Poop happens!

WASILLA — With sanitized shovel and plastic bucket in hand, Sandi Williams has managed to dig herself out of debt — one pile of poop at a time.

The former Carson City deputy sheriff and Mat-Su Borough animal control officer recently celebrated the one-year anniversary of her Valley Poop Patrol business. And she’s never felt freer.

“I started comparing the 9 to 5, Monday through Friday thing with working for myself and being able to set my own schedule and decided to give it a shot,” said Williams, 48, of Wasilla. “Right now I’m just shy of 20 clients. My ship is floating, but I’m still looking for a current. That current might be coming up with the springtime.”

Ah, springtime in Alaska — when the sun comes out of hiding, the birds begin chirping and the melting snow reveals those rather pungent, once-hidden treasures from man’s best friend.

“Some people don’t realize that if you can get the poop out of your yard on a regular basis in the wintertime, spring break-up isn’t so bad,” she said. “One of the funniest questions I get is what I do for work in the winter. I get more clients between October and November than at any other time.”

First lured to Alaska from Nevada by the Iditarod in 1995, the Air Force veteran packed up her truck, Siberian huskies and dogsled, and eventually hooked up with veteran musher Joe Redington Sr.

“I told Joe of my passion for dogs and running and he was in need of a handler,” she recalled. “I learned so much from him over the next couple of years. So between working at the dog shelter for the borough and taking care of Joe’s huge dog lot, I was able to hone my skills for what I’m doing now.”

What she’s doing, exactly, is providing a service by doing a chore most dog owners detest.

And Wasilla residents Melanie McCann and Linda Giani couldn’t be more pleased.

“She has a crappy job and I love it,” Wasilla dog lover Melanie McCann said Wednesday. “For years I just dreaded the spring clean-up. I have two big dogs and I work in Anchorage, so the last thing I want to do is come home and scoop poop. Sandi has been a lifesaver for me. I would let my roots go gray before I’d do without her.”

Williams pulled her gas-guzzling green Chevy Silverado — complete with license plate “SCOOP2” — up McCann’s steep driveway on Plymouth Circle Thursday morning and was greeted by one of McCann’s weekly “love notes” on the garage door.

Above a sketch of her dogs “Taffy” and “Carbon” doing their best downward facing dog toward a smiling caricature of her shoveling savior was yet another indication of her complete appreciation.

“We bow to the Queen of the Poop Scoopin Boogie,” the note said.

Taffy, a 50-pound mastiff mix, and Carbon, a 75-pound Akita/golden retriever mix, happily welcomed Williams into the backyard and she rewarded their kindness with dog biscuits.

With the temperature warming to 20 degrees after a two-week stretch of sub-zero chills, Williams was happy to only need her wool socks and long johns under her casual winter clothes as she shuffled her feet up and down her snow-covered “grid” in search of frozen nuggets.

“It’s a little tougher to find them after a snowfall,” she said as she ran the tip of the shovel over a dark patch of ice. “But it goes pretty quickly — 10 minutes, usually.”

Williams said in the spring and summer, when the job is a bit messier and smellier, she charges $2 per minute extra if the job takes longer than 20 minutes.

On average, those with up to two dogs who want her to drop by once a week are charged between $45 and $60 per month. For two visits per week, they pay between $74 and $95, depending on the number of dogs.

Clients with more than two dogs are encouraged to have their yards or dog runs cleaned at least twice a week, with the monthly fee starting at $117.

“For more than two dogs, if they’re only picking up their yard once a week it’s just not healthy for them or the dogs,” she said.

In the case of client Linda Giani, the owner of a small group home for the severely disabled in Woodfield Estates in Wasilla, it’s also a matter of following strict state regulations on cleanliness.

Giani built the home nearly 10 years ago to house her son, who became disabled at 18 months of age when he stopped breathing long enough to cause severe brain damage. Now 35, he has since gained two roommates who are similarly disabled.

Between the three of them, they also have two companion dogs that happen to be disabled as well. One dog only has three legs and the other is blind.

There’s also a cross-eyed cat that was born without claws. And the cat, which thinks it’s a dog, also uses the backyard to relieve itself, Giani said with a chuckle.

“It’s a very unique home,” Giani said. “The pets do them so much good, but no one working there wanted to deal with cleaning up after them. So I was so happy to find out about Valley Poop Patrol. She provides a greater service than you’d think.”

And Williams even makes sure she sprays her shovel, boots and hands with bleach water after each job to avoid transferring contaminants from yard to yard.

As Williams visited her last home Thursday near Palmer High School, she laughed about how she came up with the name of her business.

“I asked people on Facebook to help me come up with a name and I got quite a menagerie of suggestions, as you can imagine,” she said as she concentrated on the dogs’ favorite corner of the yard. “I liked the acronym of ‘VPP’ and the name explains exactly what I do. It makes me smile to know people can laugh about it.”

For more information on Valley Poop Patrol, contact Sandi Williams at 373-5520 or visit her website at valleypooppatrol.com.

Contact K.T. McKee at kate.mckee@frontiersman.com or 352-2252.