About 100 friends and family members of a Bay Area coffee shop owner missing from Oakland since Wednesday gathered in solidarity Sunday evening as they held out hope for her safe return.
A candlelight vigil at the pergola on the east side of Oakland’s Lake Merritt provided a sense of community for the loved ones of Amy Hillyard, 52, who was last seen around 2 p.m. Wednesday on the 500 block of Radnor Road in the Cleveland Heights neighborhood.
“The mood was grounded in care, connection and hope,” Sarah Wachs, a longtime friend of Hillyard’s, told the Chronicle after the vigil. “It was a space for people to come together, support one another and show up for Amy and her family with love and strength.”
Hillyard is the co-owner of Farley’s Coffee, with locations on Grand Avenue near Broadway in Oakland and on 18th Street on Potrero Hill in San Francisco.
“She is a deeply loved member of this community,” said Wachs, who has known Hillyard since their children, now in college, were in preschool together.
“Amy has been a light in this community for so many years — through the care and intention she brought to Farley’s Coffee and through the countless people and causes she supported,” Jen Bushman, a sustainable seafood educator in Oakland, said in an Instagram post announcing the vigil. “She has given so much to Oakland and to all of us who love her.”
The California Highway Patrol, on behalf of the Oakland Police Department, sent an emergency alert to cellphones around the Bay Area on Sunday night seeking help locating Hillyard.
Hundreds of people have united in recent days to search for Hillyard — “organizing teams to walk hiking trails, canvass neighborhoods and connect with local businesses in hopes of finding any information or footage that could help,” Wachs said.
Hillyard is described as a white woman standing about 5 feet, 4 inches tall and weighing about 120 pounds. She has blond hair and hazel eyes and was last seen wearing a white short-sleeved shirt and light jeans, and white sneakers with black stripes. She is considered at-risk due to an undisclosed medical condition, police said.
Anyone with information on Hillyard’s whereabouts is asked to call Oakland police at 510-238-3641.