'Greatest honor I’ve had in my life'

WASILLA — Across her long life filled with many accolades, none means more to Alaska matriarch Katie Hurley.

The 94-year-old secretary of the Alaska Constitutional Convention was the guest of honor at the Egan Dinner at Turkey Red in Palmer June 19.

Organizers surprised Hurley by inviting her daughters Susan Derrera and Mary Hilowitz to be part of the event honoring their mother for a lifetime spent investing in Alaska’s youth.

MY House Vice President Michael P. Carson attended the meeting to share information about the non-profit, which serves homeless youths in the community ages 18 to 24.

He said that while the Mat-Su Borough has an animal shelter, it does not have a homeless shelter. MY House helps connect youth with services and resources that support young people in their bid for self-sufficiency, he said. But it is not a shelter.

MY House is a grassroots community response to address the needs of homeless youth in the Mat-Su Borough, Carson said. It’s a hand up, not a hand out, he said.

The idea is to help students get their IDs, get a job and work toward housing, Carson said.

Last fall, MY House took its novel approach to lifting teens out of homelessness and applied it to housing.

The group received a grant through the basic homeless assistance program, which they used to sign a lease for a three-bed room house.

The housing program requires residents to pay $400 rent and includes a long list of rules youth must follow to remain there, Carson said.

After paying rent for a few months, executive director Michelle Overstreet said the boys began to ask about opening a girls’ house. A couple of months later, the first girls’ house opened to house six girls.

The boys’ house was named for Clay Powell, an early MY House board member. And the first girls’ house was named the Mary Kvalheim House.

Overstreet said the first two houses’ rent made it possible to lease a third house, named the Katie Hurley House.

The plaque says Hurley was selected:

“In honor of her many years of public service to the territory and the state of Alaska, including her contributions to the drafting of the constitution of the great state of Alaska, and for her unfailing enthusiasm and unending support of youth.”

Of the many accolades from her distinguished career, Hurley said naming a girls house for her is the most meaningful honor of her life.

“This is the greatest honor I’ve had in my life,” she said Friday.

Carson said housing is the foundation that helps people of all ages transition out of homelessness.

Since the center opened, he said it has connected 240 homeless young people with resources in their community that can assist with their effort to rise. All of the youth served are asked a couple of basic survey questions, including why did you leave home.

Their parents’ drug and alcohol abuse was the reason 35 percent of youth gave for choosing life on the streets over life at home. Abuse and abandonment is the reason 57 percent of youths left.

Among the youth in MY House transitional housing, 100 percent of men and women served report sexual abuse or domestic violence in their past.

Carson said the housing help is working as intended. Already the program has had its first young man move out of transitional housing and into an apartment. MY House also passed on a donated vehicle to the young man to aid in his journey.

Carson said to qualify for the housing help, youth must be employed and be drug and alcohol free.

“If we can get them employment, we can get them housing,” he said.

Contact Heather A. Resz at 352-2268 or heather.resz@frontiersman.com.