Since Rick Loughery started living on his garage roof to protest the town’s ruling that the garage was connected to his destroyed house, the town has been taking a beating in the local press. On Thursday, the town issued a statement explaining its side of the story…
Here’s the full statement from Town of Fort Myers Beach PIO Jenny Dexter…
“Town staff met with the parties involved and communicated the available options. A new single-family home can be built with the garage connected to the new home. The home’s rebuilding must be built to current regulations, and the surviving garage portion must also be brought up to current standards (Coastal A Zone, FBC 8th Ed).
“Convert the surviving garage into a stand-alone accessory structure (storage and parking only) and build a new detached single-family home. The home would be treated as new construction, and the garage must be brought up to current accessory structure standards (Coastal A Zone, FBC 8th Ed, flood ordinance) and must meet local zoning regulations as well.
“Demolish the surviving garage and rebuild a new home with a new garage as new construction, meeting current regulations.
“This situation could impact the entire Town and its residents. Here’s how: The Town must follow floodplain regulations and building codes that govern construction throughout the State of Florida. Since the Town has agreed to be a participating community in the National Flood Insurance Program, which reduces flood insurance costs for residents and impacts mortgages, following the rules of the program is critical to maintain the Town’s good standing. Maintaining the Town’s good standing also impacts post-disaster FEMA funding.”
This is my hubby on the roof…..we’ve lived here 22 years now. To me, currently we have THE BEST council and LPA that we’ve ever had before. We’ve always been proud to live here and of our community and government. We still are! Town staff is doing their job as directed by Council and the Manager. Our garage issue is literally causing issues due to the way staff is interpreting “lateral addition” out of the FEMA guidelines. I understand staff’s position, even though our team of experts (not Rick and I) don’t agree – we don’t agree either, but that’s besides the point. We’ve only asked the town staff to make our team of experts understand and agree with his position. Unfortunately, as Ed reported, we left the meeting Wednesday with they all had to agree to disagree. Kristin from the Town was amazing yesterday but getting three FEMA reps here for us to talk to. Unfortunately they won’t even meet about this until Monday. So it will be a long weekend for hubby on the roof. Everyone is welcome to stop by and say hello and share their stories with us. We love you all and our islanders and want to help be your voices during this as well!
How about we NOT sell out our LIBERTY to the Federal Govt?
The only disaster worse than IAN has been response at every level of GOVT.
To think what our local Govt is putting local citizens thru is OUTRAGEOUS-
Very simple solution: The garage was built to code in 2019 and survived the hurricane; it would not have survived had it been attached to the home. Simply issue these folks a waiver or exception from the current code and leave them alone.
Why tear down something that survived Ian.and it’s still useful to the owner.Why put more financial burden on anyone who lives on ft Myers beach.
Start the petition for a recall.
So then does this mean that ALL properties in this new zone need to be brought up to current standards?? Why aren’t all the other damaged homes being hammered by the town or FEMA? Zero common sense.
That garage was free standing. Anyone with a shred of building construction knowledge can see that. There would’ve been heavy damage to the side of the garage from the house being torn off of it if it were connected. It seems that in order for this to get resolved, the players involved need to have proper education on construction, etc. Check the education and type of degrees of all involved. That goes for town government as well. Do they have formal training on how to run a town??
Issue is my man, its the state and Feds. DeSantis needs to get his a** down here and start helping his people, especially if he has an inkling of wanting to run in 2024. He’s used the people of Lee County and victims of Ian as political pawns.
Unfortunately our town is tied up. Ed is friends with Mayor Allers as well and its never the mayors fault or the council as you would notice makes you wonder. Like “hey lets criticize all this stuff the town does, but lets not blame the people who do it.” (Mayor and council)
Unfortunately… The current mayor and council have no “say” and it’s the FEDS who are in CONTROL of all of us. This is bigger than our town. This is something all of us should be uniting together to fight together, but people are getting tired. So damn exhausting.
People should remember this next election.