As County Commissioner Cecil Pendergrass had a unique view of Hurricane Ian before and after the the storm. It started first with the staff preparing six days before landfall.
"That means activating the EOC, having more staff come into the office, different agencies, we have the Coast Guard there, Florida Fish and Wildlife there and dozens of services, agencies, United Way, all working out of our EOC," said Pendergrass.
"What we do as the board of County Commissioners is we activate this state of emergency. I think it was 3 days out. And what happens in the activation of state emergency, the county manager takes over as the CFO for the county," he continued. "Once the state of emergency is activated, We have protocols in place and everything runs like a machine with the EOC as far as the closure of county businesses, closing of the schools, activating the schools for shelters."
Pendergrass’ second unique view was Post-Ian and going up into Marine One to survey the damage with President Joe Biden.
"He came hereon October 5th," he recalled. "I was honored to be able to go on Marine One with him. I know the area, I was born and raised here. So, I went up with the President and Doctor Biden. And his response was amazing that, you know, I told him, ‘Sir, with all due respect, I've been doing this for a long time and I've seen federal governments come and go. You take the pictures and leave. We don't need you to come back. We need to make sure we get the resources that are needed. Federal funding I need now. Urban housing money, (which we got $1.2 billion.) I need help with the Army Corps of Engineers to rebuild these bridges...We have people still buried in the sand here. I need resources, I need people to help us recover running long term and short term recovery.'
"And the response from the federal government's been amazing. We've gotten everything we asked for. I really have to commend the President and the Governor both for not making it political. I explained that to both of them personally, face to face, I said, ‘Do not use this arena to be political. Please take care of our residents.’ And everything came out perfect."
Finally, Pendergrass talked about the positive impact the hurricane had on our community.
"This hurricane, I think we all should learn from this. It showed us how our community came together. We saw that here firsthand with the hurricane we have to work together. There's no way people would get back to Sanibel, Pine Island without boats for example. And we have people who were out there and looking for people in the water. I mean this, it was devastating. We had all this debris in the water. It's like we don't know who was in the boats or who were in those cars or in the water and the community came together. It was amazing to see that…
He finished by saying it will be a long-term recovery. And, our region will continue on that road to recovery, as we all help each other move forward--together.
