CHARLOTTE COUNTY, Fla. (WINK)\u2014Charlotte County is getting $7.4 million in FEMA money to help during future storms.<\/p>\n
For many people in flood-prone areas in Charlotte County, preparing for a storm is a way of life. While county leaders say this money will help protect the community, people who’ve lived through these storms say they’re still waiting to see how.<\/p>\n
Hurricane preparation starts way before a storm. For many in Charlotte County, the biggest concern is not having a safe place to go.<\/p>\n
“I remember the last hurricane; we were stuck in our closet for 18 hours,” said Nicki Capitola.<\/p>\n
“So the concern is what happens to the elderly, the people that don’t have a place to go,” Capitola said.<\/p>\n
That’s where this $7.4 million FEMA grant comes in. Part of that money will help design hurricane safe rooms.<\/p>\n
WINK News asked Patrick Fuller, with emergency management, what the timeline is to actually see these things turn into reality.<\/p>\n
“So they don’t happen overnight. When you talk about mitigation grants or any federal funding, those grants come with very specific requirements, and it’s not like you get a check and you’re executing a construction plan and then getting design permits in place,” Fuller said.<\/p>\n
Fuller said the money is for the design process, not the construction, which could take three to four years. For some, that timeline raises questions.<\/p>\n
“I reserve judgment on the county because I have not investigated what they do versus what they do not do,” said Mark Angelosi.<\/p>\n
The funding will also help provide backup power to a county solid waste facility. It shut down for nine days after Hurricane Ian.<\/p>\n
The goal is to keep essential services running during future storms.<\/p>\n
“I just hope that they use it for something that’s beneficial to everyone and to protect,” Capitola said.<\/p>\n
County leaders say these projects are part of a long-term plan to make the area more resilient. But with some still in the design phase, many people say they’ll be watching closely to see when those plans become reality.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"CHARLOTTE COUNTY, Fla. (WINK)\u2014Charlotte County is getting $7.4 million in FEMA money to help during future storms. For…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":258720,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[112117,209,211,210,4250,853,8995,28,32680],"class_list":["post-258719","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-cape-coral","tag-anti-piracy","tag-cape-coral","tag-cape-coral-headlines","tag-cape-coral-news","tag-charlotte","tag-charlotte-county","tag-civil-defense","tag-florida","tag-safe-room"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/258719","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=258719"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/258719\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/258720"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=258719"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=258719"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=258719"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}