Thirty-two years ago this month, the small and sparkling jewel-like city by the sea, Seal Beach, became the birthplace and the home of a little domestic violence shelter program called Interval House.
The love and support that we received from this small, idyllic, and unique city surrounded our program and nurtured our growth each and every day, and every year that followed.
Interval House experienced the goodness, the charm, the hospitality and the generosity of small-town life as the idealistic volunteers, groups, and service clubs from this city took us under their wings and kept us strong as we grew.
In 1979, when we opened our little three-bedroom emergency shelter in Seal Beach, the sailors from the Navy Base painted and repaired it to make it home to victims and their children.
The then police chief (a member of our first Board of Directors) offered use of the Seal Beach Police Department for office space, training, overflow, and for our holiday donation drop-off location.
Home phone numbers of the police chief, newspaper editor, local doctors, and community leaders made up, at the time, much of our Rolodex.
With this incredible beginning, Interval House has grown into a nationally recognized, model domestic violence program with shelters, transitional housing and service sites in many of the surrounding cities in Long Beach and Orange County.
Irony of Ironies, October is National Domestic Violence Awareness Month and this town that created such a force in the domestic violence movement in support of Interval House has suffered the ultimate destructiveness of domestic violence in a most horrific way.
The events of this past week are an aberrant testimony that, yes of course, there is evil in this world. However, we know that the individuals of Seal Beach will not be defined by it.
We will remain strong because we know that the people of Seal Beach will not lose sight of who you are, who you have been as a community—joined to one another and the greater community through altruism, hospitality, faith, and hopefulness.
Please know in your hearts and in your minds that thousands of women, children, and men’s lives have been literally saved by the support of this city for Interval House over the past 32 years.
For all of the lives that the generous people of Seal Beach have saved, tragedies thwarted, and futures transformed due to your decades of support for victims of domestic violence, we say a heart-felt thank you.
You had the courage and the hospitality that began a movement that has spread well beyond the boundaries of Seal Beach and all across California.
Our hearts, our love, and our gratitude go out to each and every one of you for your love and support as individuals and as a community intrinsic to our history and evolution.
Remember the collective spirit of Seal Beach has impacted the thousands of people that temporarily called your city home during some of the darkest days of their lives. May the goodness, strength, and authenticity of your support to so many now sustain all of you, and most especially the families and loved ones of the innocent victims during this painful and challenging time.
Carol Williams is the executive director of Interval House crisis shelters for victims of domestic violence.
