One-stop shopping for fire aid at Santa Rosa assistance center
Hoping to help those who’ve lost anything or everything in the Tubbs Fire, Sonoma County officials have opened a Local Assistance Center in down- town Santa Rosa.
Over the weekend, hundreds lined up for the center, which offers services from federal, state and local agencies, utilities, nonprofits and insurance companies. Fire victims can register with the Federal Emergency Management Agency, find out how to turn off their garbage collection, and get sleeping bags, housing assistance and, yes, new driver’s licenses.
Among them were Lindsay Osborne and Jeff Reitz.
When the power went out in their Santa Rosa home early Monday, the cable TV box started beeping. Reitz got out of bed to quiet the racket and smelled smoke. He poked his head outside, saw the glowing red-orange in the distance and decided it was time to evacuate.
In five minutes, they grabbed their 5-year-old son, two dogs, two laptops and a handful of memory cards storing family photos.
“We left thinking we were leaving as a precautionary thing,” Osborne said, “We weren’t thinking we would be returning to nothing.”
Their home, along with those of most of their neighbors, was destroyed. And with it Osborne’s purse, including her license.
In a back room of the as-
tance center, located in a warren of abandoned offices on the ground floor of the Santa Rosa Press Democrat building, the Department of Motor Vehicles set up shop and was taking photographs and issuing new licenses to those who lost them in the fire.
“They’re taking pictures? Today? Oh no,” said Osborne, 39 , an inventory planner for athletic clothing company Athleta. “Maybe they can just use my old one.”
She was nonetheless pleased to learn she could leave with a new license. And while identification was their main concern, her husband, 39, who had been preparing to open a business, Barley & Bine Beer Cafe, in Windsor, said they had been told they would probably realize they needed more help once they got inside.
Fire survivors started at a table where county workers and volunteers helped them assess their needs, then mapped out an agenda for them to find help at the center. Most started at the FEMA booths, where they could register for individual assistance, which can also be done online at DisasterAssistance.gov.
Aside from FEMA registration, which starts the process of obtaining federal assistance, some of the most popular services were replacing driver’s licenses and birth and marriage certificates and talking with utilities about shutting down or restoring services, said Michael Gossman. Gossman, whose day job is finance director for the Sonoma County Water Agency, is acting as the manager of the center.
“We’re trying to get done as much as we can in one stop so survivors don’t have to go all over the place,” he said.
The center opened Saturday and served 387 people, with some waiting three hours to get inside. On Sunday, lines were much shorter, and 181 people had been helped by noon. The center, at 427 Mendocino Ave., is open daily from 9 a.m. to 7 p.m.