FLAGER COUNTY, Fla. – With FEMA relief now available for Hurricane Nicole victims in Central Florida’s coastal counties, many residents are hoping it will help them get started rebuilding.
“Everyone had so much damage and it’s been hard to navigate where we go from here or what the next steps are,” Krista Goodrich said.
Goodrich is a property manager with Salty Dog Vacations and oversees 140 homes in Flagler and Volusia counties. Many of them are along the coast with the worst damage from Nicole.
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“The owners now have to be bringing in — I think we did a quote yesterday for 80 yards of sand and that’s the least impacted home,” she said.
She said many property owners she works with are relieved to hear FEMA is staying in town.
“The buildings were basically collapsed into the sea or the seawalls are down and there’s water going under pools, there is insurance usually on the buildings, but not the land. Normally that’s not an issue because you don’t need to insure land except when it completely disappears,” she said.
On Wednesday, President Joe Biden granted Florida the disaster declaration bringing funds to 10 counties including Lake, Brevard, Volusia and Flagler.
There will be individual assistance residents can apply for and public assistance for counties.
“The city of Flagler Beach particularly had a couple public works facilities that got flooded for the second time with Nicole, so they’ll be eligible to get some of those expenses reimbursed. So that’s good for our local taxpayers,” said Flagler’'s Emergency Management Director Jon Lord.
He said it will also help fund rebuilding part of the county’s destroyed dunes.
“FEMA will allow us to do repairs to some of the sand that was impacted that was part of the protection system so we can do emergency repairs right away and then we can do longer-term repairs,” he said.
FEMA is keeping its offices in the same locations for this round as it did for Hurricane Ian. In Volusia, it will be here at the Department of Health in Daytona Beach and Flagler County will be at the county fairgrounds.
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