Point Reyes Station is a small unincorporated town in West Marin, with 895 residents counted in the 2020 Census. It has no courthouse, no city government and no separate filing office. Every paper a Point Reyes Station case needs is filed in San Rafael, and every person named in one is served wherever they actually are, often at a rural address several miles out of town.
For Point Reyes Station, timing matters most with restraining orders, so they come first below, followed by what ZIP Code 94956 does and doesn't tell a server. Point Reyes Station is about 80 miles from our Sacramento office in a straight line, so requests come in online, and one Service Request can handle the filing and the service together.
Point Reyes Station in the court's terms
Marin Superior Court has one filing location, the Clerk's Office in Room 113 of the Hall of Justice, Marin Civic Center, 3501 Civic Center Drive, San Rafael. Civil cases, evictions, family law, probate, small claims and restraining orders all go there. The clerk's windows are open 8:00 a.m. to noon and 1:00 to 4:00 p.m. on weekdays, and the Civil Division page asks anyone opening a new case to arrive before 3:30 p.m. Using the coordinates on the court's location page, the building is about 16.3 miles southeast of the town's Census center point.
Two filing rules shape a Point Reyes Station case before anyone is served:
- Local Rule 1.51(B)(1). Parties represented by attorneys must file and serve electronically in civil cases, including family, juvenile dependency and probate. The rule carves out situations "when personal service is required by statute or rule." A summons or a restraining order still has to be delivered by hand, whoever filed it.
- Administrative Order 26-01. Since February 23, 2026, each e-filed document that needs its own file stamp, such as a declaration, a notice or a proof of service, must be filed as a separate PDF with its own transaction receipt. The papers that open a case can still go in as one bundle.
Self-represented filers can still use the counter, the mail or the drop box outside Room 113. Our Marin County court filing service files either way.
One ZIP Code, two communities
ZIP Code area 94956 isn't Point Reyes Station's alone. The Census Bureau's 2020 ZCTA to place relationship file shows:
- Point Reyes Station CDP: about 3.6 square miles of land, all of it inside 94956.
- Inverness CDP: about 3.9 square miles of its land, around 61% of the community, is also in 94956, along with its water area. The rest of Inverness sits in 94937.
- Outside both: about 27.2 of the ZIP's 34.7 square miles of land, roughly 78%, is in no Census community at all.
So a "Point Reyes Station, CA 94956" address may be in town, on the Inverness side of the bay, or on open land between. Before an attempt, a server needs the street number and road, plus anything that tells one parcel from the next: a gate, a mailbox number that differs from the house, a shared driveway, or which of several buildings the person sleeps in.
A restraining order, from request to service
The court's Domestic Violence and Restraining Orders page sets a daily rhythm for temporary orders:
- Before 10:00 a.m. Self-represented people turn in their forms at Room 113, through the court's ePortal, or by eFiling. Represented parties eFile. Each request includes a declaration describing the incidents in detail.
- Review. A judicial officer reviews the request. Completed forms that miss the 10:00 a.m. cutoff can still be turned in and are reviewed the next business day.
- At 3:00 p.m. Papers filed in person are picked up at the clerk's office. ePortal and eFiling users find them on ePortal.
- Hearing date. The clerk sets a hearing, and the temporary order states how many days before it service must happen.
The page then makes the point that drives everything after: if the judge grants temporary orders, they take effect immediately but aren't enforceable until they're served on the restrained person. For a request filed in the morning, that means service can start the same evening. Send the signed order the moment it comes back, with the hearing date in the notes.
The court doesn't charge for domestic violence restraining order paperwork. The Legal Self-Help Center in Room C-44 helps with it. General information, not legal advice.
Filing from West Marin without the drive
For someone in Point Reyes Station, a 32-mile round trip in a straight line, and more by road, before 10:00 a.m. isn't always realistic. Marin offers two ways around it for the most urgent papers. Under Family Code § 6307 and Penal Code § 18122, the court accepts domestic violence and gun violence restraining order requests electronically. Its ePortal takes them free of charge once the filer registers an account; an electronic filing service provider can also submit them, though the provider may charge for it.
An ePortal filing for a new domestic violence case uses the standard Judicial Council forms in PDF: the DV-100 request, the DV-109 notice of hearing, the DV-110 temporary order, the DV-130 order after hearing and the confidential CLETS-001 sheet for law enforcement. Someone with an existing family law case asks for party access first. When the court has acted, the papers appear on ePortal at 3:00 p.m., ready to be printed and served.
Outside court hours, the court's page notes that a law enforcement officer can obtain an emergency protective order, which lasts 5 to 7 days. That's a stopgap while a court request is prepared, not a substitute for one.
Papers to serve in Point Reyes Station?
Who serves it, and what that costs
Any adult who isn't a party may serve a restraining order. The protected person can't. The usual choices are the Sheriff or a private server.
The Marin County Sheriff. The Documentary Services / Civil Division, 1600 Los Gamos Drive, Suite 200, San Rafael, serves domestic violence, elder or dependent adult abuse, civil harassment, workplace violence and juvenile restraining orders. It needs a completed SER-001 and the court papers, and it serves only at Marin County addresses. Service fees are waived automatically for domestic violence and elder abuse orders; for other restraining orders there's no fee if the court waived its filing fee, and $50 if it didn't. The Sheriff also enters each order into the statewide CLETS restraining order system and files the proof of service with the court itself for orders filed in Marin.
A private server. A private server can work from a workplace address, a vehicle description or a schedule, and can follow a person who has left Marin County. If the private server delivers first, the Sheriff's page says to notify its office, give it a copy of the proof of service and file the original proof with the court.
Some people use both: the Sheriff for its free service and the database entry, and a private server for an address outside the county or a narrow window. Our guide on who can serve papers in California covers the rules.
Civil harassment, elder abuse and workplace petitions
Not every restraining order is a family matter. The court's Civil Division describes the other types:
- Civil harassment covers violence, threats or harassing conduct by someone the petitioner isn't related to and hasn't dated, such as a neighbor or a roommate. Filing fees may apply unless the petitioner qualifies for a fee waiver or violence is alleged.
- Elder or dependent adult abuse orders protect people who meet those legal definitions. The court doesn't charge for them.
- Workplace violence orders are filed by an employer to protect its workers. Fees apply unless waived.
All three are filed at the Civil Clerk's Office in Room 113. Each one, once granted, has to be served on the restrained person before its hearing, under the same Sheriff's rules described above.
When the person can't be found
If the Sheriff can't complete service, it sends an Attempt Service Return explaining why and listing the date and time of each attempt. Its page names three common reasons: an incorrect or incomplete address, an address that's no longer current, or no contact with the person. For a temporary restraining order, the page says the next step may be to have the order reissued, and the Civil Division can explain how.
A thin address is the biggest risk at a rural 94956 parcel. Before the first attempt, send a recent photo of the restrained person, the vehicle they drive, any workplace and the hours they keep. Don't send the protected person along to point the server to the house. If the address is stale, skip tracing can look for a current one while the order is still valid. Remote areas are subject to different timelines.
Other papers for Point Reyes Station
A restraining order is the most time-sensitive paper, but most requests are routine: a summons and complaint, a small claims case, a subpoena or a notice in a family case. A few Sheriff's page points apply to them too:
- Small claims. The page lists personal service on an in-county defendant at least 15 days before the hearing, or at least 25 days before for substituted service. For a defendant outside Marin, it's 20 days personal and 30 days substituted.
- P.O. boxes. The page notes a Postal Service P.O. box can't be used for substituted service. If it's the only address, the court may serve a small claims case by certified mail.
- Research. The Sheriff doesn't research addresses.
Our post on how to serve a subpoena in California covers witness papers.
The 2027 diligence standard
From January 1, 2027, AB 747 amends CCP § 415.20(b)(2): three good-faith attempts at personal delivery, on 3 different days at 3 different times, show reasonable diligence before papers are left with another adult at the home. The county clerk's register of process servers also becomes public. This doesn't change restraining orders, which must still be handed to the restrained person. Our AB 747 guide explains the rest, and our proof of service guide shows what the server signs.
Sending a Point Reyes Station request
Upload up to 5 PDFs to the Service Request, including the signed order and the hearing notice. Put the directions and a description of the person in the notes, and choose Rush or Standard; for a rural parcel, call 855-582-5776 first. For a business, our serving corporations page covers finding the agent for service of process. Get status updates by email, or email Service@ValproAttorneyServices.com, Monday through Friday, 8:30 a.m. to 5 p.m. We make no guarantees for service.
Around Point Reyes Station
Inverness is about 2.5 miles west and Olema 3.2 miles south. Nicasio is 6.1 miles east, Marshall 7 miles northwest on Tomales Bay and Lagunitas 7.7 miles southeast. Every community we serve in the county is on our Marin County page.