Chetco Bar Fire Stories: Volunteers Undertake Resource Coordination Effort

Volunteers Undertake Resource Coordination Effort

Summer Matteson-Kinney works as the Curry County Juvenile and Parks administrator, but little did she know that during the Chetco Bar Fire, she would become the lead team member for the Chetco Bar Fire Donation & Volunteer Resource Coordination Team.

It started as Summer was camping over the weekend of August 19 with friends and family. She began getting texts about donations coming in for fire evacuees, “first from Brandy Haselden [Neighborworks Umpqua], then from [State Representative] David Brock Smith,” Summer Matteson-Kinney explained. “Of course, I had no idea the fire had blown up like it had, until I got back home Sunday [August 20].”

First thing Monday morning, August 21, Curry County Sheriff John Ward came to ask Summer if she would head up the coordination of volunteers and donations. “Of course, I didn’t think to ask what it was going to entail- I just said ‘yes’, “ she explains.

Reaching Out For Help

Summer knew she was going to need some help, so the first person she reached out to was Andre Bay.  “He and I had worked together during some recent search and rescue efforts,” Summer said, “plus he was a friend; I knew he was well connected and would probably be willing to help.”

Summer continues: “ I also called Karen Layng [with the state OEM/FEMA office], who basically told me to ‘start on page 16’ of the FEMA handbook; so that’s what we did!” OEM’s (Offices of Emergency Management) from other states began to offer their help and resources as well.

Summer went on, “Well, that ‘yes’ back on the 21st turned into seven weeks of volunteering during every spare hour I had – vacation time, lunch hours, before work, after work…even weekends – because that’s what it took to stay on top of what became a massive coordination job for me and the other members of our core team.”

Andre’s Connections

“Summer’s the one who got me involved,” Andre Bay explains, “She called me the same day the Sheriff called her to be the donations coordinator. Summer and I had worked together on search and rescue missions, and she knew I was someone who could make things happen.”

Andre continued, “Well, the first thing I did was gathered info. Basically, I hit the streets, stopping in parking lots, for instance, looking for folks displaced by the fire who were temporarily living in their RVs, to find out what their immediate needs were. I drove from Gold Beach to Ship Ashore, just checking with everyone I met, asking them how we could help.”

The Core Team Is Formed

A donation and volunteer coordination team was formed. The coordination team was: Summer (government services); Andre Bay (food); Allison Thomas (press releases, manned the Remax locations); Tami Bishop (defensible space); and Jeff McFarlane (north county donations). Summer put together handbooks that each team member used and that included all the resources they had available at any given time. The team was in contact daily, varying between face-to-face, or by phone, text, Facebook Messenger, or email, and Summer acted as the “central” hub regarding any decisions the team made, because she answered to the Sheriff.

The Chetco Bar Fire Help (CBFH) page, originally started by Ryan Hanners, became a central hub for most of the donations and volunteer offers. The coordination team would get word for a need through the CBFH page, or via a Facebook “private message”, or by phone; volunteers were connected to needs via the CBFH page and were put on the list for future help.

The team served all the Curry County food banks during the fire, as well as Oasis Shelter. They also delivered a few tons of food in person to the families on Cate Road. The Elks opened their door to the team so they could offer a free clothing store there for evacuees.

The Three Percenters Answer The Call

Due to a lack of resources in Curry County, Andre decided to reach out to his contacts throughout the region who were part of “Three Percenter” Groups. (The Three Percenters (also styled 3%ers and III%ers)  are people who “stand up for people’s rights,” according to Andre: they are community-driven, self-sufficient, and non-violent; come in response to calls for help; and are there to help in whatever way they can, he explained.

“We had volunteers showing up who came from Three Percenter groups in Seattle, Portland, Salem, Lebanon and Redmond, Lincoln and Lake Counties, Del Norte County, and right here in Curry County to do whatever they could to help out,” Andre explained, “they sent people, food and emergency supplies; they helped folks clear their property to prepare it in case the fire came their way; they put on a barbecue at the Old Fireside Diner in Harbor to raise money; they were “boots on the ground”; and many of them stayed as long as they were needed, even at the expense of their own lives and families.”

The Three Percenter volunteers helped clear 56 properties located in Level 3 Evacuation areas in Curry. They moved their resources to O’Brien (Josephine County) to help out over there when the fire started moving in that direction, and after it had calmed down in Curry County.

 

Keeping Track Of It All

From the start, Summer made sure to  track donations and volunteer hours, but because the donations had to be accounted for through either a nonprofit or government entity, she needed help. She went first to the Curry County Board of Commissioners, but they didn’t have the resources or capacity to help much. The Rotary Club was willing to help, but wasn’t ready to support an online effort. That was when Wild Rivers Community Foundation (WRCF) offered to be the hub. Jessica Carrillo helped by keeping track of where stuff would go and monetary donations went directly to WRCF, with Michelle Carrillo’s help.

WRCF also organized a meeting, facilitated by Geri Livingston, that brought stakeholders together; the goal was to figure out what was needed and who could supply what. The result was a better ebb and flow of supplies, resources and volunteers, according to both Summer and Andre.

And The Donations Poured In

Andre estimates they moved approximately 45,000 pounds of food and supplies between the Brookings Harbor Food Bank and the storage facilities that Marie and Bret Curtis with ReMax opened up for them. The Harbor Remax office was also where one of the Chetco Bar Fire “free” stores was located (the other was at the Elks Lodge), where people could come get what they needed from the piles of donations that kept pouring in.

Monetary donations were mostly directed to Wild Rivers Community Foundation, but that money was not immediately available, as it had to be “passed through” a nonprofit before it could be accessed, which took time, Andre said. When the Nazarene Church agreed to act as the pass-through nonprofit for immediate needs – what Andre called the “Cate Road fund” (i.e. donations gathered by the team and meant to fund immediate needs for those who lost their homes on Cate Road) – that was “a Godsend” as Andre put it, as the church was able to make the money more easily accessible.

Challenges Identified

Summer and Andre both identified a lack of resources and limited government support as major challenges during the fire.  It was immediately obvious as well that Curry County needs to institute a Volunteer Organization Active In Disaster (VOAD), or a Community Organization Active In Disaster (COAD). Shelter and temporary short-term housing was in very short supply. The Red Cross didn’t understand our local needs, according to Summer, so the shelters they set up were little used. At Ship Ashore, they had a better handle on what the evacuees needed, she felt.

Andre is still working on relief, advocating mostly for the families on Cate Road who lost their homes and infrastructure. He said they (he and Summer) personally delivered checks on Nov. 18 – just before Thanksgiving – to those families that came from donations raised at a fundraising concert in September with the Kingston Trio.

Was There Any Good To Be Had?

When asked if there was anything good that came out of the experience, Summer smiled and said, “You’ve seen the bumper stickers floating around since then, right? The ones that say ‘Curry Strong’? Well,” she continued, “that bumper sticker says it all: we’re strong – as a community, as a county, as a region. We showed that we know how to take care of our own.”

Summer Matteson-Kinney was interviewed by Kathleen Dickson on Nov. 28, 2017, and Andre Bay was interviewed by Kathleen Dickson on Dec. 5, 2017. Thanks to both Summer and Andre for sharing their stories.