WINK News is digging into the numbers behind the Elevate Florida program for the first time. The investigation has focused on how many residents applied, were approved, and were denied.<\/p>\n
After persistent requests since April, WINK Investigates obtained the data from the city of Bonita Springs. The city provided a breakdown revealing the program received $400 million in FEMA funding last year, with nearly 2,000 homeowners applying statewide. In Lee County, 57 homeowners were approved, including six in Bonita Springs.<\/p>\n
A recent Bonita Springs City Council meeting brought another development. A vote passed requiring properties to have flood insurance to receive FEMA funding. This condition is already a requirement for Elevate Florida applicants who were approved.<\/p>\n
Tom Masters, a Bonita Springs resident, expressed concerns, saying, “Where did that $400 million go?”<\/p>\n
Stephen O’Reilly, another resident, echoed the sentiment, asking, “Where did that money go?”<\/p>\n
Residents are urging for full transparency regarding the spending of the $400 million, seeking details on how much each homeowner received and the criteria for approval or denial.<\/p>\n
WINK Investigates is committed to uncovering these details and will continue to provide updates as more information becomes available.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"WINK News is digging into the numbers behind the Elevate Florida program for the first time. The investigation…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":127370,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[63037,209,211,210,33603,6641,356],"class_list":{"0":"post-127369","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-cape-coral","8":"tag-bonita-springs-city-council","9":"tag-cape-coral","10":"tag-cape-coral-headlines","11":"tag-cape-coral-news","12":"tag-federal-emergency-management-agency","13":"tag-flood-insurance","14":"tag-lee-county"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/127369","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=127369"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/127369\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/127370"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=127369"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=127369"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=127369"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}