Healdsburg Free Store back in business to help Kincade fire victims

The air in Healdsburg was clean, the legions of first responders were gone. But the toll taken by the Kincade fire was evident in the line of people snaking around the building that formerly housed Di Vine Pizza.

Starting at 10 a.m. Thursday, that space became the Healdsburg Free Store, or, as some were calling it, the Healdsburg Free Store 2.0. Two years ago, in the aftermath of the Tubbs fire, the original Healdsburg Free Store had sprung up in a nearby warehouse.

That original incarnation of this “freetail” experience featured tens of thousands of items, from clothing to strollers to flashlights, diapers and toiletries, for those whose lives were disrupted by the North Bay inferno, which destroyed 5,334 homes in Sonoma County.

While the Kincade fire claimed many fewer homes, it took a severe toll on those who lost wages because they had to evacuate, “or their place of work closed, or burned down, or because schools closed and they had no place to take their kids,” said Ariel Kelley, CEO of Corazon Healdsburg.

That award-winning nonprofit operates out of the Healdsburg Community Center, which doubled as a local assistance center in the days after the Kincade fire. Based on the sheer numbers of people who showed up, seeking help, “We knew the need was going to be severe,” Kelley said.

The decision was made to bring back the Free Store. Organizers feared, at first, that donations wouldn’t be as robust as they were in 2017. As truckload after truckload pulled up to the old pizzeria this week, those fears were allayed.

Shortly after 10 a.m., Kelley excused herself from the registration table to assist the driver of a truck that had just arrived from Las Vegas bearing two pallets, she said, “of unknown merchandise.”

“It’s a little chaotic this morning,” she explained to a woman waiting in line. “It’s not Neiman Marcus in there.”

In truth, the shopping experience for the 200 or so people who showed up Thursday morning was quite orderly, with Kelley and co-worker Serena Gervreau carefully controlling the flow of foot traffic into the store.

Marcy Flores or Corazon Healdsburg kept track of visitors who’d lost homes - “I counted 21,” she said. Those shoppers were ushered to the front of the line, then led to a kind of VIP room stocked with such primo merchandise as T-Mobile cellphones, J. Jill merino wool sweaters, skirts, dresses, plush blankets, bags of Wolf coffee - ground and whole bean - and a stack of “Storybook” pillows from the Disney movie “Frozen” - one of which was tucked under the arm of a man with a creased, careworn face.

He asked to be identified, through a translator, as a member of the Laguna family, who’d lost their house of 20 years on Milk Barn Road. He also selected some items of clothing, and a Gillette shaving kit which, unlike the storybook pillow, was presumably for his own use.

In the back of the building, Fabian Reyes stepped out of the line to help carry into the store the boxes that had arrived on the truck from Las Vegas. They contained cleaning kits of some kind, and bore the cheerful legends “You are loved!” and “Stay Strong.”

Reyes, a roofer, had lost his house in the Alexander Valley, he said, and was there with his girlfriend to collect “blankets, food, clothes, hygiene, basic necessities,” he said. “We’re just trying to get back on our feet.”

When volunteers realized he’d lost his home, he went to the front of the line.

The owner of the building, Brian Spiers, dropped by. He expressed delight at how smoothly the operation was running, before asking Kelley to make sure shoppers did not block the entrance to the parking lot of their neighbor, the Tip Top Liquor Warehouse.

Savvy visitors arrived with both shopping bags and empty strollers - “that’s a ninja move,” said Kelley. No item flew off the shelves faster than the diapers and pullups supplied by a nonprofit called Baby2Baby.

Diapers are expensive, “so this is a big help,” said Maricela Dunne, who stood outside the store with her 6-week old daughter. She was waiting for her boyfriend, a Lyft driver who’d already lost income when he took time off to be home after her C-section. “And then this happened,” she said, referring to the fire.

By noon, the Free Store’s inventory had dwindled considerably. While it will be closed Friday and Saturday, the facility will be open for donations, of new items only, Kelley emphasized.

Some 30 pallets of various items will be delivered Monday.

An elderly woman approached the table, explaining that, although she had not lost her home, she was ill and out of work. “Does that count?”

“Everything counts,” declared Kelley, who cheerfully welcomed her to the store.