SPOKANE COUNTY, Wash. — Recovery efforts are still going strong in both Elk and Medical Lake after the devastating fires just over a year ago.
What started as a 3,000-square-foot home has now been reduced, but it isn't the end for the Smiley family, as it is just an unexpected new beginning.
"Just go forward and be positive because negative will get you nowhere," Pam Smiley said.
This is something the Smiley's say to themselves whenever they think of August 18, 2023, when they were told to leave their house of 33 years because of the Oregon Road Fire.
"They said you have to grab an armload of stuff and you have to leave now," Pam Smiley said.
And when they came back, there was nothing left.
"We drove up here and saw the devastation and it was just a total heartbreak," Jim Smiley said.
Now flash forward a year later and the Smiley's are just one of eight different families getting a house built for them by the Spokane Region Long Term Recovery Group.
Now, it isn't going to be what they had, but in a way, this new home means more to them because it was given to them by the generous hearts of the community.
Unfortunately, this isn't the first time that something like this has happened to the Smiley's.
"We had our house burn down before at Diamond Lake, and the real difference there was we had insurance then," Pam said. "This time, we didn't."
According to the Salvation Army, there are currently 54 cases open with disaster case managers from both the Elk and Medical Lake areas. Of those cases, only four percent of people who lost their home were insured, 50 percent were underinsured and 46% of people didn't have insurance at all.
The Spokane Region Long Term Recovery Group said that means over 30 families in Elk will still be living in temporary housing this winter.
Jeanna Swanson, the director of the New Hope Resource Center, said that close to 90 families have asked the Center for Disaster Relief for help, and a quarter of them were already registered with new hope.
This means that they were already low income, so their recovery process is already a lot more challenging because those families just don't have as much resources to recover on their own.
The Spokane Region Long Term Recovery Group said currently, there are about 30 families still without permanent housing in Elk, and the Smiley's say construction for their new house could potentially take as long as next spring.
But as the Smiley's say, be positive because being negative will get you nowhere.
"I don't know what else to say but thankful, grateful, and there is always something to look forward to," Pam said.