PINELLAS COUNTY, Fla. — It’s a hard sight to see.
Jason Pickering’s once-beachy and blissful community near Dunedin has changed drastically since Hurricane Helene.
“I thought I found heaven when I moved down here,” he said.
Sun Retreats Dunedin, a mobile home park, now looks like hell in places. The community flooded badly during Helene’s historic storm surge.
“There’s quite a few sleepless nights or nights interrupted by thoughts of despair,” Pickering said.
Pickering and neighbors like Debby Weaver are still in limbo seven months later. They’re unsure if they’ll be able to rebuild, unsure if they’ll get money to elevate, and unsure if they’ll have to move away and find a new home somewhere else, maybe outside Pinellas County.
WATCH: Pinellas County mobile home owners hope the county will use federal funding to help
“I feel like we deserve every opportunity to stay here and continue to be productive citizens of this county,” Weaver said.
But for people like Weaver and Pickering, help might be on the way.
Pinellas County is drawing up a plan for the $813 million in federal funding it was recently awarded to help meet unmet needs after the recent hurricanes.
By all accounts, the unmet needs are still plenty.
“There are people in here that have gone into debt taking out, maxed out their credit just trying to buy new cars and, you know, things that were ruined in here,” Weaver said.
In an initial draft action plan for the money, published just days ago, Pinellas County proposes how it would spend the $813 million.
Of those funds, $490 million would be used to help homeowners, reconstruct or rehabilitate their homes, elevate or replace homes where that’s required, or relocate mobile homes where they can’t be replaced or rebuilt.
Roughly $21 million could be spent to reimburse homeowners for costs they’ve already paid to demolish, rebuild, or rehab homes.
Another $10 million could be spent to relocate homeowners from certain vulnerable mobile home communities.
Pickering, Weaver and Debby don’t want to be relocated. If possible, they want to remain at Sun Retreats Dunedin.
“We just want to get back to our lives,” he said.
Regardless, they know many of their neighbors will need help, and they hope the county will deliver sufficient aid.
“Please just don’t forget about us, you know,” Pickering said.
You can share your thoughts with Pinellas County about the plan for the funds through May 23. Click here to do so.
