After a series of wildfires in Northern California wrought devastation across countryside and residential areas in Napa, Sonoma, and Santa Rosa the second week of October, social media feeds filled with images of leveled suburbs and reports of lives lost.
Central Coast resident Daneal Nally was like most, watching the news and reports of “apocalyptic” destruction, she said. But then she made a decision.
“I just had one of those feelings, like I kind of had to make a decision,” Nally said, “where you think to yourself, ‘Am I just, as a human being, going to keep scrolling through these images, or what, if anything, could I as one woman do to help these people?’”
She stood up and texted her husband, brothers, and father. The family owns two wastewater treatment and equipment businesses in Arroyo Grande—Cloacina and Fluid Resource Management. They share a large office and warehouse space, which she wanted to use to start a drive to support those who lost homes and more in the fires.
Everyone else was onboard with the idea immediately, she said.
“I thought we could fill our conference room with supplies, but we did that in the first two days,” she said. “We have a 21,000 square-foot building … and we’ve had to have projects come to a halt to deal with the amount of stuff that we have received.”
The drive lasted through Oct. 19, and multiple businesses and agencies reached out to Nally to provide drop-off locations and then transport goods to their office.
Jennifer Herbaugh, an advertising executive at the Sun, is friends with Nally, and noticed her post about the drive on social media. Both the Sun and New Times offices became drop-off centers as well, where dozens of locals brought flats of bottled water, bags of clothing or towels, and much-needed toiletries like toothpaste and shampoo.
“We just felt like we needed to help as well, do our part, whatever we could,” Herbaugh said. “We have these big empty offices that have space and could accept donations.”
Herbaugh said that Sun employees Kim Rosa, Colleen Garcia, and herself took eight crammed carloads of goods to the Cloacina office in Arroyo Grande, and the New Times office saw at least three truckloads go as well.
Other local businesses and institutions that served as drop-off centers included Village Pediatrics in Arroyo Grande, Murphy Home Loans in Pismo Beach, the city of San Luis Obispo’s corporation yard, Arroyo Grande High School, Century 21 Hometown Realty in SLO, Burdine Printing in Arroyo Grande, and PG&E employees at Diablo Canyon.
What started out as a drive for nonperishable food and water and some lightly used clothes expanded to include a lot more goods that locals wanted to donate, Nally explained. There were donations of plates, silverware, and other kitchen goods, as well as toys for kids or Halloween costumes.
“We didn’t ask for any of that stuff, but it was like, think about your entire house burning down,” she said. “I don’t think people really stop and think about all the money that you have in just your kitchen alone, how much money would it take to replace everything in there, all the drawers of stuff.”
People showed up directly to Cloacina’s office with goods and also to donate their time helping manage all the stuff coming in. Locals spent hours sorting the donations, Nally explained, so that clothing was packaged by size, not just by men’s, women’s, or children’s clothes, she said.
Other items were shrink-wrapped or repackaged, she said, and many included cards or handwritten notes to whoever would receive the goods.
“Honestly, it has been amazing what is happening in this community,” Nally said. “I’ve never seen anything like this before.”
The amount of goods that came in was staggering, Nally said, and she and her family had planned to rent moving trucks to ship it all up north. That was before Bruce Lackey, owner of Ritchie Trucking Company, donated multiple semi-truck trips with his company’s resources.
As of Oct. 19, they had already seen one semi-truck packed with donations head north, and Nally anticipated at least two or maybe even three more truckloads. Everything was headed to a centralized location, Nally explained, which would then send out goods to affected areas based on varying needs.
It was an incredible amount of work, Nally said, but she was also amazed at the sheer amount of goods and help she and her family received.
“The Central Coast is filled with such amazing families, and I know that people feel like they want to do something,” Nally said. “We sit here sort of helpless while natural disasters and tragedies are happening in different parts of the country, and I think what’s different about this one is it’s close to home. This is a situation where you can do something; you can get your hands dirty.”
Locals like Donna Kuzminski, who donated a few bags of goods to the Sun office after she saw a notice online, agreed—she was just glad for an opportunity to help.
“I have empathy for those people,” Kuzminksi said. “If I had nothing, I would hope that somebody would have compassion to help me too.”
Managing Editor Joe Payne can be reached at jpayne@santamariasun.com.
This article appears in Oct 26 – Nov 2, 2017.