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Empty Bowls celebrates 20 years of filling Glory Hall’s financial needs and people’s stomachs
‘The amount of change and growth that we've gone through is just tremendous,’ says former unhoused resident who is now a longtime worker at the shelter
By Mark Sabbatini
Juneau Independent
Logan Henkins has gone from being without housing to assisting people without housing, so for Saturday’s 20th anniversary of the Glory Hall’s Empty Bowls fundraiser, he did double duty by filling attendees' ears and stomachs.
Henkins, who said he’s been affiliated with the shelter for about 15 years and helped at the fundraiser for the past five or six, revisited his early days as a kitchen worker in his first-ever soup providing at Centennial Hall. For the second straight year, he made a Tlingit drum as an auction item, performing a song to entice bidders partway through the evening.
"The amount of change and growth that we've gone through is just tremendous," he said in an interview before his drum performance, referring to his time at the shelter since his arrival.
Empty Bowls, the Glory Hall’s biggest annual fundraising event, allows the hundreds of ticket-buying attendees to select handmade ceramic and wood bowls created by various locals that are displayed on tables in the entrance hall of the convention center. Those bowls — or disposable paper ones nearly all people opt for — can then be filled with various soups served in the main ballroom that are made by restaurants and individuals.
Two Glory Hall workers, including Henkins, were among those making soup.
"Some of my first cooking at the Glory Hall was breakfast cooking — sausage gravy," he said. "I couldn't do a gravy today, so I went with a breakfast chowder."
Henkins said he learned drum-making in 2020 and decided to make one identical in form to last year’s, with a different artist design, when that one earned $500 for the shelter. He performed a Chilkat blanket song — remembered from childhood — to get the attention of potential bidders.
For some people attending the event looking at the items for bid — which included a dessert auction as well as the one for donated items — there were personal connections with both donors and locals with housing needs.
"My friend Tara, who made those cupcakes was coming and I have done a lot more work with the unhoused community this year," said Binta Wold, looking at the dessert auction items with Griffin Plush.
Wold said she works with Juneau Animal Rescue, and issues arise when pets and their owners need help.
"A lot of the time unhoused folks have pets, and maybe you give them some resources or they are getting harassed by people who don't think unhoused people should have pets, so we end up working with them," she said.
The Glory Hall’s 55 shelter beds have been full every night for the past two years, said Jorden Nigro, executive director of the Zach Gordon Youth Center, the emcee for Saturday’s event. She said the shelter also provides about 60,000 meals a year to local people in need.
The shelter experienced struggles during the past two years when the Juneau Assembly eliminated a designated campground for people experiencing homelessness, resulting in dozens of people setting up tents near the building so they could access meals and other services.
Last summer and fall, it closed its doors to people without beds at the shelter due to safety concerns before reopening them after the city’s cold-weather emergency shelter opened for the winter. The city-run shelter is intended as a night-to-night overnight facility that is closed during the day, while the Glory Hall offers longer-term assistance to its occupants.
The Assembly earlier this year approved keeping the shelter open during the warmer months for the first time, while also cracking down on illegal camping in public spaces. Kaia Quinto, executive director of the Juneau Housing First Collaborative, which operates the shelter and soup kitchen, said in an interview Saturday this summer went much smoother than last year.
"It was wonderful because of the warming shelter," she said.
Among those making soup and providing other food and drinks for the fundraiser were Red Spruce, Devil’s Club Brewery, Harbor Mountain Brewing, Queen of the North, Coppa, Island Pub, Grumpy’s, Rainbow Foods, Lemon Tree, The Rookery Cafe, Tide + Timber Cafe, The Hanger, U.S. Foods and Sysco Alaska.
Among those making bowls were University of Alaska Southeast professors Jeremy Kane and Boni Parker, who "collaborated with a group of 10 students to complete these bowls that have been in progress since the start of the fall semester," according to a post on the UAS Facebook page.
"Last week, artists glazed and fired all 100 bowls. The entire process took 40–60 hours of work, plus a 12-hour firing!" the post notes.
Other makers included Neil Slotnick with a series of small carved wood bowls, Jim Bowman, Paul Voelckers, Mary Pat Wyatt, Travis Smith and The Pottery Jungle.
"I don't know about you, but I have so many bowls at my house that came from all these Empty Bowls and I just love them because they're all different," she said. "They're all made by different makers, but they also all came from a cause that feels very important and close to my heart."
Heather Byrd, who grew up in Juneau, said she’s been coming to Empty Bowls for several years and "this is pretty much all I eat out of, are these kinds of bowls." She was with Matt Sykes, who moved to Juneau last year. He hefted a rust-colored ceramic bowl as his choice before entering the ballroom.
"It's got good depth, good feel to it, nice color," he said. "I mean, I never knew I was just into bowls, but after looking at all these bowls, I guess I'm a bowl enthusiast."
• Contact Mark Sabbatini at editor@juneauindependent.com or 907-957-2306.
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