Road to recovery at The Longest Table in the Palisades

Eddie Navarro, who runs the recently opened Pali Drip, poses for a photograph during the second annual Longest Table Potluck Picnic Sunday, Oct. 4, 2026, on Pampas Ricas Blvd. in Pacific Palisades, Calif. Navarro originally opened Estate Coffee in 2018 but lost the business in the 2025 fires. He returned to Pacific Palisades because of his connection to the community. (Guillermo De La Barreda | The Corsair)

Pacific Palisades community members Robert Lamb (Left) and Nancy Lamb (Right) pose for a photograph during the second annual Longest Table Potluck Picnic Sunday, Oct. 4, 2026, on Pampas Ricas Blvd. in Pacific Palisades, Calif. The event was organized by residents Billy Jones, Lee Ann Daly, Deb Javerbaum, Fati Adeli and Jimmy Dunne as an opportunity to rebuild a sense of community after the 2025 Pacific Palisades fires. (Guillermo De La Barreda | The Corsair)

Pacific Palisades community member Eleanor Keare interacts with other residents during the second annual Longest Table Potluck Picnic Sunday, Oct. 4, 2026, on Pampas Ricas Blvd. in Pacific Palisades, Calif. Keare, who currently lives in the Bay Area, lived in Pacific Palisades for seven years. She is rebuilding her home and hopes to return sometime in 2028. (Guillermo De La Barreda | The Corsair)

Pacific Palisades High School Ambassadors pose for a photograph during the second annual Longest Table Potluck Picnic Sunday, Oct. 4, 2026, on Pampas Ricas Blvd. in Pacific Palisades, Calif. The students volunteered to help set up and break down the event, which was organized by residents Billy Jones, Lee Ann Daly, Deb Javerbaum, Fati Adeli and Jimmy Dunne as an opportunity to rebuild a sense of community after the 2025 Pacific Palisades fires. (Guillermo De La Barreda | The Corsair)

Pacific Palisades community members enjoy food and beverages and catch up despite the heat during the second annual Longest Table Potluck Picnic Sunday, Oct. 4, 2026, on Pampas Ricas Blvd. in Pacific Palisades, Calif. The event was organized by residents Billy Jones, Lee Ann Daly, Deb Javerbaum, Fati Adeli and Jimmy Dunne as an opportunity to rebuild a sense of community after the 2025 Pacific Palisades fires. (Guillermo De La Barreda | The Corsair)

Signs display the names of neighborhoods affected by the 2025 Pacific Palisades fires during the second annual Longest Table Potluck Picnic Sunday, Oct. 4, 2026, on Pampas Ricas Blvd. in Pacific Palisades, Calif. Two years after the fires, the Pacific Palisades community continues to rebuild, with the event offering an opportunity for residents to reconnect and strengthen a sense of community. (Guillermo De La Barreda | The Corsair)

Pacific Palisades Longest Table organizers (L to R) Lee Ann Daly, Fati Adeli, Deb Javerbaum, and Billy Jones speak during the second Annual Longest Table Potluck Picnic on Sunday, Oct. 4th, 2026, at Pampas Ricas Blvd in Pacific Palisades, Calif. The event is an opportunity to rebuild a sense of community after the 2025 Pacific Palisades fires. (Guillermo De La Barreda | The Corsair)

Pacific Palisades community members enjoy food during the second Annual Longest Table Potluck Picnic on Sunday, Oct. 4th, 2026, at Pampas Ricas Blvd in Pacific Palisades, Calif. The event is organized by residents Billy Jones, Lee Ann Daly, Deb Javerbaum, Fati Adeli and Jimmy Dunne as an opportunity to rebuild a sense of community after the 2025 Pacific Palisades fires. (Guillermo De La Barreda | The Corsair)

Santa Monica College (SMC) Continuing Education professor Heather Lyle (Left) and her husband Michael Lyle (Right) pose for a photograph during the 2nd Annual Longest Table Potluck Picnic on Sunday, Oct. 4th, 2026, at Pampas Ricas Blvd in Pacific Palisades, Calif. Heather has taught Contemporary Singing Techniques at SMC for 15 years. The couple is rebuilding their home after losing it in the 2025 Pacific Palisades fires. They had moved to the Pacific Palisades 33 years ago after losing a previous home in the 1993 Malibu fires. (Guillermo De La Barreda | The Corsair)

Community organizer and Palisades resident Lee Ann Daly explained that after the 2025 fires forced many to leave their homes, a Palisadian diaspora formed, scattering residents across the world. Her friend and fellow resident Billy Jones said Daly and two other locals felt isolated last year after the fires and searched for a way to connect with friends and neighbors. Jones then reached out to The Longest Table, a nonprofit founded in Chelsea, New York,, during the COVID-19 pandemic that brings communities together through organizing potlucks.

“Sort of like COVID in a way, you have your four or five people that you talk to all the time, but there are all of these other people who are in your heart; they’re not peripheral. They’re important to you, but you just don’t run into them because everybody has been cast to the wind,” Daly said. 

The potluck Jones hosted last year drew around 720 people, and this Sunday’s event was planned to attract 900. Tables stretched from one end of Pampas Ricas Boulevard to the other underneath canopies lining the street. Despite the intense afternoon heat,  residents filled the tables, eating, talking and laughing with one another throughout the two-hour event.

Small business owners like Eddie Navaro said the event was a great opportunity to advertise his recently reopened coffee shop inside Prima Cantina. Navaro lost his original shop in the fire and struggled to find funding to come back to the Palisades until another small-business owner, Michelle Murphy, reached out with an idea for how he could return by partnering with Prima Cantina.

Navaro said he was working for another coffee shop in Santa Monica when Murphy presented him with the idea, but he loved it so much he quit his job immediately and returned earlier that summer.

“I’m back, Eddie’s back,” Navaro said, describing the sign hanging in Prima Cantina’s window as his response to his old customers constantly asking when he would reopen.

Contemporary singing professor Heather Lyle said she has taught continuing education classes at SMC for over 15 years and has lived in the Palisades for 33 years.. Her husband, Michael Lyle, said this wasn’t the first time they lost their home; they first moved to the Palisades after losing their first home together in the 1993 Malibu fire.

“We lost everything, and I actually had this tattoo. In the Woolsey Fire, my best friend lost her place, and I sat with her all day and kind of carried her on my back. So that's the Greek word for survivor,” Michael. Lyle said, pointing to a tattoo with three flames representing the two fires he’s survived and the one he helped his friend Alicia Stevenson through.

Heather said she wants to rebuild and is stressed about an upcoming vote at the condominium complex where she and her husband live. Michael, on the other hand, said he wasn’t as concerned if it didn’t work out, and that they’re considering moving to Mallorca, Spain, as a backup plan if the vote to rebuild doesn’t pass.

Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors member Lindsey Horvath, whose district includes the Palisades, also attended the event. Horvath said the Longest Table gathering showed that the Palisades community never left and people were coming back.

“Well, fires may have taken many homes; they can't destroy a community, and this is a community that's committed to each other,” Horvath said.