalous announcement, which was very welcome.
have the certainty that what usually happens is happening in terms of assistance from FEMA.
Mr. Fisher. Through the chair, the co-chair of Hymshoe, thank for that. The answer is yes.
So there is a very rigid and formal process for states or tribes to request disaster assistance
The response if you will from the federal government on that so all of that has taken place
We submitted what's called a request for federal assistance in accordance with both federal regulation and the Stafford Act
Initially the response to that and to publish the announcements in the Federal Register
Which can be seen on FEMA's website at FEMA.gov Alaska the Alaska storms are one of those top
disasters still listed on their website. So those things have happened. They have occurred.
The formal communications kind of the standard way are in place now. We do have an additional
request that the governor submitted to add additional areas of state into the federal disaster.
Federal law requires an assessment of damages to occur before the president can consider
We got the initial disaster from them for the Northwest Arctic Burrow and communities,
all communities within the lower Cusk equipment, lower Yukon regional education attendance area.
There are a few small communities in that area that are not part of those areas.
Technically, so we've asked for those to be added on as well as a few
Education attendance areas to the east of the main impact area that we have requested to
Be added onto the federal disaster. So we did that formally as. Well, we're waiting to hear back from that request
As well. I would say all of that is being done kind of a traditional way
It's just the initial announcement and the official notification of declared federal disasters
Did not include that cost share information that was usually there, but and we didn't hear about that until December
But everything else is through the the normal way that we do things in accordance with the federal regulations for federal disaster assistance
Follow-up representing him shook. Thank you to her divert through. The chair
My next questions have to do with this schools, and it's both the reactive at one point
in the immediate aftermath
I think the Kipnik school was supposed to run on multiple generators and had only one
functioning generator.
So I want to confirm that the incoming funding can both repair and upgrade the impacted schools.
But also you've talked a lot about preparedness, so this might be a separate question.
Going forward, we know we need to harden and prepare every school on the western coast
of Alaska.
How does that get done?
Emergency preparedness fall to the local school district's budget, or are there funds that schools can use to make sure that all their generators are functional.
That, that they're prepared for storm extreme storm conditions. So I think that was two questions.
Mr. Fisher.
Through the, through the chair, uh, coach or him, shoot.
So to your first question, yes, the repairs that we will make either for uses of the schools.
or actual flood damage to the schools including their power systems and their water systems.
That's all that falls within the declared disaster so repairs and restoration of those services
you know clean up of the school because not only were they utilized for shelter purposes
I've been used fairly extensively by our contractor folks that are out in the community doing some of the initial emergency repairs, so we'll be able to replenish and refurbish the portions of
the school that we utilize for those purposes as well as any actual damage. When it comes to longer term kind of capital support of our schools, that funding is usually in terms of what as you characterize that that's a cost to the
It comes through the funding that they receive through Department of Education and Early
Development.
There are some programs that are out there and potentially available for this disaster
from the U.S. Housing and Urban Development, they typically have a program called the
If that program is funded, there is additional funding available that could be used throughout
the region to do some mitigation, some hardening, looking at backup power supplies and those kind
of things. Those are all subject to congressional appropriations. So I hate to give the lawyer
Some, the disaster recovery funding is targeted at the communities impacted.
Some of that longer term gap analysis and needs assessment and recovery that could happen
region wide, if you will, and sometimes statewide will come in the out years and there may or
may not be funding available through the federal government to the school districts
to look at some of those gaps that are out there before the next storms hit any communities.
Final follow-up representative him shoot should never say final, but I think it's
Through the chair mr. Fisher. I'm also curious about
Environmental mitigation and cleanup
All of that insulation has to go somewhere. So what's happening so to speak on the on
the back end and and my sincere hope is
that no plane is coming out of these communities
without carrying something out that needs to be removed.
And this is an issue across the state with backhaul.
But in this situation, the tremendous amount,
you know, I can imagine there's even contaminated soil.
So I don't know how much you can speak to what needs
to happen in terms of environmental cleanup
and is that supported through the FEMA funding or.
EPA or is there some place we should be looking in and is that already underway?
Excellate chair. Yeah, mr. Fisher representative him chute
The answer is yes, that is covered under the disaster itself
We really we rely on the folks at the Department of Environmental Conservation
The us EPA and the Coast Guard in this case
to be our technical advisors and experts with their contractors on
contaminants, contaminated soil, household hazardous waste, all the petroleum that may
have been spilled from fuel tanks. So the immediate planning that is occurring right now
and the D.C. and and, the other agencies are preparing for this is to re-mobilize
their contractors to the communities once breakup comes because we know
a lot of the contaminants were just frozen in place when winter came. So there's a huge cleanup
effort that's going to have to happen. We have had specific requests from the communities to make
sure we are looking at all of their subsistence areas and if necessary based on, you know,
brief thought contaminants, if you will, to get boom out in certain places to protect the
subsistence area to the extent we can. There was a, I think I mentioned lots of saltwater
and the drinking water sources as well.
So in the immediate, we are planning to have our agencies
and their contractors out there to continue that cleanup.
On the same vein,
we're communicating exactly what you said,
probably not via aircraft,
but we were working through FEMA
with their logistical contractors
to make sure if we scheduling additional separate barges.
to come into the communities with rebuilding material
that they are planning to do backhaul.
We understand very well that there is not capacity
in our local landfills to take disaster debris
and deal with that.
We're looking at things like incinerators
through some other federal agency programs.
that could burn some debris that is burnable, that won't contaminate the air.
And then that whole concept of making sure the barges that drop off rebuilding materials
be utilized to backhaul contaminated materials, household hazardous waste,
all of the waste streams, if you will, to make sure that that's pulled out of
the community because we know that it can't stay in the landfill. They're just not,
they just don't have that capacity. So we are working on that planning right now.
And one final comment representative imphew I know final I'm sorry. I shouldn't say final
I am grateful for the recognition that when these people come home
It needs to be as much the home they left as possible and so the
Recognition that it needs, to, be cleaned up and people need to live life the way that they've always lived life
I really appreciate your attention to that and the fact that
getting anything out of a community is as hard as getting things into the community. So
I think this speaks to your experience on the ground in Alaska for so many years
that, and maybe this is just standard practice, but I know in my communities in rural Alaska,
it is really hard to get things out the communities once they're there. Thank you for that reassurance
as clean an environment to come home to as they left.
So thank you.
Thank you, thank
you Representative Hymshoot.
I'm really glad that you brought up the schools,
you know, through this typhoon,
Alaskans learned just how important our schools are
in our smaller communities.
Much more schools
are much more
Then a place for youth to go in and learn they're a community center and now an emergency center where people
Can go for safety and that was very much
Brought to the light during after this disaster
Mr. Fisher we have a question from
Representative story
Thank you, Chair Dibert, and thank you Mr. Fisher for all your information and work.
My question, you might have a slide on this later, but as I'm sitting here and looking
at all these infrastructure needs that are being met and the assessment and various things
being carried out, I can't help but wonder about the things we can see.
everyone who has been affected. Are there interventions, supports in place that do disasters
Thank you through that chair representative story great question
I will say early on when we were evacuating folks from the communities
They were in congregate sheltering and both Bethel and then further on to the big shelters that we had opened in Anchorage
That I referenced the Alaska native tribal health consortium
and local tribal health organizations and entities in the agritarian and Bethel
mobilized immediately. I mean, didn't even have to ask. They were just there immediately with
mental health professionals of every sort to make sure that they were dealing with that.
The immediate needs of our survivors that were displaced and evacuated and the immediate trauma
The governor did request two specific programs that are available under the disaster.
That's one program with kind of two time frames. It's called the Crisis Counseling Program.
And the crisis counseling program is a federal disaster program administered by
the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, SAMHSA.
I apologize. I know they don't know the acronym for SAMHSA, but once approved within that program,
there are two sub-programs. One's called the immediate services program for funding to come
through that as a grant to the state of Alaska, which will end up with the Division of Behavioral
Health to pass through grant funding, to our regular regional and local mental health service
So the immediate services is a shorter time frame and then in that crisis counseling program,
there's a regular services program that will provide additional funding from U.S. Health and
Human Services through us and the Department of Health Division of Behavioral Health out to our
mental health providers across the state to continue to add and increase additional capacity to provide
for folks that have experienced this horrible trauma.
Thank you.
Follow-up rep story?
Yes, thank you for that.
I'm glad to hear about that my other thought
has to do with on going back to our schools.
And do you know if there is any through the Department
of Education, any recognition that that is a hub for where
children return to and do they get extra counselors, supports?
in their school communities.
Yeah, through the chair representative story.
Yes, that will be coordinated directly
with the schools and the school districts themselves
and our mental health care providers
with all the entities both regionally and statewide
is to make sure that that type of support
would be available to children when schools
are back up and running and kids are
back in learning in the communities in there schools.
I think you, Mr. Fisher, we have another question from Representative Hall.
Thank you Madam Chair.
Director Fisher, I want to express my deep gratitude and appreciation for all of the work
that you and members of your team and all others who are involved in the disaster of
response for your work and your dedication to our state and to Alaskans, especially our
friends and neighbors in Southwest Alaska.
career opportunities that I've had, and I know the stress,
and um, I'm familiar with the
stress and the pressure that is involved
with that kind of a response. I also consider myself a lifelong learner
when it comes to ways in which we can always improve,
and i'm curious because this disaster was of such an order of magnitude that we
have not seen in this state.
Is there anything that you wish that had done differently, or is there
anything you think we can improve upon for the next time that this happens?
Because it seems as though we're all recognizing that
this will happen again.
Thank you.
Thank You Rep. Hall.
Mr. Fisher.
Through the Chair, Representative Hall, first but let me say thank you, I appreciate that.
I may have been here a long time.
Only the agency had.
But my 64 positions and roughly 55 employees right now are really, they are the greatest
Alaskans that there can be.
They are dedicated to taking care of their friends and neighbors.
And they all work very, very hard day in and day out many times, seven days a week to
make sure we're supporting our communities and our residents are impacted by these things.
So I definitely appreciate that.
Thank you.
One of the greatest positive things that had occurred prior to disaster was the development
in our division of this rural resiliency unit.
We conduct a series of events called Rural Resiliancy Workshops.
And prior too, along in the other couple of storms that impacted the west coast, we had
doing a great partnership with the Association of Village Council presidents to bring in community
leaders from all of the tribes in the AVCP region into Bethel for an intensive week-long workshop
to talk about all this pre-planning about how you write a local emergency plan, how
you coordinate with your schools, the things that you need to look at when a disaster strikes in
The process of requesting assistance, all of those kind of preparedness activities we were because the ABCP region is so large, we had broken up the region into three sub regions, if you will, to do these workshops.
We bring in all partners from the Coast Guard and from Division of Forestry and Fire Protection and DEC and and all sorts of agencies you asked today troopers to come in and provide that that training ahead of storms.
And we accomplished two of those sub-regions in the last two years.
The third workshop was scheduled, was going to be scheduled this month at AVCP's request.
We have delayed that because of the disaster.
So I would say, I think what I've, we've learned is.
That workshop and that partnership with regional entities bringing in our local communities to build that capacity and
understanding of emergency operation centers and disaster response and recovery. I
We need to do more of that.
I think that's my biggest lesson. It's a huge success. We were able to communicate with officials from communities in the entire YK
Delta region
And they kind of they they understand the language we speak when it comes to emergencies and disaster response
Now that wasn't always the case. They know how to communicate their needs
Clearly and concisely to us so we can target that response effort and the recovery effort
And I just I feel like more of that needs to happen and it's a really a statewide
But issue you know I have a couple of individuals in that section that work this program and then need is statewide
for all of our capacity and capability building, if you will, with our local units of government,
whether they be tribal or municipal. And I really think that it was proven a success
in how we were able to respond to this event and in other regions of the state. We've done this
since about 2015. I just think we need to continue doing more and more of that to build that capacity
Probably number one follow-up representative Hall. Thank you madam chair
Given what you know at this point director Fisher. Are there any barriers to you being able to?
Accomplish what? You just shared
Through the chair representative hall no no specific barriers
We have that entity in place we continue to get greater and greater
cooperation and work with our regional entities, many of them, the tribal non-profits or the
tribal health non profits that support us with that. We continue to just grow the program and
kind of multiply its effect using village public safety officers through the various
entities that are out there. Our partners at the Alaska Native Tribal Health Consortium are a huge
Um, so I don't think there are any barriers. It's just time. There are many communities in the state. You know, we can't go to every community every single year. That's
just been practical. But I think we're in a good position to continue that preparedness work. Um moving forward.
Thank you. Thank
you, Mr. Fisher for that explanation. And I just think about, um,
where you mentioned on Thursday of bringing out elders on flights during them when an
emergency is about to happen and watching the, you know, going out on the flight and
watching water and then the elders are able to go back to the community and speak in their
native language, what's coming and just more programs like that.
story and effort out there. And that one that we could use statewide when these disasters are
about to happen. We have a couple more questions. I'm in the queue.
I'd like to go to the subsistence where there was this slide that had the
Can you tell us more about this photo of getting subsistence food to the folks who came into
Anchorage, I'm assuming, or what organizations did you work with to make sure that people
got food that would nurture them?
Thank you so much.
I think this I believe this picture was seal we and as I had mentioned the
Department of Fish and Game had authorized some extended time periods for a
collection of subsistence products to be brought in to where our survivors were
to play so I thought this was some residents of the communities in Anchorage
preparing seal for one of our community meetings that was occurring.
Really, a huge, huge partner. You might not think this, but the Alaska Native Heritage Center in Anchorage really stepped up to the plate and worked with folks from AVCP and from Chilist Corporation and others to support this effort to make sure that
public meetings, the folks that set up the Western Alaska Disaster Relief Fund with the Alaska
Community Foundation. It was really kind of an all hands on deck, working with folks,
the dietitians from the Alaskan Native Medical Center at ANTHC, making sure that we were providing
appropriate food sources for these big public venues that we're having.
The Native Heritage Center expanded and worked with other partners that build some pretty good refrigerated or freezer capacity to continue to collect donations either from new hunts or from available subsistence products to get them shipped into Anchorage and have those stored and available.
to either be prepared or be delivered to survivors in either of their hotels and
now our big effort is moving folks to apartments. So that effort
is continuing to go on. I will just say above that we
understand when these floods happen and there's a loss of power in
communities that many residents lose all of
their subsistence material, right, that it spoils because there is no
power. That's huge, a huge challenge so
additional collection of subsistence materials, whether it's eggs or berries or fish or
or walrus or or seal, whatever it is, that that will be available for folks when they get back
into their homes. We cannot, the state disaster programs and FEMA's programs can't replace
But we have worked with FEMA and convinced them this is unique to Alaska where they do provide
out of their benefit, their financial benefit to homeowners funding to essentially money to
replace the loss of subsistence food. It was originally authorized that $1,000 per household.
I requested them to up that to at least $2, 000. There is a cap there.
That is a unique consideration and approval we got from FEMA that recognizes the criticality
of subsistence food for our communities when they're impacted by disasters such as this.
So that's, that financial assistance is there as well. It obviously doesn't replace everything
that was lost, but it's a, it is assistance that residents of this country and other states don't
get. So I'm glad that that is out there and that FEMA supports that for us, recognizes that need.
That's wonderful. Thank you, mr. Fisher for
Describing how that all went down and I remember in the interior we if we were maybe got a second moose
we we're able to donate it to
the survivors of this and
I know like there's nothing more healing after
any kind of traumatic experience that there's nothing better than a hot bowl of mousse soup.
So I know how important that is after something like this for those folks.
We have Representative Carrick with the question.
Thank you, Director Fisher.
our deepest gratitude to you and to the team that works behind you that we're not hearing from today,
but certainly have so much appreciation for. I wanted to kind of follow up on Representative
Hall's question because I think that was a really good line of inquiry and I just want to
I know there's probably many, many things we could do both short term and long term related to how long recovery and to disaster preparedness in general, but I wanted to ask you a twofold question.
In your mind, what is maybe one important way the legislature can help in the short-term related along recovery?
What is one long-term thing the legislature should be doing to support disaster preparedness
for any disaster that might take place in Alaska? In other words, what do you need right now?
What do most need, right, now, from the Legislature? Mr. Fisher?
Through that, Chair, and Representative Carrick, thank you for that.
I think in the short term, you know, I certainly
My ask would be to support the governor's proposed budget for the disaster relief fund.
That is the mechanism that gets this assistance to repair and rebuild to this community.
Those funding requests are usually all encompassing of kind of all the open disasters that we've
had.
We've had a couple of other state declared disasters since this storm.
There was a wind storm in the Massey Valley.
and the utility failure in the Posky Act that we're continuing to work on. So in
the immediate, the support that
we've always received from the legislature on that state disaster funding side
is incredibly important. I know you all know this because of the lack of robust
revenue and tax bases in our local communities. It really, and us being such a
That funding from the legislature on the kind of on
the state level is critical to the survivability
and the recovery, the ability to recover
for our rural communities that don't necessarily have
that robust revenue base there.
So that is probably the number one thing in the short term
is that funding there, I will just say as of today
the majority approved $37 million for the State
The majority of that, roughly $33 million directly to homeowners, directly
to households and individuals. That is an unbelievable amount of funding that's
primarily, like I said, on the individual family side.
There will be a huge amount of funding as we start looking at the rebuilding projects of
infrastructure and what that cost is going to be. And there is a share, a cost share to the state
associated with that. So that support is gonna be critical to affect this recovery.
I think as a legislature, whether it's policy or anything else, that just the acknowledgement that
whether they're weather-induced, whether
they are technological or man-made.
We certainly do have nation-state threats
that this state is dealing with as well.
So the support of the Department of Military and Veterans
Affairs, and I'll call them the traditional response
agencies, the department of natural resources,
environmental conservation, Department
of Public Safety, corrections,
Department Of Education for our schools,
that kind of holistic support.
to improve the health of a community really lends to the the term resilience right the
the ability for a Community to bounce back quicker following one of these catastrophic
events. It's really a whole of community issue so it kind of affects all of the agencies of
the state and our federal partners that live and work up here to keep that.
that continuing. Our agency is, you know, unfortunately well practiced in the response and recovery
piece. We do and will always continue to focus on the preparedness piece to build that resilience
in our communities. And I, I think the reality of the federal situation with the administration
and with Congress is that they are looking to states to take more of The burden directly.
The federal emergency management agency is still under an executive order looking at what FEMA
and what federal disaster assistance and emergency
management should look like in the future. There is potential that the buck is going to be passed
on to state and local and tribal governments more than it has been traditionally. So I think the
The fact that we may have to deal with more of these disasters on our own.
And that's going to be a tough reality for all states and all localities across the country.
But that kind of a chatter that that.
We're hearing coming out of the beltway.
So, as we move forward and identify real changes to federal emergency management support, we're
going to need the legislature's support to adjust to whatever that new reality is going
to look like.
It's all uncertain as today, but it certainly seems like the conversation is
going.
The more responsibility shifted to us.
I know that's a lot to thank you Mr. Fisher follow-up representative Carrick just just a thank
you to director Fisher I Know we've all said it today but and and thank
you also to the agencies that provided support during along and for any of our
other disasters I hope that in our transportation committee we can cover
specifically how DOT assisted I knew that the schools are instrumental and as
sometimes the last to leave the community because they're providing a lot of support for the
community. So, you know, thank you for recognizing those other agencies that helped and thank
you again.
Thank you, Rep. Kerrick. And I'm just going to do a time check before that. I would like
to, for record, recognize Representative Ruffridge joined us at 926. Good morning.
And doing a time check, we have about 20 minutes left.
We have a couple of questions from representatives.
And closer to in a few minutes, I would like to give the floor
to Representative Jimmy for comments and final questions.
So let's go ahead and go to representative Holland.
Thank you. Thank You and through the chair back to director Fisher. One of the things that I thought was really
startling if not valuable in terms of community learning in this hollong event was
How that event came to Anchorage and South Central?
This wasn't something that happened somewhere out in Faraway, Alaska.
The transportation of people, the congregate housing,
the effort through the Anchorage School District to place students really brought this disaster,
I think, in a new way to more people in Alaska and to South Central to realize
that this actually impacts all of us in new ways.
As a result, it raises a question about what is happening in terms of the planning and the capacity to deal with the cross-jurisdictional or cross geographic impact of these disasters where we now maybe need to be more prepared for support from either regional hubs or even in the case of this situation where Anchorage
do we have the planning to work across those kind of jurisdictions for
Anchorage to be ready for a storm in western Alaska?
I think that's a new paradigm of planning and capacity building
and as a follow-up to that do
we
have
the funding to help anchorage
cover some of the costs that they may have born in responding and supporting families.
And do we have the funding that will help the families that have been in Anchorage all winter?
And I think also the Matsuyu Valley.
to help them get back to their communities.
I think this is a different paradigm that we're in.
And I'm wondering what your view of that is
and how that changes some of our planning capacity
and the programs that will support making everyone whole,
given this new way this disaster impacted Alaska
and different jurisdictions.
Mr. Fisher.
Through the chair, Representative Holland, again,
really great questions.
So, this is a relatively new paradigm for long-term housing of displaced survivors in
Anchorage, if you will, but we have a pretty substantial amount of history and experience
doing this in Fairbanks and the Fairbank's North Star Borough.
There have been, I remember when I first started here, there was a catastrophic event on the
that that impact that hues a lot in an allicacket and we had to relocate this place folks from
those communities into Fairbanks, legalized the Carlson Center up there back in 94-95 to
house folks for the long term out of their communities and the interior into where you get
those particular communities that were impacted by a river flood back up and running and get people
home.
So we have done that in the past. We definitely rely and work with our regional
and statewide tribal organizations to support these efforts. I definitely
think it's critical to recognize the support that the Association of Village
Council Presidents and Yukon Cusquim Health Corporation has provided for this
disaster as well as what we refer to as host communities. So Anchorage has not
seen anything to this level in a very long time.
However, they immediately stepped up to the plate and all the things you mentioned to provide local transportation service to coordinate with the social services agencies of the municipality and in the area.
provide recreation opportunities, the Anchorage School District, above and beyond incorporating
students from the displaced communities into classrooms in Anchorage and bringing their
teachers in to help maintain that continuity for learning. All of that incredibly important,
all of those costs that were incurred for opening up the Eagan Center and the Airline Center
in Fairbanks or other areas, and you're right, it does include the Mountain News
go-so-sit in a borough. All of those are eligible emergency costs to be reimbursed to those
communities for their service, for the support of taking care of displaced survivors. So,
we have processes in place. On the FEMA side, they call it host state policies because they're
used to evacuating the coastal states inland in southeast for hurricanes. We do the same thing
with FEMA on the kind of city, you know, community to community side in Alaska.
So those costs incurred just take care of these new residents, their neighbors that are now here
for the long term are all eligible costs that will be able to reimburse through the FEMA disaster
programs that were there. Thank you.
Thank
you so much, Mr. Fisher. And as a resident of Fairbanks, I do remember
that crisis in Fairbanks where everyone was staying at the Carlson Center.
It opened up in the beds and just, you know,
it takes everyone to come together to help communities.
Thank you for that question and representative story.
Thank You, Chair Dibert, through the chair, a couple of things.
And you said it at last hearing, too.
You said I have 66.
positions and 55 people and I'm wondering why the vacancies and wondering if the
hiring freeze is affecting your department and then another question I'll just ask
it right away. You had made a comment that right now you're still moving folks to
apartments are they still in congregate living? I thought I mean that's a long
time anyway so those two questions please.
But to the last question, we shut down the congregate sheltering within two weeks getting folks into Anchorage and moved folks in two hotels.
So we still at its peak,
we had 178 households, 682 individuals in hotels in six hotels at Anchorage.
And we are working now to move folks out of the hotel living into apartments.
The Alaska Housing Finance Corporation worked with the market that the apartment market, if you will, to identify
apartments that were available to get folks transitioned into.
We are down to below 90 households.
We're at 82 households and 400 individuals that still need to move out of the hotels into apartments.
intensive process to get folks their deposits and get background checks for the landlords and
furnish those apartments so they have utensils and furniture and also we're continuing to do that
and we expect folks to stay in those appointments until we can clean up the communities and rebuild
their homes and give them back home. The rental assistance for those departments if you will is
coming directly from FEMA so that is not a cost to the state that's federal funding that
So that is is continuing. We're trying to move folks there. I have 64 full-time
positions authorized and I think we're somewhere around 55 or 56 that have
that are filled due to a myriad of reasons just people retiring moving to
other jobs. Unfortunately we had in the middle of this disaster
a couple of deaths of staff members, which was pretty challenging to deal with.
So the hiring waiver process is not affecting us at all. We're the administration.
recognizes the criticality of our position.
So that has not been an issue at all.
The time for my staff to get the recruitment out
and conduct interviews and do the hiring and all
was a little bit delayed,
because we were 100% focused on survivors
from this disaster for the first couple of months.
We're moving through the various processes
of recruitment and hiring now,
and I don't really see an issues with that.
I would say, kind of, we see.
typical turnover that state agencies have, we did have a delay in trying to fill some of those
vacancies just because we were focused on the response to this disaster, but we're moving forward
now just fine, I think. Thank you. Wonderful. Uh, thank you, Rep Story, and thank
you Mr. Fisher for those words. Um, it's such a large undertaking that you're still working to
taking care of them, even though it's February.
So thank you for that question, Representative Story.
So time check, we have about 13 or so minutes.
If you have further questions,
follow up questions can go to my office
at rep.maxine.diber.akledge.gov
I know we won't be able to get to all questions or comments,
but I would like now to give the floor
to Representative Jimmy, who was there on the ground.
These are her communities.
I'm sure very involved and still involved,
I am sure, with this typhoon along.
So Representative Jim, if you'd like to say a few words
Any comments for this?
Goyanna Madam Chair and it's good to see again Director Fisher I hope all is well with you and
thank you for all your work in helping District 38 and also other rural communities that have
been impacted. There's too many village communities named to name but I'd like to share about
So I was supposed to fly in for the early into anchorage and I didn't know about the storm.
I wasn't tracking it until my daughter said, you know, they're declaring this a really bad storm
and as like, well, I'll just stay. And my dad kept egging me on to leave Tooksook and you
know she wouldn't stop and planes were flying even as the winds were picking up and
I just kept saying no. Not long after the evening came.
So it was my daughter my niece up there at my place and not long after the wind started picking up and all you could do is
Just sit and hunker down and watch water rise up
can't do anything. I know men were struggling and running down to the beach
to try it even as if we did prepare. They still had to run down
to that beach to pull up their boats even further up because the water was
rising pretty quickly and men we're also being affected by almost being hit
For the first time, we didn't sleep the whole night,
and this was the 1st time I've ever felt so helpless,
where I knew I couldn't protect my own daughter
and my family.
Excuse me.
So we waited out this storm.
That's all we could do.
And just by chance, my daughter, she
came upon TikTok where people were posting life from Kip.
about their water coming in quickly and their homes were floating away and people
trapped in their houses and even though they called for help they couldn't get
help. So it was a pretty hard time. It's another thing to go to the community and
Relatives homes are destroyed.
Where they had to leave everything behind and just bring a backpack, how do you leave?
How do leave looks that were passed down to you from your grandmother or your and sisters?
How did you lead family pictures? How'd you?
How to just leave every thing and carry what you can't?
But my people had to do that and just coming into Anchorage, I wanted to go to the shelters
humanity taken away from them as they described being in a floating house looking
out the window and seeing their own loved ones in their coffins passed by
their house. Were homes where they were floating away to be hitting each other
Where they didn't know if their children were safe in another house because they separated because nobody expected the storm to be this bad
Where this parent had let her children see better mom's house and they're just right next door only for their house to
be
For them to drift it away
There's so much that happened
returning to being able to have eyes on the ground at Kipnik and Quigalup.
Just the smell was different. It didn't smell like our area. There's...
It was gone.
One of our tribal administrations from Night New Chris George said...
They went to bed in the storm and they're pretty inland and you can only access it by river.
He said they went home, they survived the
storm which usually there's tundra in
the front and then they woke up to the ocean in front of them.
That's how high the water came in.
I know it's going to be a long recovery and I
know the trauma that we have suffered out there.
But how do you leave a village where your ancestors came from?
Where you were grandmothers, grandfathers passed
down the knowledge of where to hunt?
When to hunt how to process the subsistence catch there's just so much loss
I just hope we get as much assistance as we can to rebuild and
Thank you all for bringing up such great questions and showing your support
I don't know, I just want to close out by thinking Commissioner of DMVA, Major General
Torrance Hacks, Director Brian Fisher, Mayor Le France in Anchorage, and the municipality
who just opened their arms to my people.
in all the communities that took in our own and all
the entities that step forward.
Guyanajakar bhaksti, Genkamchi.
Anabasi for your words, and it's very helpful for us
in this committee, both committees to hear your thoughts
try to problem-solve through this disaster where entire communities are basically uplifted
and missing, destroyed, and I appreciate our committee members here for asking great questions
And Mr. Fisher, just thank you for all of your work in gosh trying to sew like all these
entities together to help these communities on a bassy.
to the chair, to members of both committees,
Representative Jimmy, Koyana, thank you.
We're all fellow Alaskans, you are our neighbors
and the agencies, all of the agency's are gonna be in this
as long as it takes to make sure we can get you home
back to where you want to be and back on kind of
the new normal moving forward.
I can't thank all of you enough for your questions and your support, make myself available throughout the session for any follow up that needs to happen.
I just want to say, particularly Representative Jimmy, but to all you, thank you very much for acknowledging the responders from all the agencies and for highlighting what is a truly catastrophic event that we're all going to have to deal with for years to come.
So thank, you. Very much to the chair and the co chairs and members of the committees.
on a bossy now I'll refer to my script it'll help me get through director Fisher
thank you so much for coming back before the committee today it your words were
so helpful I can't thank
you enough on the bossie I appreciate the overview the state emergency
operations Center and the great discussions during this joint hearing
be able to continue our problem-solving of disasters like this here in the legislature, and look forward to those further discussions.
And with that, I believe we are, it is,
look at that 957 and the House Tribal Affairs is now adjourned, thank you.