Gov. Ron DeSantis said Florida has what it needs to clean up after Hurricane Helene and that the federal government should instead focus relief efforts on North Carolina, where search and rescue missions continue following catastrophic flooding.
“Florida, we have it handled,” DeSantis said during a news conference Monday in Steinhatchee, on the Big Bend coast.
“We got approved for the individual assistance things we wanted. We have what we need. Now obviously, there may be additional things that we’ll ask for in the future. It depends on how things shake out. But I think most of the effort should be in western North Carolina right now, because you still have active rescues that need to take place.”
The governor announced Sunday that the state was sending resources to North Carolina and Tennessee to address flood damage and conduct rescue missions.
Included in the efforts are two Florida State Guard search and rescue teams and two teams from the Florida National Guard in Chinook helicopters. Additionally, the state is sending water, Starlink ground stations, high water vehicles, airboats, shallow-draft boats, trucks, and teams from the Florida Department of Transportation.
“We’re running rescue flights. We’re happy to do it,” DeSantis said. “But I know the federal government has more assets than the state of Florida has, so there should not be anybody left behind in those communities.”
The Federal Emergency Management Agency has issued major disaster declarations in Florida, North Carolina, Alabama, Georgia, South Carolina, Tennessee, and Virginia that authorize individual and public assistance.
“FEMA and the Small Business Administration are there to help the residents whose homes and businesses were literally destroyed, washed away, or blown away,” Biden said Monday. “And, the federal search and rescue teams have been working side-by-side with state and local officials and partners in very treacherous conditions to find those who are missing and will not rest until everyone’s accounted for.”
The Associated Press has counted 107 people who were killed by the storm across six states, 30 of them in one North Carolina county. According to NBC News, 12 people died in Florida in the storm.
“I think in North Carolina, whatever fatalities have been reported, I think that’s probably just scratching the surface of what’s possible if we don’t get people in there and get them out to safety,” DeSantis said.”
DeSantis said Florida has focused on stabilization and providing relief for Floridians who have been affected by the storm, but that North Carolina needs immediate assistance.
“Particularly when you get up into the mountainous terrain of western North Carolina, and as damaging as you see around here, it’s important to acknowledge that they are in really dire straits right now,” DeSantis said.
“When you have roads totally washed out, bridges totally gone, you have whole communities that have basically been wiped off the map, because it’s very rugged terrain.”
DeSantis said President Joe Biden called him Sunday but they were unable to talk because the governor was “in the air” at the time.
According to PowerOutage.us, 116,740 customers were without Florida Monday morning. In North Carolina, that number was 455,056. According to the Florida governor’s office, 2.3 million customers here had their power restored.
Business assistance
DeSantis hosted the news conference at Roy’s Restaurant, which will need to be rebuilt following the hurricane. In the meantime, the restaurant would like to do business out of a donated a food truck, but “bureaucracy” was slowing the opening, the governor said.
“I don’t have time for bureaucracy. We don’t have time for red tape,” he said.
DeSantis announced that the Department of Business and Professional Regulation has issued an emergency order allowing businesses “devastated in Hurricane Helene and want to be creative can stay in businesses.”
“Ron DeSantis directs state agencies to lift bureaucracy on restaurants and businesses that is standing in the way of getting temporary operations back up to keep communities served and fed,” DeSantis’ communications director Bryan Griffin explained on X.
Resources available
The state is offering more than 30 point-of-distribution sites providing food, water, tarps, and more in areas with the most damage. A full list of the 35 sites is on the Florida Division of Emergency Management website.
The governor pointed people toward floridadisaster.org, the crisis cleanup line (1-844-965-1386), and to Hope Florida, an organization connecting Floridians to private, nonprofit, and government resources.
Urban search and rescue teams will complete missions Monday, according to Kevin Guthrie, executive director of the Department of Emergency Management. The state reported Monday morning that those teams have rescued 13 survivors.
–Jay Waagmeester, Florida Phoenix
