Finding Solutions to Support the Team

When Property and Program Manager Kathryn went to work at Alaska Housing Finance Corporation's Sitka office on Aug. 29 and realized that she, along with the rest of the town, was without internet service due to a break in the town’s fiber-optic link, her first course of action was to send out a lifeline to her supervisor.

Kathryn could send texts for a few hours that morning before losing cell coverage, enough time to notify Regional Manager Lisa in Juneau and to get the statewide AHFC team working together to support their colleagues in Sitka’s Paxton Manor office.

Lisa reached out to Mike, AHFC's director of operations and facilities management, who began the process of coordinating a solution with the Information Technology department in Anchorage. Meanwhile, Kathryn and her two Sitka-based colleagues were quickly working to adjust to a workplace with limited tools.

“There was a massive increase in walk-ins into the office,” Kathryn said. “But without access to our online systems, I couldn’t answer many questions for tenants. Really all I could do was start a lengthy callback list. At the time, the ETA on internet service being restored was 13 days, it ended up being 17.”

Maintaining Safety Standards

The most significant hurdle was maintaining high safety standards at AHFC’s senior housing property. With phone coverage and internet service lost, the fire alarm system at Swan Lake Terrace was offline.

“One member of our three-person team had to be physically in the building 24-7 until the alarm system was restored and to walk all floors and communal spaces every hour,” Kathryn said. “Going into fire watch is a big deal, but it’s necessary to make sure our 19 senior housing residents are safe.”

Kathryn, Davin and Keith created a rotation to ensure coverage at the property at all times while also continuing to help with routine maintenance needs and assist tenants in the office to the best of their ability.

Identifying and Expediting a Solution

In Juneau and Anchorage, AHFC team members were working to ensure that Kathryn and her colleagues wouldn’t have to keep up this rotation for long.

When Lisa notified the Facilities Management team in Anchorage, they approached the IT department for a solution. Within 24 hours, IT had purchased a Starlink kit, configured it for use on AHFC's network, tested it in the IT department then shipped it to Sitka on the GoldStreak service.

By the morning of day three of the outage, AHFC’s Paxton Manor office was back online.

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“Everybody involved went above and beyond to get the office up and running that fast. There were so many pieces that had to click.” 

- Kathryn, Property and Program Manager, Sitka

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With connection restored, the AHFC office offered phone use to their tenants so they could contact loved ones outside of Sitka.

“There were people who said, ‘I call my mom every day and if she doesn’t hear from me, she’s going to panic!’ Once we were up and running, it was nice to offer that resource to our residents too,” Kathryn said.

Looking Ahead

Kathryn says the outage has given her and her colleagues across the state lots to discuss as they think ahead to support the safety of AHFC tenants and the reliability of their business operations.

“This was a small emergency, but it does give us something to think about to make sure our offices are prepared for similar situations in the future,” Kathryn said. “Thankfully, our communication between offices is super good. We do whatever is needed to make things work.”