Jeremy Hsieh

Hundreds of young kids in Juneau are getting vaccinated for COVID-19 this week at clinics put on by local health officials.

A lot of kids barely notice the jab. For others, it’s really scary, but they have advice for anyone else who’s nervous about getting a shot.

 

At Dzantik’i Heeni Middle School, nurse Aisha Hill tells third grader Nehir Caf to take a big, deep breath. She gives her a quick poke with a needle to give her the vaccine.

“And let it out. All done,” Hill said.

It hardly registers on Nehir’s face. Mom and dad tell her good job.

“That hurted like my sister pinching me, a little,” Nehir said. “I could get thousands of those in one day!”

She said she’s happy she got it.

“Because if everybody gets it, and then we might not have to wear masks in school,” she said.

She said COVID is like the villain from Harry Potter.

“I don’t know why, but COVID reminds me of Voldemort,” Nehir said.

Her little sister Feray goes next. No problem.

Giuli Russell had a tougher appointment. She was really quiet, right up until the needle was ready. Then she started whimpering.

“I don’t wanna get it!” she said between alarmed breaths.

Giuli holds onto her mom’s hand, who’s pouring praise on her. A volunteer nurse keeps Giuli’s exposed arm still. Giuli bawls through the shot.

“You did amazing!” her mom said. “Come here, monkey butt. Oh, you did awesome.”

Mom gives her a big hug. Her next shot for the flu goes about the same.

A few minutes later, Giuli’s eyes are dry, and she said she feels good.

She and her mom hang out in the gym of Mendenhall River Community School, just in case there’s a bad reaction. For the other kids that need to get shots, Giuli said, “Be brave.”

Giuli’s mom, Carolina Russell, promises her some treats, too.

“Uh, I did say McDonald’s and froyo after,” she said. “And then we found out she gets to go to Coppa this weekend, so she’s got a pretty good deal out of this one. But I said, ‘If you’re gonna do that, you’ve got to get a flu shot, too.’ So pretty good negotiation, right?”

Giuli’s not so sure.

Coppa is offering a free scoop of ice cream to young kids with their vaccine cards.

Carolina is eager to get her daughter vaccinated. Her parents live in Sweden, and she said the family had to cancel two trips to see them because of the pandemic.

“I’m trying to get to some sort of normalcy, as much as possible,” Carolina said. “So, I mean, that is one of many things, of course, but I feel like it’s important to be part of the solution in whatever way we can.”

Trey Powers is in sixth grade. He’s a few minutes away from getting his shot, and he’s nervous and upset.

“I didn’t have a choice! They forced me to get a shot,” he said. “They wouldn’t let me not get it.”

His parents walk him through some downsides of not getting the shot.

“What reasons do you not want to get a shot?” his dad asks.

He’s oozing with petulance. “Uh, I’ve done well without getting COVID for two years!”

Then mom: “And why is that?”

“Because I’ve been wearing a mask,” Trey said.

“And, staying at home all the time,” dad adds.

“That and –”

“– Not doing a lot of stuff because you’re not vaccinated?” dad continues.

Trey’s a little deflated. “Technically it’s only been a year,” he grumbles.

Once he’s in the hot seat, he asks to see the needle.

Nurse Aisha Hill shows him. “See how small that is? … So that’s what we’re going to put in, it’s .2 milliliters, so it’s that much fluid in there. OK?”

“OK. I’m like, gonna get a spot ready to pinch, so I can not deal with that,” he said, eyeing the needle.

And that’s his suggestion for other kids: Distract yourself with a pinch somewhere else.

A moment later, it’s over. Trey’s protests shift to how soon he can get free ice cream.

Through Tuesday’s clinics, about 450 young children in Juneau got their first dose of the Pfizer vaccine. So far, none have had a bad reaction. At least, not in the medical sense.

These clinics are a big step for the school system.

“We have seen the highest percentage of our cases in schools being our elementary, unvaccinated population,” Superintendent Bridget Weiss told the Juneau Board of Education on Tuesday.

Among all school system employees, Weiss said at least 93% are vaccinated.

Appointments are still available for upcoming free, youth vaccine clinics in Juneau. You can sign up at Juneau.org/vaccine or by calling 907-586-6000.

Juneau’s local governments are steering extra money to some child care providers.

These providers are having an especially hard time finding and keeping workers in the pandemic labor market. Being short-staffed means they can’t enroll as many kids as they have space for, and that often means running at a loss. Even with higher wages and bonuses that government grants helped make possible, the outlook is not good.

For example, Little Eagles and Ravens Nest Child Care Center opened in February of 2020 and has continuously advertised for several openings.

Pay starts at a little over $17 an hour, which is on the high end for this kind of work in Juneau. And unlike typical, privately owned child care businesses, these entry-level jobs come with tribal government benefits.

“We now offer professional development courses and classes that we pay for. As well as, you know, university credits that we would pay for. We have health insurance, life insurance, retirement,” said Executive Director Jamie Shanley. “We’re employees of Central Council of Tlingit and Haida, so our benefits are wonderful. We have holiday pay, paid leave, family leave — and we still can’t find people. So it’s very grim.”

Since October, she’s even been able to advertise a temporary, $4 per hour bonus. It’s federal stimulus money going through the Central Council of Tlingit and Haida Indian Tribes of Alaska. She said she could use five more employees, but hasn’t gotten a single application for months.

“There’s nothing,” Shanley said.

Other child care providers in Juneau don’t enjoy the tribe’s support and can’t be as competitive. Discovery Preschool, for example, is offering a $500 hiring bonus, but for a job that starts at $13 an hour.

Discovery Preschool and others do get financial assistance through a program the Juneau Assembly started last year, run by the Southeast Alaska Association for the Education of Young Children.

Blue Shibler is the nonprofit’s executive director. She said before the city started paying stipends to qualified child care providers, the average starting wage for entry-level child care workers in town was about $11 an hour. Now it’s about $13.

“Which is still not great. I mean, it’s not even competitive with McDonald’s right now,” Shibler said.

Juneau’s local McDonald’s doesn’t advertise pay for its entry-level workers, but according to third-party labor websites like ZipRecruiter and GlassDoor, it’s around $12 or $13.

Local child care jobs usually don’t come with any benefits.

“Not even paid sick days,” Shibler said. “You look at no paid sick days in the middle of a global pandemic? It’s not a real attractive field to enter.”

A normal business would probably raise the price of its services to cover its costs. But with child care, it’s easy to price-out your customers. If child care costs more than a parent can earn working, then why work?

“Child care as a business model is in market failure. It does not function in a business market,” Shibler said.

This is why the city stepped in and started giving child care businesses grants last year. The city initially paid for it with CARES Act money, then kept it going this year with local money. But the labor problem is tripping up that program, too, because it’s based on the number of children a provider serves.

Shibler said every provider participating in the city’s grant program is under-enrolled, even though most have waitlists.

“So they have families wanting to fill their empty spots. But they’re not able to take any additional children because they can’t find staff,” she said.

It’s a circular problem.

“I mean, most child care centers, they have overhead that doesn’t change much if they have fewer children,” Shibler said. “Their rent is still due. Their bills are still due.”

Right now, the city’s got hundreds of thousands of dollars left over in unspent child care subsidies. On Monday, the Juneau Assembly had a brief discussion about what to do with the leftover money. Assembly member Michelle Hale asked to send it along to participating child care centers as if they were operating at capacity.

“Everything we can do to help the child care providers right now is just critical,” Hale said.

There were no objections.

A lot more federal relief for child care is on its way, though state administrators have been slow to release it.

Juneau public health officials have tentatively scheduled free, youth vaccine clinics in Juneau schools beginning Nov. 8. Registration is expected to open at noon on Thursday, pending federal approval of Pfizer’s COVID-19 vaccine for kids age 5 to 11. Appointments can be made then at juneau.org/vaccine or by calling 907-586-6000.

Clinics are planned for next week at the Marie Drake Building, Floyd Dryden Middle School, Dzantik’i Heeni Middle School, Mendenhall River Community School and Riverbend Elementary School.

Local children can get vaccinated at any site and don’t need to be enrolled in the school system. Kids must be accompanied by a parent or caregiver. Flu shots will also be available.

The initial supply of the youth version of Pfizer’s COVID-19 vaccine for these clinics is expected to be limited to about 1,200 doses. But Southeast Alaska Regional Health Consortium, local pharmacies and the Juneau Public Health Center expect to get additional doses.

City officials expect there will be enough to meet demand in the first half of the month.

Another Juneau resident has died of COVID-19. According to city officials a man in his 60s died at Bartlett Regional Hospital on Friday. There have been 14 resident deaths in Juneau during the course of the pandemic.

On Monday, state data identified 34 new cases of COVID-19 among Juneau residents over the Halloween weekend. Statewide, three additional COVID-19 deaths were reported.

In this newscast:

• A local hiker reported missing over the weekend is found dead
• COVID-19 vaccine clinics are tentatively scheduled in Juneau schools for younger children starting next week
• Oil price forecasts could lead the state to getting $1.2 billion more in unexpected revenue this year
• Wrangell joins other Southeast Alaska communities calling for stronger protections from mines in Canada
• Tribal leaders, commercial fishermen and environmental advocates celebrate a federal court decision that could further protect Bristol Bay
• A state report shows marked improvement salmon harvests in Southeast Alaska across all five species
• A wildlife biologist urges Sitka to improve garbage practices after a spate of defensive bear killings

In this newscast:

• Alaska joins nine other states suing over President Joe Biden’s vaccine mandate for federal contractors
• The Alaska Legislature sets a record for the number of days in session in a year
• $2 million in donations from a cruise ship company reaches local nonprofits
• State officials report 30 Juneau residents with new cases of COVID-19
• Another member of Anchorage Mayor Dave Bronson’s administration resigns
• Clear night skies and a geomagnetic storm make for phenomenal aurora forecast this weekend

The $2 million in relief that Norwegian Cruise Line Holdings offered Juneau earlier this year is now reaching local nonprofits’ accounts.

This summer, Norwegian’s initial offer went to the City and Borough of Juneau government. The company said there were no strings attached, but most Juneau Assembly members didn’t like how that would look. Norwegian wants to build a new, downtown cruise ship dock and needs the city’s cooperation to do it.

So instead, Norwegian sent the money out to a bunch of nonprofits in the community. Company officials did not respond to requests for comment. But the organizations on the receiving end did. They were grateful. And, like the original offer to the city, they say there were no strings attached.

Here’s where the money went.

The Juneau Community Foundation got half of it, $1 million. The foundation broke that up into 14 grants to local social service organizations. Among other things, it’s going to help restock the Southeast Alaska Food Bank and fix up housing for people in crisis or experiencing homelessness.

The foundation’s biggest grant is for half a million dollars to the campaign to build the Teal Street Center, which will be a hub for several social service agencies located next to the new Glory Hall building.

Executive Director Amy Skilbred said the foundation prioritized organizations that serve basic needs: food, shelter and mental and physical health.

“They’re the ones that get the stuff done in our community,” she said.

Specifically:

• $500,000 for construction of the Teal Street Center. A groundbreaking ceremony is scheduled for Nov. 2.
• $150,000 to The Glory Hall emergency shelter and soup kitchen for operations.
• $60,000 to the Tlingit & Haida Regional Housing Authority for repairs to the youth shelter Shéiyi X̱aat Hít, or Spruce Root House.
• $60,000 to AWARE for building new apartments.
• $50,000 to St. Vincent de Paul to repair its housing.
• $45,000 to JAMHI Health & Wellness for workforce development and retention.
• $30,000 to Capital City Fire & Rescue’s community health program for a vehicle.
• $25,000 to Bartlett Regional Hospital’s Community Navigator program for a vehicle.
• $25,000 to the Southeast Alaska Food Bank for food.
• $12,000 to Bartlett Regional Hospital Foundation for program kits that help school-aged children learn to be safe while home alone or to babysit younger children.
• $10,000 to the Central Council Tlingit & Haida Indian Tribes of Alaska for its reentry program.
• $10,000 to Juneau Carbon Offset program for home heating improvements.
• $10,000 to SAIL for its home improvement program.
• $8,000 to Juneau Housing First for maintenance and repairs.

Finally, the foundation is keeping $5,000 for administrative overhead.

Two of the foundation’s intended recipients are city government entities: Bartlett Regional Hospital and Capital City Fire/Rescue. In both cases, the money is intended to buy vehicles for programs each one runs that try to reach vulnerable community members physically where they are before unaddressed needs become emergencies.

The hospital’s grant manager said hospital administrators can usually sign off on grants like this without action from its board or the Juneau Assembly. The city’s finance director said the Assembly will likely need to take action to accept the fire department’s grant. So it’s possible the optics issue may come back up.

After those Juneau Community Foundation grants, there’s another million dollars of Norwegian’s donations to account for. The Greater Juneau Chamber of Commerce and Juneau Economic Development Council got $800,000 for local business relief. Board members of the two organizations are working on the particulars of how that will be spent.

The last three donations go toward improving places cruise ship visitors are likely to visit.

Sealaska Heritage Institute got $100,000 for its downtown arts campus project. Chief Operating Officer Lee Kadinger said the main facility will be mostly finished by the beginning of December.

“They’ve just been a great partner in the community and have been wonderful in ensuring their clients come visit Sealaska Heritage,” Kadinger said. “So it’s been a great mutual relationship working with them.”

Other elements, like a covered, outdoor performance area, were delayed because of fundraising concerns amid the pandemic.

Norwegian’s donation “helps complete the bigger vision that we initially had,” Kadinger said.

The Catholic cathedral on Fifth Street downtown is getting $50,000. Father Patrick Casey said it’s going into a campaign to renovate the building to make it wheelchair accessible. Casey also explained that some cruise ship passengers seek out Mass services while they’re in town. The church gives free rides from the docks to its services.

Finally, $50,000 is also going to the New JACC partnership, which wants to replace the Juneau Arts and Culture Center. The current facility was originally a National Guard armory.

Juneau was one of six Alaska port communities that Norwegian Cruise Line Holdings’ ships visit that it donated money to earlier this year. The company committed $10 million total. The other communities were Hoonah, Ketchikan, Sitka, Skagway and Seward.