Sonoma Stories: Santa Rosa women purchase local gift cards, give them to fire survivors

The double-the-good idea came to Tracy Merriken early on in the era of grief, shock and uncertainty spawned by the firestorms of last October.

Merriken's concept: Collect dollars to purchase gift cards for families with school-age children that lost their homes to the historic disaster. And then show some love, too, to local retailers reeling from the fallout by purchasing the cards from them, rather than from national chains.

Merriken and the eight other women who created Santa Rosa Team Phoenix aimed to collect $315,000 - enough to give $400 in gift cards or certificates to the families of each of the 781 Santa Rosa City Schools students whose homes were destroyed.

“It truly started the day after the fires,” Merriken said.

Crushed by the human toll of the catastrophe, she went onto Facebook to ask for help to offer displaced survivors a bit of relief, comfort or distraction through the presentation of a little mad money. In flowed gift cards and cash, and offers of assistance.

Before the end of this past school year, the appeal took in more than $18,000 and distributed $400 in gift certificates or cards to 46 graduating Piner and Santa Rosa high school seniors who lost their homes. The women wanted to get the gifts to as many qualified members of the Class of 2018 as possible before they scatter.

Why $400?

Merriken and the team's Kim Kobre said that seems like a reasonable amount for a family that survived the disaster to spend on a bit of fun: Dinner out, an outing to a sports and games center, perhaps some shopping.

The women purchased cards and certificates at a number of fire-impacted north Santa Rosa businesses, including Molsberry's Market, Epicenter Sports & Entertainment, Luigi's Restaurant, Kaede Japanese restaurant, Mel's Fish & Chips and Royal China.

“It's an awesome program that they have going,” said Joe Molsberry, whose family supermarket in Larkfield came close to burning. Neighborhoods all around the store were ravaged.

Molsberry said it was another gratifying sign of community support when members of Santa Rosa Team Phoenix came in and purchased $4,500 in gift certificates for distribution to fire survivors.

Many regular shoppers who lost their homes and were forced to move continue to return to the market for their groceries, Molsberry said.

“We've had great support from people outside the area,” he added. Though business is down “quite a bit,” he said, “we're grateful that we're still standing.

“There are people who lost everything.”

Molsberry said the market is doing what it can to support and encourage fire survivors, and he and his family appreciate all that initiatives such as Santa Rosa Team Phoenix are doing.

Merriken and Kobre and the other team members - Tiffany Templeton, Karey Barnett, Dena McDonald, Kim Schroeder, Ashley Haskins, Kim Kinahan and Leslie Gude-Dunbar - appeal for donations through their website, santarosateamphoenix.org. Donations go through their nonprofit partner, Inclusion Revolution, Inc., of Windsor.

The women also urge members of the community to talk up the gift-cards project on social media - and to reach out to any celebrities and influential people they know, asking them to give a shout-out to Santa Rosa Team Phoenix.

On its website is a letter about the mission that Merriken and her team would love to see sent to famous and powerful people across the country.

Kobre and Merriken got the ball rolling with people of influence last February at the celebrity-rich AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am golf tournament. Kobre has volunteered at the Pro-Am for 18 years, and five years ago recruited Merriken to volunteer, too.

This year, the pair received permission to approach the players as they finished and request videotaped statements of support for their fire relief effort.

“I just grabbed them as they were coming off the 18th (hole),” said Merriken.

Ex-49er Steve Young went on camera to promote the gift-cards project, along with Green Bay Packers quarterback Aaron Rodgers and Washington Redskins quarterback Alex Smith; TV host Chris Harrison of “The Bachelor;” pro golfer Jason Day; Larry the Cable Guy; model-actress Kelly Rohrbach; country singers Clay Walker, Jake Owen and Colt Ford; Arizona Cardinals receiver Larry Fitzgerald; No Doubt drummer Adrian Young; and actors Ray Romano and Josh Duhamel.

Also at the golf tournament, Merriken approached investments giant Charles Schwab. He arranged not only for a Twitter shout-out to Santa Rosa Team Phoenix, but a $10,000 donation.

The women on the team are attracting dollars to the cause also through the sales of a necklace by jewelry maker Michele Rhodes that features a brass pendant hand-stamped with #SantaRosaStrong.

So far, the entire effort has brought in nearly $40,000. The distribution of gift cards and certificates began shortly before the end of the academic year.

Team members told Santa Rosa City Schools officials of their quest, and were told that they could have the number of students from each school who lost their homes. No names, just the numbers.

Merriken, Kobre and other Team Phoenix women delivered 26 packets of $400 gift cards and certificates to Piner High and another 22 packets to Santa Rosa High. All went to fire survivors about to graduate.

Once classes resume this fall, the team members will go to Montgomery High with gift packets, then move on to Carrillo. They will leave the gift cards and certificates first for seniors, then juniors, sophomores and freshmen.

The plan is to then distribute fire-relief gifts to middle-schoolers who lost their homes, then to grade schoolers.

Merriken said she and her team hope the gesture will be a boost to the students' families as they work to rebuild, or to do whatever it is they'll do as they recover from the loss of their homes.

Injected Kobre, “These people can't be forgotten.”

She and Merriken and the others are beginning to plot a special event to mark the first anniversary of the fires this October.

You can reach Staff Writer Chris Smith at 707-521-5211 and chris.smith@pressdemocrat.com