Many borohydride reagents are useful for COOH -> CH2OH reduction, just not NaBH4 alone. LiBH4 (from LiCl/NaBH4 in THF), as well as NaBH4/I2 and NaBH4/H2SO4, but I haven't posted about any explicit procedures, as I have assumed that the transformation isn't very popular with people here in general, and that these reagents were known to work by those who wanted to do it.
I have never seen Ca(BH4)2 used anywhere before though.