Malibu families struggling to recover after the Woolsey Fire are receiving support from the “Adopt-a-Family” project of “Malibu Love.”
The program was the brainchild of homemaker and mom Tahia Hocking. Website founder Kelly Wirht, a web designer who grew up in Malibu, and local Shayna Spreckman helped make it happen.
Visit malibulove.org/families-in-need to see all the families listed and donate.
The requirement for a family to sign up is that they must have lost their home in the Woolsey Fire. Families are vetted by providing a FEMA claim number; pictures of their damaged property and a cross check of addresses with the City of Malibu website listing damaged/total loss properties.
The White family
Professional dancers Ethan and Nikki White have two children: Dax, age five, in kindergarten at Webster Elementary School, and Skye, age two, at Malibu Methodist Nursery School. Their Malibu home burned down in the Woolsey Fire, including “the attached vacation rentals, which represented a significant part of our income and allowed us to spend so much time volunteering and working in the arts and community development,” Nikki wrote. The Whites are staying with Ethan’s family in Santa Fe, NM, for now, making return trips to Malibu as needed for debris clearance. They plan to come back to Malibu full-time this summer and live in a mobile or temporary home on their property.
Ethan and Nikki both were professional dancers for about 15 years, including stints on Paula Abdul’s “Live to Dance” competition. The couple met at the Smuin Ballet in San Francisco and had been working as self-employed choreographers and dance instructors in various LA-area studios and on various productions like the “Nutcracker” since about 2012. In Malibu, Nikki has taught at Dance Star.
The couple has become increasingly more involved in the Malibu community. They established the “4 the Village” nonprofit and also created “Malibu Moves” to teach community volunteers a flash mob dance routine at last year’s Chili Cook-Off. Nikki taught regular classes on Westward Beach and offered annual ballet camps at the Malibu Playhouse. The couple’s first community production took place last April at Juan Cabrillo Elementary School with “Peter Pan.” They also planned weekly dance classes at the Boys & Girls Club.
When they evacuated their home before the fire, Ethan spent hours packing the Nutcracker costumes needed for a performance the following week; but the family of four only took one suitcase between them.
“I initially didn’t want to accept help, but with the encouragement of several friends, I set up a GoFundMe campaign,” Nikki said—one that she hopes to pay forward in the future.
“Our most immediate needs are income, advice and guidance in the rebuilding process, and we also might need jobs,” Nikki wrote. “Ethan is getting his master’s in consumer psychology from USC and will be looking for a market research or data analysis position.”
The Johns family
The Johns family, Taylor and Katie (Kaitlin), purchased their first home in September 2017 in the Seminole Springs Mobile Home Park, near Kanan and Mulholland. Fourteen months later, it was one of the 119 homes in that neighborhood destroyed by the Woolsey Fire. They had spent months renovating their home; only to see it go up in smoke.
“We are heartbroken by the loss,” wrote Katie. “In addition to the loss of artworks, surfboards, skateboards, camping equipment, clothing and sentimental items left behind, we’re particularly impacted by the loss of Taylor’s expensive and extensive kit of photography and cinematography equipment, which is necessary for his business as an independent cinematographer.”
Taylor has been an associate producer at Moxie Firecracker Films in Malibu since graduating from Pepperdine University in 2012 with a degree in film studies. His film credits there include “Make Every Wave: The Life of Laird Hamilton” (2017), “Without a Net: The Digital Divide in America, narrated by Jamie Foxx” (2017), the Academy Award-nominated documentary “Last Days in Vietnam” (2015), “MAKERS: Women in Politics” (2014), “MAKERS: Women in Hollywood” (2014) and “Ethel” (2013).
Katie’s mother wrote that the couple needs “funds urgently to cover everything you can think of—temporary shelter, rental car, home goods, clothes, toiletries and even simple things like a phone charger. Taylor was self-employed and worked out of his home office. He lost all computers, cameras and movie equipment.”
Katie wrote to TMT, “We are gratefully staying with friends on Point Dume and feel really lucky to be able to remain close in location to our jobs and community. We definitely plan to rebuild in Seminole Springs and are very much looking forward to calling it home again in the future.”
