Residents in southwestern Florida continued to struggle today with
recovery efforts and in some cases getting their basic needs. Power
is still out to more than half a million homes and businesses in
the state and more than 90 people in Florida died in the wake of
Hurricane Ian, according to the latest counts from several news organizations.
At the same time, President Biden visited Puerto Rico today to survey
the damage there from Hurricane Fiona. William Branham begins with
the
This report.
Days after one of the strongest storms in U. S history made landfall.
Recovery efforts are still in full force in places like ST James
City, Florida coastal hub northeast of Fort Myers. Local residents
are pitching in on the effort as well. We've had people wandering
around the streets and we were able to get out there, then get them
under rescues. We get them on helicopters.
This morning over 570,000 homes and businesses and Florida remained
without power. A substantial recovery from the 2.6 million who were
in the dark days earlier, Myers were more than 40 people have died,
Residents collected what was left of their homes, packing up belongings
into suitcases and shopping carts.
The kitchen's gotta come out. The bathrooms are all gonna come out.
It's a complete redo enormity of their losses, starting to sink in,
just devastated, seeing what was happening to the property.
Into my neighbor's place downstairs, and it was hard to comprehend.
For some in Lee County, home to Fort Myers. Questions remain about
why local evacuation orders weren't given until Tuesday.
The National Hurricane Center's earlier forecasts found that Lee
County was outside the more direct path of the storm, but projected
the area could face dangerous storm surges as high as six FT. Local
officials have repeatedly defended their decision. I am confident
County manager.
Our leaders.
Our governor.
All of us in law enforcement that we got that message out at the
right time.
Now whether people listen to it.
We can't force people out of their homes. Florida Governor Rhonda
Santis yesterday gave an update on recovery efforts. There's more
urban search and rescue teams in Florida now that in any one place
in American history since September 11th and if you think about it,
there's been massive events that have happened since September. 11th
and we have more here beyond Florida. Wrath continued north to the
Carolinas and up to Virginia, which saw some of the worst flooding.
And over a decade.
For his part. President Biden plans to visit Florida on Wednesday.
But first the president spent the afternoon in Puerto Rico surveying
damage in the southern part of the island blasted by another hurricane.
Category one Storm Fiona. It touched down on September 18th and killed
at least two people and is estimated to have caused three billion
in damages.
The president announced $60 million in U. S aid and reiterated that
he'd stand behind the island as it rebuilds
that the climate crisis and more extreme weather is going to continue
to hit this island and hit the United States overall. And as we rebuild,
we have to ensure that we build to last. I want the people of Puerto
Rico to know I'm committed to my entire administration is committed.
Standing with you every step of the way as long as it takes. Power
has been restored to about 90% of the island, but over 60,000 people
still remain without water. The White House said aid will go towards
strengthening flood walls and creating a new warning system to ensure
the island is better prepared for future storms.
And joining me now for the latest on recovery efforts in South Florida
is Pam James. She's an executive producer at public Media Station.
WGC You in Fort Myers, Florida. Pam. Thank you so much for being
here. Could you just give us a sense of how things are in Southwest
Florida right now? Sure. Right now, it's really overwhelming the
amount of damage that we're seeing along the coastlines. It's been
described as you know, a bomb going off on certain parts of, say,
Fort Myers Beach or
Uh, Santa Bell or even where there's a small little artistic village
called Mala shades. Just completely decimated doesn't exist anymore.
There's so much loss and devastation and people who are now without
homes. But then there's this inconsistency because we have the other
half of the broadcast area that was
More or less and less phase. I should say less impacted. There was
some wind. There was some water, but there wasn't as much damage
just maybe a last loss of electricity and water. We know that also,
some of the poorest residents of your area were suffered some of
the worst damages and also are most likely to to not have flood insurance.
How are those residents in particular faring?
We've had residents on ST James Island, and there are some other
communities that have been hit hardest, and a lot of these people
live in trailers. And of course, many of these people with trailers
don't have rental insurance. And so it's going to be a challenge.
Especially down here in Fort Myers, when we are I think number one
when it comes to real estate, Uh,
Prices that have been just outrageously jacked up. So when you're
dealing with suddenly now a loss of housing, this is going to be
a huge issue for us for the next year. At least I know that there's
an issue brewing on on what's known as Pine Island, which is a small
barrier island off the coast residents there, apparently complaining
that they were not getting enough relief and local officials saying
that it's just so difficult to get there that they should try to
get off the
Island. Can you tell us what's happening there?
Absolutely so, Uh, Pine Island is like Santa Bell, which is a barrier
island to our southwest coast. And the only way to get on island
other than by boat is bridge and as the only land liner that the
tether that is between the barrier island and our mainland, and Hurricane
Ian just kind of took out both those bridges.
So, uh, yeah. So these people are stranded on their islands if they
don't have boats, And so the challenge is is that electricity is
out waters out.
And so the government officials are trying to get recovery efforts
to them on island. Um, but it's been challenging because a lot of
the residents don't want to leave. Pine Island is definitely a blue
collar Agricultural island. And so these people are very independent
minded and didn't want to leave the island when it was time to go.
But then now, they don't want to leave the island now that they need
to have some of those rescue efforts taken care of there are people
who just want to stay and secure their their livelihoods there.
We hope those cut off communities do make it through. Okay, that
is Pam James, executive producer at WGC You Public Media Station.
Thanks so much for being here.