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Measuring Hurricane Ian’s toll on Florida’s ‘forgotten’ neighborhoods

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Measuring Hurricane Ian’s toll on Florida’s ‘forgotten’ neighborhoods


FORT MYERS, Fla., Oct 4 (Reuters) – Betty and Hubert Toney have misplaced depend of all of the hurricanes they’ve lived by means of since shifting into their home within the modest Dunbar neighborhood of Fort Myers, Florida, in 1958.

However they’d by no means earlier than skilled something like Ian. The highly effective Class 4 hurricane sheared the roof off the Toneys’ inexperienced flat-top dwelling, leaving the inside uncovered to the torrential rain.

“I assume it actually took a beating,” stated Betty Toney, 81, of the home the place she and Hubert raised their two youngsters, in addition to a dozen nieces and nephews.

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She shuddered to consider the price of repairs. The Toneys, like lots of their neighbors within the low-income, primarily African-American neighborhood, don’t have insurance coverage to cowl hurricane harm. It is both too costly or, within the Toneys’ case, insurance coverage corporations refused to cowl their home.

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Their expertise is widespread. Research have repeatedly proven that low-income residents are much less prone to carry insurance coverage, at the same time as their properties are sometimes extra prone to wreck. Low-income residents are additionally sometimes extra susceptible to a catastrophe’s financial shock and fewer in a position to transfer to a safer space.

Within the aftermath of Ian’s harmful assault on Florida, which precipitated at the least 103 deaths statewide, a lot of the eye has targeted on prosperous enclaves alongside Florida’s west coast, corresponding to Sanibel Island.

A vacation spot for vacationers and retirees dotted with massive beachfront properties, Sanibel suffered overwhelming harm within the storm, and residents there and in different coastal communities face a frightening activity in rebuilding and recovering.

The harm was much less extreme in lower-income neighborhoods additional inland, but flooding and excessive winds nonetheless dealt a heavy blow in locations like Dunbar – one which many residents can in poor health afford.

Within the zip code that features Dunbar, the median earnings is $38,000, and almost 1 / 4 of the inhabitants lives beneath the poverty line. The median earnings in Sanibel, which is 98% white, is $93,000, based on U.S. census information.

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Hubert Toney, 86, nonetheless works as a part-time salesman to make ends meet, and Betty cleans homes. However they are saying they’re going to handle one way or the other to rebuild a home that is filled with reminiscences for them. “It means all the things, actually,” Hubert Toney stated.

The primary order of enterprise was to cowl the roof. Toney spent a part of Monday attempting to achieve the Federal Emergency Administration Company to put in a tarp.

Close by in Dunbar, Howard Dillard, 48, watched the wind rip off his roof and usher within the rain.

“It was very scary – heartbreaking,” he stated.

The kitchen of the home that he rents now has two heaps of soggy drywall – what’s left from the ceiling that collapsed in the course of the storm.

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His landlord has insurance coverage to restore the home, however Dillard remains to be sleeping in it, rain or not. Dillard, who works in a cement plant, figures he’ll should give you $2,000 to interchange his wrecked furnishings and belongings.

Regardless of the struggles, the group is slowly recovering, stated Pastor Raymond Davis of the neighborhood’s New Life Hope Meeting Church, noting that crews have swiftly eliminated fallen palm bushes that blocked roads and restored energy for some.

“It should take a while and help,” he stated. “These are working-class individuals. It’s going to be troublesome.”

Whereas Davis stated he believes emergency response companies took motion shortly, his godmother, Mary Isaac, 83, thinks they’ve been sluggish – a well-recognized feeling for some in Dunbar.

The hurricane uprooted her Japanese plum tree, tossed her steel shed throughout the road and crushed her sunroom. She says officers haven’t proven as much as distribute meals and water, as they’ve in different districts.

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“I name us ‘the forgotten enclave’,” Isaac stated. “I do know everyone wants assist, nevertheless it appears we’re the final individuals to get something.”

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Reporting by Rod Nickel in Fort Myers, Florida; Further reporting by Joseph Ax in New York; Enhancing by Sandra Maler

Our Requirements: The Thomson Reuters Belief Rules.

Rod Nickel

Thomson Reuters

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Covers power, agriculture and politics in Western Canada with the power transition a key space of focus. Has finished brief reporting stints in Afghanistan, Pakistan, France and Brazil and lined Hurricane Michael in Florida, Tropical Storm Nate in New Orleans and the 2016 Alberta wildfires and the marketing campaign trails of political leaders throughout two Canadian election campaigns.



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3 most underrated signees in Florida State football's 2025 class

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3 most underrated signees in Florida State football's 2025 class


Florida State football had an embarrassing 2024 campaign where it finished with a 2-10 record. This is not the expectation of what the Seminoles are all about.

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Head football coach Mike Norvell understood the urgency as he could not allow the program to snowball into a laughing stock after a productive 13-1 season in 2023. Norvell was heading into a pivotal sixth season with his job on the line.

As a result, he went out and hired a ton of new coaches on his staff, including Gus Malzahn, Tim Harris Jr., Herb Hand, Tony White, Terrance Knighton, and Evan Cooper. This was uncharted territory for Norvell since he had never had to fire multiple coaches like that.

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Nonetheless, we were wondering how the Seminoles’ 2025 recruiting class would play out with new coaches as well as the struggling year in 2024.

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The recruiting class did well, and it finished with the 20th-best in the 247Sports Composite rankings (prospects can still sign in February). In this article, I want to highlight three of the most underrated signees from Florida State’s 2025 recruiting class.



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U.S. Amateur runner-up Noah Kent is transferring to Florida

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U.S. Amateur runner-up Noah Kent is transferring to Florida


Noah Kent is heading home.

The 2024 U.S. Amateur runner-up is transferring to Florida, he announced Saturday. The sophomore at Iowa, whose hometown is Naples, Florida, entered the transfer portal earlier this month, and he made his decision to join coach J.C. Deacon and the 2023 national champions come next fall.

Because of NCAA rules, Kent won’t be eligible to compete for Florida until the 2025-26 season, but he can finish his sophomore year with the Hawkeyes. This fall, he placed in the top 13 all four tournaments, his best finish being a T-5 at the Fighting Irish Classic.

And, of course, he has a tee time at Augusta National Golf Club in the spring.

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Kent will essentially be the fourth member of Florida’s 2025 signing class, which ranked second in the country on signing day. He’ll join a talented roster that includes Parker Bell, Mathew Kress and Jack Turner, though with new NCAA roster limits coming, there’s bound to be some unprecedented roster turnover in college golf before the start of the 2025-26 season.



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State Your Case: Do Panthers or Lightning own state of Florida?  | NHL.com

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State Your Case: Do Panthers or Lightning own state of Florida?  | NHL.com


There are two NHL teams in Florida: the Florida Panthers and the Tampa Bay Lightning.

They are separated by about 250 miles and have been fierce rivals since the Panthers joined the NHL for the 1993-94 season. The Lightning joined the League a season earlier.

Florida (21-11-2) and Tampa Bay (18-10-2) meet for the first time this season at Amalie Arena in Tampa on Sunday (5 p.m. ET; FDSNSUN, CRIPPS, SN, TVAS).

The teams have played each other 157 times in the regular season; the Panthers have gone 77-51-19, and the Lightning are 70-64-13. There have been 10 ties.

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For years, the rivalry was a parochial affair, deeply important to hockey fans in the state but under the radar nationally. Lately, though, Florida supremacy has often meant NHL supremacy.

The Panthers are the reigning Stanley Cup champions and defeated the Lightning in five games in the best-of-7 Eastern Conference First Round last season to start that title march. They reached the Stanley Cup Final two seasons ago, going on a miracle run before losing to the Vegas Golden Knights. The season before that, they won the Presidents’ Trophy with an NHL-best 122 points but lost to the Lightning in a second-round sweep, marking the second straight time that their noisy neighbors ended their season.

The Lightning won back-to-back Stanley Cup championships in 2020 and 2021 before reaching a third straight Final in 2022, losing to the Colorado Avalanche. Tampa Bay won the Presidents’ Trophy in 2018-19.

This season, each team is on course for another appearance in the Stanley Cup Playoffs and has a point percentage of better than .600.

So which team has the merits to claim bragging rights in this all-Florida showdown as the rivals face off for the first time this season? That’s the question debated by NHL.com senior writers Amalie Benjamin and Dan Rosen in the latest installment of State Your Case.

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Benjamin: Let’s lay out what the Lightning have accomplished in their 32-season history: They’ve won the Stanley Cup three times, becoming the first team from Florida to win it when they took the championship in 2004. But that doesn’t come close to what they’ve accomplished during the past 11 seasons, starting in 2013-14, when they became a powerhouse. They’ve been to the Stanley Cup Playoffs 10 times in those 11 seasons, making the Stanley Cup Final in a whopping four of them. Let me repeat that: Four trips to the Cup Final in the past 11 seasons, winning twice, in 2020 and 2021. And if that’s not enough, they made two more trips to the Eastern Conference Final, in 2016 and 2018. Forget Florida’s team. They’re the team of the past decade in the entire NHL.

Rosen: Yeah, yeah, yeah. But what have you done for me lately? Florida’s team fluctuates. It was the Lightning. It is the Panthers. They’ve got the Stanley Cup. They went to the Stanley Cup Final two years in a row. Sure, a few years ago, this wasn’t even a debate. Florida’s team, the Panthers? Please. No shot. Even the top executives with the Panthers would tell you that. But things change. With success come the riches. Just think about the past three seasons for the Panthers: Presidents’ Trophy winners in 2021-22, Stanley Cup Final in 2022-23, Stanley Cup champions in 2023-24. The Lightning lost in the 2022 Cup Final, lost in the first round in six games the next season and lost in the first round in five games to the Panthers last season. Florida’s team is Florida.

Benjamin: OK, sure, you have a point. Florida has done pretty darn well lately. But let’s see how history will judge the state of Florida and its hockey teams. Hall of Famers? The Lightning have got ’em. Though Steven Stamkos has moved on to the Nashville Predators, the Hall of Fame is going to come calling, and the forward will go in as a member of the Lightning. Add in coach Jon Cooper, forward Nikita Kucherov, defenseman Victor Hedman and goalie Andrei Vasilevskiy, and you’re talking at least five future Hall of Famers on a single team. That’s not just good, that’s historically good. It’s a group whose names are synonymous with winning, with the Stanley Cup, with the state of Florida. That’s powerful. That says the Lightning win this debate, no question.

Rosen: I have a question. Is Aleksander Barkov not paving his way to the Hall of Fame? Is Sergei Bobrovsky, with a Stanley Cup ring, 400-plus wins and two Vezina Trophy wins as the NHL’s best goalie, not a lock for the Hall of Fame? Is Paul Maurice, who could finish his career with at least the second-most coaching wins of all time, along with his Stanley Cup ring, not also a lock for the Hall of Fame? In the way-too-early department, could Matthew Tkachuk and Sam Reinhart be future Hall of Famers? I lied. That’s four questions. But you get the point. You brought up the Hall of Fame and I countered. That’s why the Lightning do not win this debate without question. Could they win it? Yes, certainly, if we were having this debate in 2023. It’s almost 2025. It’s a different world. It’s the Panthers’ world, at least in Florida. The Lightning are just living in it. At least the sun is still shining on them too.

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