By SUZANNE DOWNING
Feb. 26, 2026 – Just as Anchorage Fur Rendezvous kicks off in downtown Anchorage, Mayor Suzanne LaFrance is touting an expansion of municipal cleanup crews aimed at restoring parks and public spaces. It’s concierge service for street people.
Late last night, as temperatures dipped below zero, groups of street residents were still huddled along Fourth Avenue within sight of magnificent new arch that heralds the “Anchorage Mushing District.” The Iditarod Sled Dog Race ceremonial start is set for March 7.
The Alaska Story observed multiple individuals clustered together for warmth near storefronts and in doorways downtown on Fourth Ave.. At Town Square Park, people slept in bundled lumps under blankets, while others paced the sidewalks to keep from freezing in the bitter cold.
The contrast is stark: A city preparing to welcome visitors for one of its signature winter festivals, while some of its most vulnerable residents remain exposed to subzero conditions beneath the marquee sign.
On Wednesday, Mayor LaFrance announced the official launch of an additional 10-person Healthy Spaces crew, doubling the number of workers assigned to clean parks, trails, and greenbelts year-round. It’s an expansion of government.
Managed by Anchorage Parks and Recreation, the Healthy Spaces team removes litter, addresses illegal dumping, and remediates areas where illegal camping has occurred. In other words, cleaning up after street people.
According to the mayor’s office, the existing team removed more than 2.4 million pounds of trash from public lands across the municipality in 2025. Most of it was from encampments.
“A cleaner community is a safer community,” LaFrance said in her statement. “Our parks and trails are the crown jewels of Anchorage, and we want to ensure every resident and visitor can enjoy them. By doubling our Healthy Spaces capacity, we are making a visible, lasting investment in the health of our neighborhoods — and just in time for breakup season.”
The Municipality maintains approximately 250 miles of trails and nearly 11,000 acres of parkland. The expansion is funded through a $4 surcharge at Solid Waste Services facilities — $4 for small loads and $4 per ton for large loads — proposed by Assembly Chair Chris Constant and approved by the Anchorage Assembly last year.
That means people with small loads will either bear the burden or resort to dumping their trash on the streets.
The surcharge took effect in January and is intended to fund cleanup efforts without using property tax dollars.
LaFrance encouraged people to report illegal dumping or trash accumulation through the municipality’s online reporting system. The form is here:
While the Healthy Spaces program focuses on debris and encampment remediation, the visible presence of people sleeping outdoors downtown suggests Anchorage’s homelessness crisis remains unresolved.
Fourth Avenue, which hosts Fur Rondy events and the Iditarod ceremonial start, continues to be a gathering place for unsheltered individuals, night and day. Town Square Park, often the city’s symbolic front yard, sees nightly clusters of people attempting to survive winter conditions.
The mayor’s announcement emphasizes aesthetics as Anchorage heads into breakup season and festival time. But for those spending the night outside in below-zero temperatures, cleanup crews alone do not address the underlying issues of shelter capacity, addiction, mental health, and long-term housing stability.
5 thoughts on “Mayor expands cleanup crews, street dwellers huddle on Fourth Ave., Fur Rondy gets under way”
It’s time for a New event
Fur Rondy and Iditarod best days are behind
Today they just look Ghetto and the homeless just makes it look more obvious
I am one of the people you are writing about.
I have been sleeping in my car with my service dog since June 2024. In Alaska. Through winter.
I was a wife for 28 years. A mother of four. A business owner. I worked full time most of my life. I built a home. I built a family. I did everything “right.”
And I still ended up here.
I was diagnosed with ADHD and Narcolepsy in 2018 — at 48 years old. Before that, I was told I was depressed. Lazy. Emotional. Too much. Not enough. I spent decades trying to fix a problem no one correctly named.
When I finally understood my brain, my life made sense. The racing thoughts. The exhaustion that no amount of sleep fixed. The bursts of brilliance followed by crashes. The way I could build something beautiful — and then watch it fall apart when the structure around me changed.
When my kids grew up and moved out, the rhythm that kept me regulated disappeared. My marriage ended. My business failed. We lost our dream home. Then came a wrongful eviction in 2022 that still follows me. Every application. Every background check. Every door.
Adderall helped me function. It helped me stay awake. It helped me think. After a disagreement with a provider in 2024, I lost access to treatment. Since then, I’ve been bouncing. Spinning. Trying to hold myself together without the one thing that stabilized my brain.
I am not an addict. I am untreated.
People see tents and trash. They don’t see untreated neurological disorders. They don’t see women sitting in their cars in the dark, ashamed, wondering how they became the headline.
I grew up in Chugiak. I know isolation. I know what it feels like to be the embarrassment. I know what it feels like to have suicidal thoughts because your brain never turns off and you cannot make it stop.
I believe many people outside right now are not lazy. Not criminals. Not disposable.
They are missed diagnoses.
They are untreated ADHD.
They are sleep disorders.
They are trauma.
They are people who once had lives.
Cleanup crews remove evidence. But what if treatment prevented the collapse?
If we are serious about reducing homelessness, we must expand access to proper adult ADHD and sleep disorder diagnosis, treatment, and medication — without automatically assuming addiction. Treat the brain, and you may prevent the street.
Please don’t look away.
The end of Chris Constant’s term on the Assembly cannot come soon enough. Ordinarily, I would worry about whomever follows him in that seat, but it is completely impossible to imagine that anyone could be worse. Could this mean that better days for Anchorage are ahead?
While this all seems positive, I expect Chris’ ego will demand attention in the future. He will seek some other office and many that have benefitted from his misdeeds will support him.
Potemkin. Its a tyrant tradition
Tolerate them, embolden them, and subsidize them, and they will come.
.
Tolerance of degeneracy and self-destruction is not a virtue.