MindSite News: How a Mental Health Community Saved Lives in LA Fire

by Eliza Partika February 28, 2025

As fire erupted in the Hollywood Hills in early January, with flames visible as far away as the iconic Hollywood Walk of Fame, the leaders of Fountain House Hollywood sprang into action.

Like other clubhouses run by Fountain House, the Hollywood clubhouse is a healing community run by people with serious mental health conditions. Dozens of members of the mental health clubhouse were scattered all over Hollywood when the order for evacuation began, and the most urgent question was: Would Fountain House be able to reach them in time?

The clubhouse’s community partner, Hollywood 4WRD, rushed to create an emergency provider contact group, making it possible to immediately reach out to all 51 members of Fountain House. Besides relaying the orders to evacuate, callers shared critical resources for rides, food and shelter.

Among those called was Eric Birky, a 63-year-old, 10-year resident of LA and a member of Fountain House Hollywood. He was watching the flames inch closer to his home near Hollywood Adventist, the church he attended regularly, when he got the evacuation order.

Birky was hesitant to leave – because of a recent knee surgery, he couldn’t move as quickly – but a ride offer from someone at his church prompted his evacuation. He threw his cat into her carrier, packed clothes and basic necessities, and left with acquaintances from his church.

The fires brought up previous traumas for him, including living through tornadoes in Wisconsin and dust bowls in Arizona – except in those cases he was able to hide out in a cellar until the crisis had passed. But Birky said having the support, both from his church and Fountain House Hollywood, helped him recover quickly after the evacuation.

If the fire had been closer, escaping with his cat and bags along with an injured knee and a cane might have more difficult, Birky recalls. “Thank God the elevator had not shut down yet,” he said. “Had the elevator shut down, I would just have the stairs. And, you know, luckily, I only live on the second floor, but…I would have to try to struggle to get out as fast as I could.”

“I was truly impressed by the constant flow of communication we maintained, even as some coordinators faced personal challenges with their own homes in jeopardy.” -- Jillian Santoro, clubhouse director for Fountain House Hollywood

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Jillian Santoro is the clubhouse director for Fountain House Hollywood. She praised “the tremendous efforts” of the Hollywood 2.0 provider community and the Los Angeles County Department of Mental Health in getting Fountain House clubhouse members and others through the crisis, as well as the outreach and emergency hotline set up by Hollywood 4WRD (which stands for 4 Walls, A Roof, and a Door), a coalition leading the conversation on preventing and ending street homelessness in Greater Hollywood since 2008.

“While Hollywood is globally renowned, it remains a tightly knit community where people genuinely care for one another, regardless of socio-economic backgrounds,” Santoro said. “I was truly impressed by the constant flow of communication we maintained, even as some coordinators faced personal challenges with their own homes in jeopardy.”

And it wasn’t just people in California that were pitching in.

“Our sister clubhouses in NYC played a vital role in supporting our members during this difficult time,” Santoro said. “They made a concerted effort to reach out to each of our 51 members daily, checking in on their well-being and relaying any necessary assistance back to us. This level of commitment underscored the strength of our community and the unwavering support we have for one another.”

Hope Dixon, another Hollywood clubhouse member, remembers getting the hotline call to evacuate from Fountain House. She could see the flames and smoke from her balcony as the fire descended upon Hollywood’s Sunset Boulevard from Runyon Canyon, close to where she was living on a friend’s couch. Dixon, in her 30s and a five-year resident of Los Angeles, had been homeless for a year. In 2023, she left her apartment after the living conditions became untenable. After she lost her job at a Hollywood production company – fallout from recent strikes and union organizing – she lived in her car, in a tent, in her storage unit, and then on various couches, until she came to settle with a roommate near Sunset Boulevard.

“I was already in survival mode and feeling stressed,” she recalls. “I was really already packed; I just, I tried to condense what I had. Because in my mind, I’m like, okay, I can look out on the balcony, and we can see smoke, like we can see it. We can smell it. Our eyes are burning. I just kept picturing myself, like, running down Hollywood Boulevard with my suitcase screaming, running from the fire. But I didn’t want to leave because I wasn’t sure I was going to make it back. I would have nowhere else to go.”

"I just kept picturing myself running down Hollywood Boulevard with my suitcase, screaming, running from the fire. But I didn’t want to leave because I would have nowhere else to go.” -- Hope Dixon

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Fountain House was founded in 1948 in New York with a novel clubhouse model: a non-clinical community space that offers resources to help people access clinical support, participate in career development and job searches, develop social connections, and work towards goals like employment, housing and education. The Hollywood branch – one of more than 370 clubhouses in 33 countries around the world – has operated since July 2024. It focuses on relationship development, social engagement and providing feedback on strengths, needs and challenges, along with an emphasis on letting members be in charge of their own recovery.

A 2021 study in the Canadian Journal of Community Mental Health found that psychiatric hospitalizations among 656 clubhouse members fell by more than half after they joined the program. Members of accredited clubhouses worldwide are also less likely to interact with the criminal justice system and are employed at a rate that’s double that of people in public mental health systems.

The virtual and in-person support from Fountain House members and staff who knew what people were going through during the fire meant the world to Dixon.

“I was so shocked that they actually thought about me: ‘Do you need any food? Do you have any pets? Are you safe and everything?’” she recalls. “I was without shelter and didn’t have stability at all. I have depression already, I get paranoid living with certain people, so I’ve never experienced that before. It made me feel really big in the world. Sometimes I feel overlooked or like they don’t really care. (This) made me feel cared for and loved.”

Birky, who’s been with Fountain House L.A. since its inception three years ago, is one of its ambassador members. He provides resources to members and helps them find what they need to meet their goals, whether it’s food, shelter, a job, health care or simply someone to listen.

Birky told Mind Site News that during an emergency, having someone like himself, who can share his experience with crises and overcoming them, goes a long way with people who just need someone to pay attention.

For a long time, Birky added, mental illness has been seen as something to recover from, but that doesn’t tell someone’s whole story. “People look at others with mental illness like, well, there’s something wrong with them, and they’re not worth anything,” he said. “But (the clubhouse has) this concept, saying, “Oh yes, they are worth something, and yes, they can learn skills and they can recover, and they can learn how to love themselves and be loved by other people.”

Evacuated Fountain House members reported that they were getting everything they needed during the emergency, said McKenzie Dowdle, the program director at Fountain House. Dowdle underscores the importance of human connection and community in fostering the trust and resilience needed to weather a terrifying crisis like the wildfires.

Fountain House members, she said, “feel empowered to have control over their own recovery and their own life. Being able to rely on each other is very healing, I think, because especially with individuals with serious mental illness, you’re told where to be, when to be there, how to do it, and it takes away that humanity. When a member knows they have control over their own recovery, as well as being a support system for another person, it helps them build trust again.”

“I was so shocked that they actually thought about me: ‘Do you need any food? Do you have any pets? Are you safe?’ It made me feel really big in the world. Sometimes I feel overlooked and this made me feel cared for and loved.” -- Hope Dixon

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After the fire was under control and the Sunset evacuation order lifted, Dixon and Birky returned to Hollywood – and a new chapter in their lives.

Dixon moved out of the temporary apartment where she was staying and found a spot at a shelter in Hollywood, which has given her enough stability to search for jobs. Birky, who is also looking to relocate, is hopeful he will find a new apartment with the assistance of Fountain House.

In the midst of uncertainty, both are finding productive ways to cope. Birky plans to pursue music, art and an education at Santa Monica College. Dixon plans to find work and stable housing and to continue her involvement with Fountain House.

“I’m grateful I have the resources, So, even though I have been through something I never thought I would have to go through, I am healthy, and I have places I can go,” Birky said.

Dixon also feels a new sense of hope and purpose.

“I feel like I can excel and do something bigger, you know, and Fountain House really gave me that push to keep on believing in myself and striving for it,” said Dixon, who adds that she wants to get healthy both mentally and physically. “So that’s what I want to do. I want to keep growing.”

This article was originally published HERE in Mindsite News. Support for the story was provided by the California Health Care Foundation and the California Wellness Foundation.