In 1989, my wife, Kate, and I were living and working in my hometown of Oakland while going through a challenging time after my 16-year-old daughter’s untimely death in an automobile accident. Friends offered us the use of their second home in Inverness as a refuge and sanctuary. Being out in nature, walking the beaches and hiking the trails, helped us begin to heal. The experience eventually inspired us to move here and open Point Reyes Books. I am forever grateful for our friends’ recognition of our need and for their generosity. Now things have come full circle, and we have had the opportunity to share our home with others in need of rest and healing.
“Sanctuary” is often associated with a place of refuge and safety for humans or a place of protection for wildlife and nature. For many of us, West Marin is the definition of a sanctuary. For other people, the idea is not at all familiar—or available.
Before moving to Inverness, I had worked as a community organizer and often witnessed how those on the front line of social and environmental justice work rarely had breaks for self-care or to recharge. They either thought they shouldn’t take the time, or they didn’t have the resources to find a sanctuary.
Today, community organizers and frontline workers are experiencing intense, divisive, politically charged and sometimes dangerous environments. They are absorbing increasing levels of both their own and their communities’ trauma. To sustain their critically important work and the deep societal transformation they envision, they must be able to renew and heal themselves.
In 2019, out of a desire to bridge my life in West Marin with the growing needs of community organizers in Oakland, I conceived of the Point Reyes Sanctuary to provide opportunities for rest and quiet through one-week stays at second homes, guest cottages and vacation rentals.
I approached Windcall Institute, an Oakland-based national nonprofit organization that for 33 years has offered three-week sabbaticals to social and environmental justice and labor organizers around the country. I proposed that they do the necessary outreach and vetting of deserving organizers while I found the homes in West Marin. Windcall enthusiastically responded and employed Suzanne d’Coney as our site coordinator last year.
Since then, 30 organizers have come here for one-week stays, primarily from cities around the Bay Area, staying in 10 homes generously shared by their owners. Most had never had time off in the sort of setting West Marin offers—with nothing to do besides sleep, recreate and rejuvenate. Windcall provides each sanctuary resident with a stipend for expenses for the week and nine months of personal coaching and workshops to integrate ongoing healing and resilience practices into their daily lives. For more information or to support the Point Reyes Sanctuary, contact Windcall Institute through their website, www.windcall.org.
The need is great, and so is our potential. There are approximately 2,000 second homes on the Marin coast from Stinson Beach to Dillon Beach, and more than 500 of these homes are registered as short-term vacation rentals. Many sit vacant for long periods. Having fewer full-time residents impacts our communities in ways we know all too well: the growing dearth of affordable and rental housing, a rural economy that depends on seasonal visitors and a reduction in basic services such as health, education and transit due to the smaller number of full-time residents.
I invite those of us with the good fortune and privilege to own second homes and vacation rentals in this land of such beauty to respond to these tumultuous times by providing places of brief respite for frontline workers, be they justice or environmental organizers, political activists, teachers, domestic workers, caregivers, health care providers or other essential workers.
If you need support as to how you might open your home or connect with frontline and essential workers seeking a rest, write to me at [email protected]. Your act of generosity will be a gift both to yourself and to the recipient.
Steve Costa is the former co-owner of Point Reyes Books and co-founder of the West Main Fund. He lives in Inverness.