Family

Friday was the last children’s storytime at a Juneau library branch that’s been in the Mendenhall Mall for over 30 years. The days of checking out books and grabbing a slice of pizza are over because the branch is moving to a new location at the end of the month.

About 15 kids are sitting crisscross applesauce listening to Amelia Jenkins read a picture book. She works at the Mendenhall Valley Library.

Her audience is sometimes captive, sometimes not. But she knows how to handle the crowd by breaking into song and dance.

“There’s some weeks when everybody wants to sit on a lap and listen quietly and these other weeks like today when everyone wants to do the hokey pokey straight for half an hour,” Jenkins says.

Kids can check out the books at the end of storytime, which is exactly what library staff want. Left behind materials have to be transported to the new location so patrons are encouraged to check out up to 40 books.

You can check out all the Harry Potter, Game of Thrones, Hunger Games and Fifty Shades books and you’d only be halfway.

M.J. Grande, the youth services librarian, has worked for the library for 15 years and is excited about the new 20,000-square-foot space at Dimond Park.

It cost $14 million to build, paid for by a grant from the state and city sales tax. Another million was contributed by the Friends of the Juneau Public Libraries.

Of all the perks, there’s one Grande says she’s looking forward to the most.

“Space. We are almost doubling our footage here so the kids programing is a really dominant part of the library,” Grande says.”We have these wonderful reading cubicles that are extra padded and cozy.”

There’s also wheelchair accessible reading nooks and a room that has its own teen advisory committee to decide function and decor. But probably the biggest difference is it won’t be sandwiched between a restaurant and a tanning salon.

Grande says not too long ago, it wasn’t uncommon to see a library in a mall.

“You know, kind of in the 70s when malls were really getting established as a one-stop shop, you can do your shopping, you can do your library, you can do your other business. That role in the evolution of malls has changed.”

For Letha Bethel, the old location has been convenient. She’s a stay-at-home mom with two kids and another one she watches during the day.

She says the kids love dancing and singing at the reading circle, the toys in the children’s section and of course the books.

They walk to the Mendenhall Mall on sunny days and Bethel says she’s sad the library will be closed for a few months as it moves to its new location.

“It’ll be nice though that it’ll be bigger hopefully and more space to run around. They’re excited to see it and it’s right by the pool,” Bethel says.

But will she check out 40 books?

“For their sake, probably not. Because I don’t know if they’d last at our house.”

Bethel says she might consider checking out one or two before the Mendenhall Valley Library closes on Aug. 31, opening back up at Dimond Park sometime in November.

The Alutiiq Museum recently published a book called “Kal’unek” with the University of Alaska Press. The nearly 400-page volume focuses on archeological discoveries near the community of Karluk and delves into the site’s lasting effects on those involved.

The museum’s director of research and publication, Amy Steffian, says the site at the mouth of the Karluk River — Karluk One — opened to excavation in 1983 when few people knew about Kodiak Island’s Alutiiq history.

“Many people would not even claim their Native heritage because there was so much disenfranchisement and disrespect, and there was this sense that the prehistoric culture … was impoverished,” Steffian says. “[It was thought] that these were poor people who suffered and who didn’t have a vibrant artistic life, and certainly when we set out to study this site, it became pretty clear that that was false.”

Steffian says it became extremely exciting to the Alutiiq community to see the objects coming out of the ground and to have access to them. She says the book is really about two different stories.

“It’s the story of the site and its contents and it provides an ethnography; it talks about how people lived [hundreds of years ago] … but it also tells how this kind of anthropological, archaeological study, when done in partnership with the community, when done with support and involvement, can be a very powerful experience,” she says.

Steffian says that the museum worked on “Kal’unek”with the help of many contributors, from researchers to people who had excavated the site. She says they’ve built a picture about Alutiiq life using a variety of resources, from oral history to Russian texts. Many of the artifacts are especially well-preserved.

The museum’s director, April Laktonen Counceller, says the freshwater that leaked into the site helped prevent oxygen from touching the artifacts until excavators could unearth them.

Counceller says she was involved in the project through the Kodiak Alutiiq New Words Council, which draws on the knowledge of Alutiiq elders. She says the members who had helped create words for modern technology turned their attention to ancient objects.

“By creating words for items where the words were once lost, we were able to kinda put our mark back on that prehistory and say, ‘This is our prehistory,’” she says. “Our people have long been discussed by outside archeologists and anthropologists. For the elders, it was really important to claim ownership over the past by giving back new words to those old items.”

She says they didn’t always invent new words or combine existing ones. For instance, they use applied the modern word for “knife” to an ancient one.

“That helps show the cultural continuity,” explains Counceller. “That we don’t need to come up with a completely unrelated word. We can use an existing word so that people can leverage the language they already have.”

Counceller says there are many more words listed in the book. Steffian says “Kal’unek” is a thorough study of Alutiiq culture and that “the goal was to make it a joint project where everyone was involved and people of all heritages and interests had access to the material.”

Representative Tammie Wilson claims to have heard hundreds of disturbing stories about actions taken by the Office of Children’s Services from parents and guardians struggling to regain custody of their children. Wilson sees several similarities in a number of the complaints and that pattern has her convinced an investigation is necessary. OCS Director Christy Lawton says Wilson is one of many legislators who contact her office for information on cases.

“The bulk of the cases that we’re getting called on are the cases that are in foster care which are all overseen by the court system. Whereby parents have attorneys, as well as in some cases CASA’s which are court appointed special advocates,” says Lawton.

She says the number one thing OCS tries to convey to anyone who questions the agency’s actions is that they do not make unilateral decisions on placement, removal of children, “termination of parental rights, how long a child should stay in custody if we’ve complied with the Indian Child Welfare Act or not.”

She says all of those things and more are heavily scrutinized by the courts which make the ultimate decisions. Wilson says she’s seen three common trends in a large number of the stories relayed to her. OCS appears to not prioritize reuniting families, in many cases it isn’t a clear why children are removed from homes, and it’s unclear what steps parents or guardians must take to get their children back. Lawton says two of those perceived problems aren’t real.

“Our number one priority, when a child comes into custody, is to always be looking at reunification as the primary goal. We’re in the business of keeping families together and ensuring child safety,” says Lawton.

Lawton also says on emergency calls, if law enforcement does not respond alongside the agency then the decision whether to remove a child rests solely with OCS. But, the reasons are “mapped out” in a petition filed with the court.

“And that’s a petition basically for what we call probable cause and a judge would then have to make a ruling whether or not there was probable cause to remove that child,” says Lawton.

Lawton says removing children from their home is one of the agency’s last resorts. She does give credence to the last issue Wilson worries about. She says she would be the first to say there are inconsistencies in the steps families have to follow to win back custody of their children.

“When I’m sitting in my office as the director [they] seem very concrete, they seem very clear cut. You start at A and you get to B, and then C, and then D; but the truth is we’re dealing with human beings and our staff are human beings and the work is messy. It’s hard and it’s gut wrenching and there’s nothing black and white about it,” says Lawton.

She says the best OCS can do is make the policies easy to understand and train supervisors to think critically for the situations that are unpredictable.

“And that’s why it is so challenging and it continues to be an area of improvement across the board,” says Lawton.

Lawton doesn’t know whether the grand jury investigation Representative Wilson is suggesting would help but says she is open to any action or suggestions that can help the agency move forward.

“The system is flawed. It has its strengths and it has its challenges and the more important thing to me is trying to protect those kids that we are charged with serving and doing the best that we can,” says Lawton.

Representative Wilson says she is trying to collect enough information to show an investigation of OCS is warranted and expects it will take at least two weeks. Whether an investigation actually takes place is solely the decision of a standing grand jury.

Netflix maintains a network of DVD distribution centers across the country. Workers there typically report for their shifts at 2:00 a.m. and according to job postings, the work in these centers can be physically demanding and repetitive. It involves lifting, sorting and inspecting thousands of DVDs for damage.

These employees are offered vastly different benefits than their white-collar colleagues.

In a blog post Tuesday, Netflix announced that it would begin allowing unlimited leave for new parents, allowing them to take off as much time as they want during the first year after a child’s birth or adoption. Netflix said it’s part of the company goal to foster a “freedom and responsibility” culture — allowing employees “to make their own decisions along with the accompanying responsibility.

Under the new policy, Netflix says new parents can come back to work part time or full time, or return to work and then leave again as needed during that first year of parenting. “We’ll just keep paying them normally, eliminating the headache of switching to state or disability pay,” the statement said. “Each employee gets to figure out what’s best for them and their family, and then works with their managers for coverage during their absences.”

When asked how many employees this new policy applies to, a Netflix spokesperson told NPR that the policy only applies to “salaried streaming employees,” not to employees in the company’s DVD distribution centers.

Netflix also offers high-tech, salaried employees unlimited vacation time. But again, not everyone benefits.

How many employees are not covered? The company won’t say. Netflix says it has just under 2,000 salaried streaming employees. In January, it reported more than 2100 full time employees in its annual report and more than 200 part-time workers.

After analyzing job postings and financial statements, NPR believes that at least 400 to 500 employees at Netflix, both full- and part-time, don’t work in streaming or are not salaried, and therefore are left out of the new parental leave policy.

Netflix has not yet responded to NPR’s request for further detail on the benefits offered to workers in its dozens of distribution centers. However job postings for full-time employees offer some paid time off, temporary disability insurance and a free Netflix subscription.

Copyright 2015 NPR. To see more, visit http://www.npr.org/.

A Southeast health provider has adopted what may be the most progressive parental leave policy in Alaska. At least two experts say they don’t know of another employer in the state with a comparable benefit.

The Southeast Alaska Regional Health Consortium’s isn’t as far-reaching as Netflix’s new 1-year paid leave policy, but it may start a trend.

Ann Stepetin is due to deliver her fourth child in February. She and her husband had already decided she’d only take two weeks off from her payroll job at SEARHC.

“Because I didn’t think we could afford to be off any longer,” Stepetin says.

Then, she went into work one day and that plan drastically changed.

“You can see me getting emotional, I was like, ‘Oh my God.’ It was such a blessing,” she says.

SEARHC’s new parental leave policy lets Stepetin take eight paid weeks off instead of using her accrued leave.

“Having that in place does give me more of a relaxed feeling to prepare emotionally more or less for the baby rather than stressing about the finances,” Stepetin says.

And that’s exactly what SEARHC executives hoped the new policy would do.

“We want that family to be really focusing on the new child, the new addition to their family, and to not have to worry about any of the other issues,” says Peggy Kadlec, SEARHC’s interim head of human resources. “It’s an important time of bonding.”

SEARHC has about 650 employees in communities throughout Southeast Alaska; most are concentrated in Juneau and Sitka. Kadlec says the health organization wants its employees to have work-life balance.

“We believe our employees that are healthier, happier, will be here at work more frequently, provide the better kind of service into our community and at the end, (it) saves money,” Kadlec says.

She says people who take an active role in health and families have less health issues.

“If our employees are out less for medical reasons, our costs are reduced and we can transfer those dollars to programs to help them as well.”

Kadlec is excited about the new parental leave policy. So is Joy Lyon.

“Because that might pave the way for other organizations to see how successful that is,” says Lyon, executive director of the Association for the Education of Young Children in Southeast.

She says it’s critical for the time after childbirth to be as stress-free as possible.

“When you add the extra stress of trying to get back to work, find childcare, figure out your feeding schedule, that just adds such a layer of stress,” Lyon says. “Babies are little sponges for stress, so they’re going to be feeling that stress. Continuous stress inhibits the child’s ability to learn and grow so it has a really long-term impact.”

Ironically, AEYC does not offer paid parental leave to its employees.

The federal Family and Medical Leave Act requires most employers with 50 or more workers to guarantee up to 12 weeks of unpaid time off for a new child, among other reasons.

AEYC only has 10 employees, but follows these guidelines, like many other employers.

“Being a small nonprofit we just don’t have the ability to pay the extra the whole time,” Lyon says.

Most state and municipal employees are entitled to up to 18 weeks of unpaid leave for a new child. People who take family medical leave often use accrued time off to get paid.

Dan Robinson, head of research and analysis for the state Department of Labor, says the agency doesn’t have any research on paid parental leave in the state. That could change. The department has applied for a federal grant to look into it.

“It’s very possible that there will be state legislation, that a legislator will say we want to require employers to pay for parental leave, we want to make that paid. In that case, those questions could likely come our direction,” Robinson says.

At SEARHC, parents of new children can still access 12 weeks of Family Medical Leave after the eight weeks of paid parental leave. Ann Stepetin isn’t sure if she’ll dip into it.

“I haven’t thought that far yet. Eight weeks is a blessing compared to the two that I was planning on doing,” Stepetin says.

She says she’ll start with that and see how it goes.

This is a tale of two cities. In New Orleans, there are signs of hope that veteran homelessness can be solved. But Los Angeles presents a very different picture.

Under the deafening highway noise of the Pontchartrain Expressway in central city New Orleans, Ronald Engberson, 54, beds down for the night. Engberson got out of the Marines in 1979, plagued even back then by problems with drugs and alcohol. He says that’s mostly the reason he’s been homeless the past 10 years.

“My longest stretch sober was 14 months,” he says. “Being out there on the streets, it’s tough.”

About 50,000 vets are homeless in America. In 2009, then-Veterans Affairs Secretary Eric Shinseki declared that all of them would have housing by this year. At the time, even inside the VA that goal was considered aspirational at best. But last year, cities across the country said it was looking achievable. New Orleans was the first to declare, in January, that the city had done it. (Jump to the bottom to see how your state stacks up.)

So if New Orleans has zero homeless vets, why was there a Marine sleeping under the expressway?

It’s called “functional zero,” according to Melissa Haley, director of supportive services at Volunteers of America in New Orleans.

“Homelessness is a continuous process. There’s a veteran right now who is in a home who could very well be homeless tomorrow,” she says. “Functional zero is defined as having a process and the resources in place where we can immediately house a veteran.”

So if a vet loses a job today, misses the rent and gets evicted in New Orleans, the city can get him or her housed within a month. Haley says it’s often faster; they got Marine Corps veteran Ronald Engberson housed in one day.

A Volunteers of America caseworker, DaVaughn Phillips, met Engberson under the expressway and started asking him questions from a survey. When he heard Engberson’s name, he looked down at a list on his clipboard.

“Mr. Engberson, we’ve been looking for you!” Phillips said. “When you said Ronald Engberson, I’m almost about to get up and shout!”

Nonprofits, the New Orleans VA and the mayor’s office now coordinate to keep one constantly updated list of homeless veterans. Because Engberson was on the list, his military record had already been confirmed, and Phillips could get him into an apartment.

The next morning Phillips met Engberson by the expressway overpass and took him to a modest, clean apartment. First thing Engberson did was shave off his ragged beard.

“Last night I was under the bridge,” Engberson said. “I’m thankful I’m inside. I have AC, don’t have to deal with the rain, the lightning, people walking up on you all the time.”

New Orleans went from 470 homeless vets in 2011 to functional zero today, using what are now considered best practices — such as the master list — and powered by a huge cash injection from Washington.

Nationwide, spending on homeless vets is up 300 percent since President Obama took office, hitting near $1.5 billion last year. That tracks with a reduction in homeless vets by about a third.

“We’ve been able to house more vets in the last five years than at any point in our history … 30-plus years,” Vince Kane, special assistant to the VA secretary, says of the agency’s housing programs. “In the past, both inside and outside of VA, we were focused on models more about managing homeless than on ending homelessness,” Kane says.

Part of that shift is to embrace a philosophy called “housing first.”

“It’s about getting guys in housing first and then treating whatever ails them afterwards,” says Kevin Kincey, who does outreach for the group U.S. Vets in Los Angeles.

“Back in 2005, to come into a program … you needed to be sober,” Kincey says. “[Now] once you get in housing, if you need substance abuse treatment, mental health treatment, they’ll wrap that around you.”

Kincey says he’s seen housing-first programs arrive just recently in Los Angeles — which VA officials acknowledge is lagging behind many other cities in the race toward the goal.

LA has the most homeless vets in the country. It also has a housing shortage that makes it hard to find places even with the funding available. And there were other problems — the Los Angeles VA was embroiled in a lawsuit about misuse of resources. Kane was sent this year from headquarters to get the Los Angeles VA back on track.

Still, LA would need to house 3,000 more homeless vets by the end of the year to reach zero, and no one expects it to happen on schedule. Angelenos say it’s not fair to compare the scale of their homeless problem to smaller cities like Houston or New Orleans.

“They’ve all done great work, but no one has done as much as Los Angeles has done in total volume,” says Greg Spiegel, who advises the mayor of Los Angeles on homelessness.

For perspective, New Orleans housed 227 vets last year to reach zero. Los Angeles housed about that many last month and the month before that. LA has found homes for about 4,000 veterans since January 2014. But Spiegel says as fast as they can house them, about seven more veterans become homeless every day in LA.

“That inflow of vets becoming homeless is so big, it essentially neutralized the incredible progress we made. That had never been done before and is more than anywhere else in the country,” Spiegel says.

Many of the vets becoming newly homeless are from recent wars, raising fears of another generation of combat vets winding up spending a life on the streets.

“I don’t want to see these guys homeless 40 years from now,” says Jim Zenner, who runs the Hollywood Veterans Center, a barracks-style halfway house for veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan.

Zenner moved to LA when he got back from Iraq in 2008 and started pursuing a master’s degree in social work at University of Southern California. The war still had a grip on him, though — even the LA freeway reminded him of routes he had driven in Iraq. Anger and depression put him on edge. At home with his wife and kids, he’d yell so loud the neighbors would call the cops.

“The fourth time the police … basically told me that if one of us don’t leave the house, then they’re going to take our kids. So I packed my stuff, slept in the car that night and then got a hotel room, took my oldest son, and we stayed there for four days,” he says.

After that, he had nowhere to go. He and his wife were both students. They were living off loans and GI bill money — not enough to pay two rents in Los Angeles.

He went to the VA for help, but none of the shelters at that time would take in a father and son. Then a place run by Volunteers of America did him a favor and bent the rules to house them both. He stayed seven months. Then they asked him for a favor.

“I did some volunteer work for them,” Zenner says. “And in early 2010 they offered me a position to take an empty building and turn it into a readjustment facility for Iraq and Afghanistan veterans.”

That facility looks a bit like one of the makeshift barracks troops made out of buildings in Iraq and Afghanistan — right down to the free weights and boxing gear in the covered alley next to the building. There’s a TV lounge and a group therapy room, too.

“They try to get us to talk about it, but you know how vets are. We like to talk about it privately together. And that’s the stuff that helps out the most,” says Joe Scogan, who did two combat tours to Iraq.

After a divorce, he wound up living in his truck. He went to stay at a VA housing program before landing at the Hollywood Veterans Center this May.

“At the VA, I was there with some Vietnam vets, and they were great. But it really helps being with guys that you went through something with. They’re different wars,” Scogan says.

Zenner says his mission is to be flexible and fit treatment around school and job possibilities, even if it means bending the rules, like they did for him when he and his son had nowhere to stay.

He’s got mixed feelings about the goal of ending homelessness.

“I don’t think it’s possible,” says Zenner. “And the play-with-words like ‘functional zero’ and all that crap — I don’t like to do that. Everybody knows in LA it’s not going to end in 2015. [But] it’s a good way to get people to work extra hard.”

The deadline also has some worried.

“My fear is that someone will claim victory at the end of this year and funding will start going away,” says Steve Peck, president of U.S. Vets.

He’s already seeing it happen. This summer Peck planned to raise funds for a homeless veterans’ event in Houston. Then the city declared in June that it had reached “functional zero.”

“It was only weeks after that we began making calls to our community partners to help us. We get donations from all over. And one of them actually said, ‘Well, wait a minute, I thought we’d ended this.’ ”

Peck worries that once the deadline passes with the end of this year, the momentum in Washington will disappear, regardless of how many vets are still living on the street.

Copyright 2015 NPR. To see more, visit http://www.npr.org/.