It’s late into the evening at Angels Flowers in Santa Ana. The owners, three generations of Latinas, are shuffling through diapers, shoes, and other items set out for donation to those impacted by the fires in Los Angeles.
Olga Calderón, owner of the flower shop, stacks lightly colored blankets on one side of the store while her daughters, Jenny Acosta and Zulma Arzate, organize the rest of the items near their front door.
“We’ve become a donation hub here in Santa Ana,” Acosta says, pulling a plastic box from underneath the table. “There’s more shoes here.”
The family is widely known for their unique flower arrangements and hospitable personalities, as well as for organizing drives and collecting donations during challenging times. All to help out their community.
They are now among many residents and businesses in Santa Ana and other parts of Orange County who have quickly found ways to help after seeing the severity of the fires.
Realizing that a space was needed to serve as a donation hub prompted them to open up their flower shop to collect necessities before dropping them off to those most in need.
“It was very important for us to get on the ground and help our neighbors,” Arzate adds, expressing her love and appreciation for Los Angeles. “We travel there often and commute there to source our flowers.”
The family was initially overwhelmed when its first donation drive filled up so quickly and enabled them able to drop items off just two days after the fires started. The first place they donated to was an organization called It’s Bigger Than Us in Crenshaw. In the following days, they filled their flower delivery vans and dropped off more essentials to AltaMed and Malaya Midwifery.
The family plans to continue helping in this way as much as possible. Anyone interested in donating should follow their Instagram page for more information on what is needed.
“We want to thank everyone who helped us help others,” Calderón says in Spanish. “Cada quien puso su granito.” ("Everyone did their bit.")
A few miles away from Angels Flowers, El Pico De Gallo's donations come warm, stuffed, and wrapped in foil. The O.C. Mexican restaurant, located on 17th Street, has been around for over a decade. Much like the flower shop, it is a business that is all about giving back.
Owner Verenice Cuellar told L.A. TACO on Tuesday that she and her team didn’t think twice before deciding to donate their food to first responders after learning about the fires. They posted on Facebook groups for information on the best places to donate to firefighters, eventually learning of a few locations.
“One of our customers told us that her brother-in-law was at the 85th fire station in Los Angeles,” Cuellar says while finalizing a batch of burritos that were soon to be en route to L.A. “The customer said it had been three days that they (firefighters) were working nonstop. So I told my mom and we decided to take them food.”
After connecting with the firefighters of Station 85 in Harbor City, Cuellar was informed that volunteers at various locations needed food to help fuel them while they collected, organized, and passed out essentials to the community.
Shortly thereafter, they delivered 280 burritos among the volunteers at the Dream Center.
“We opened it to collect donations because we quickly realized this was way bigger than something we could do alone,” Cuellar says, as trays with burritos de asada, al pastor, pollo, and chile relleno were loaded onto a yellow bus. “We have a top donor named JFK Transports in Santa Ana, and along with the community donations, we’ve been able to donate 550 burritos altogether.”
By 10:45 a.m. this past Tuesday, they were ready to head to Los Angeles to drop off close to 300 hefty, protein-filled burritos personally.
“It was important for us to thank first responders and those impacted to know that your community is here for you. You are not alone,” Cuellar says, explaining that helping through food has always been their way. “My mom says that's why she has a restaurant, cuz she likes to share her food with everyone.”
The connection between Santa Ana and L.A., much like the two neighboring counties they consist of, is clear. Many residents commute to L.A. for work, or have family or friends who live there. Similarly, people who were raised in or once lived in Santa Ana have made the City of Angels their home over the years. Such is the case for artist, producer, director, and rapper Jay Taj, whose help and advocacy goes beyond pen and paper.
The rapper, who appeared on the latest season of Netflix’s “Rhythm and Flow,” was born and raised in Santa Ana. He calls Los Angeles his second home since moving there to pursue his dreams. Taj rightfully sought to create a donation drive in O.C. to collect essential items for families and pets.
“We’re just trying to make it a little easier for the people in Orange County to get supplies to the people who need it the most,” he tells L.A. TACO. “When it comes to the concept of community and culture, there’s a lot of overlap between being a Santanero and being an Angeleno, you know, and so when my neighbors need something we show up for them the same way they have done for me my whole life.”
It was the second donation drive done by The Love X Change, which was hosted at Santa Ana’s Suavecito headquarters. Aside from collecting essentials, baby products, and food, they have also collected walkers, pet supplies, and anything they can think of that a person may need if they lost their home.
“Everybody here in my hometown has a soft spot for those who have lost something because people in this city know what that feels like,” Jay says.
Maria Jose Jimenez and Sarah Marshall, two locals and volunteers we spoke with, feel the same as Jay, telling us about the importance of grassroots community organizing. They are part of The Girls Room in O.C., a community organization that focuses on collecting women products.
Over the last few weeks they have collected over 4,500 menstrual products that were donated to the organization It’s Bigger Than Us, which provides aid to fire victims.
“L.A. is our neighbor, and seeing so many Orange County businesses and regular people driving to L.A. to drop off donations,” Marshall says before pausing. “To me, that really shows the community we have built between the two cities.”
Other businesses in Santa Ana are also organizing, including Alta Baja Market, which is raising funds through an Instagram campaign with plans to donate the proceeds to Pasadena Humane, an assist for the care of animals.
Cervecito in Downtown Santa Ana is also co-hosting an event with Jacquie Rivera, daughter of the late Jenni Rivera, to raise funds for victims. The Coollab Project, an organization that hosts open mic and jam sessions in Santa Ana, also continues to collect items to donate to various drives.
So it’s safe to say that to many Santaneros, L.A. is more than just a neighboring city; it is family.
“The message, for those affected by the fire, from people like us here in O.C. and especially Santa Ana, is LOVE," says Jay Taj. "You got us, we got you."
