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For Manasota Key, Hurricane Milton caused unprecedented damage

Monicel
For Manasota Key, Hurricane Milton caused unprecedented damage

If you go to the south side of Manasota Key, and the residents really want to, watch out for the white house on Sand Dollar Lane.

It is one of the oldest structures in the fishing village turned former Florida resort town. Now it has sunk into a sandy road, tagged with an orange Charlotte County sign labeling it unsafe.

The same could be said this week for much of the 11-mile-long key about 30 miles south of where Hurricane Milton made landfall. If the measure of a hurricane is the amount of devastation it causes, the south side of Manasota Key, between Fort Myers and Sarasota, is ground zero in Southwest Florida.

Many homes and businesses on Manasota Key were severely damaged after Hurricane Helene made landfall on September 26. Then last Wednesday came Milton’s much higher swell and more powerful wind, strong enough to rip entire houses off their foundations and into the water.

On Wednesday, the southern end of the key looked like a war zone. Paved streets covered with piles of sand four to six feet high. In residents’ yards were piles of furniture, bicycles, appliances, food, glass, roofing material and wooden beams. Truck after truck moved in to remove the debris. Contractors toured neighborhoods, leaving cards in parked cars.

Scores of longtime residents said Wednesday that Milton was the worst hurricane they can remember. Before five hurricanes and two severe tropical storms in the past two years, they say life there was pretty easy.

At Angler’s Resort on Gulf Boulevard, residents emptied mud-soaked units as they marveled at the strange realities they left behind in their modest slice of paradise.

A pristine white SUV from a house a block away pulled up after Milton by his dirty pool filled with lounge chairs and tables.

A lone mattress and furniture moved into the small marina alongside the fishing boats that survived unscathed.

A yellow Adirondack chair flew through the air from a local business and landed hundreds of feet away, crashing into the front yard of Jim and Theresa Legnante’s dilapidated second home.

The Legnantes, like many owners of the 16-apartment HOA community, were in the process of restoring their place after Hurricane Helene when Milton hit last Wednesday.

Milton’s force left water marks about six feet high inside his house, about twice as high as those left by Helene. So high, the marks reached a TV hanging on the living room wall.

“We’ve had this place the last 13 years, and the last two years have been terrible,” Jim Legnante said.

Legnante, whose year-round home is in upstate New York, said he and his wife feel they have no choice but to start renovating again. They talked about replacing all the walls, needing all new electrical and a new kitchen, although experts say ground-level properties like theirs are likely to suffer the most damage from climate change.

“When you’re 81, what else do you have to do?” Legnante joked.

More seriously, he added: “What choice do we have? I think a lot of people would like to sell. But if we flood the market with all these depressed units, what will you get?”

The Legnantes were satisfied, at least, that their sturdy new roof, replaced by a Montana company after Hurricane Ian, was undamaged.

Others did not fare so well.

Joanna Rea returned to her new 2020 construction on stilts with the facade of her home looking as she left it before the storm.

Out the back, however, he discovered a neighbor’s hot tub sitting next to his small backyard pool, which was littered with mattresses, fences and other debris.

Rea, who had to wreck her home after Hurricane Ian in 2022, thought she was being smart when she took all her valuables and brought them home to her native Indiana before Milton arrived.

When she returned this week, she found looters had climbed a spiral staircase to gain access to her nearly empty home and vandalized it, leaving items stolen from a neighbor’s home inside. Police took fingerprints but had no immediate leads.

“People need to do a better job of checking IDs when places like this are under curfew,” he said. “And they have to keep the voyeurs away. It just makes it harder for all of us. It prevents the cleanup.”

The residents, who declined to give their names, complained that Charlotte County did not do enough to clear the debris before Milton arrived last Thursday, saying piles of furniture, building materials and remains of Helene they caused more destruction than might otherwise have happened. Some also complained about Florida’s 50 percent rule for damaged properties, saying it will likely inhibit the ability to rebuild for families who have been on the island for generations.

According to Charlotte County, the 50% rule is a requirement mandated by the floodplain management ordinance. If the repairs or improvements needed are 50% or more of the property’s building or structure value, the rule requires that they conform to Florida Building Code standards, including FEMA requirements or d elevation

While updated new construction would likely better withstand the area’s growing hurricanes and bolster property values, the rule makes it financially impossible for some to rebuild, said Nick Peirano, owner of Transformers Building and Remodeling.

But South Florida native Addie Granob said she and her husband Mikey bought on Manasota Key in 2020, knowing they needed a house on stilts.

While the neighbors’ houses were ripped from their foundations, the Granebs’ house suffered only cosmetic damage, including the loss of siding, after Milton.

“I hope all these neighbors learn not to build on the ground,” said Addie Granob. “But most of them are from the north.”

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