- This weekend will mark 30 days since Hurricane Idalia ripped through Valdosta.
- Valdosta and Lowndes EMA have announce contracted debris removal will end October 5th.
- Watch the video to see how neighbors have been coping with the aftermath.
BROADCAST TRANSCRIPT:
Saturday marks one month since Hurricane Idalia rocked South Georgia. I’m Malia Thomas, your Valdosta Neighborhood reporter. Living and working here, I’ve seen the debris pile up day after day. Now, neighbors are telling me what they think of the cleanup process.
“We’ve been through something.”
This is Hazel Edgecomb. I spoke with her when Hurricane Idalia first hit. She had to evacuate her home, lost many belongings, and has been living outside of her vehicle ever since.
“They said 62 trees fell over on the other side of Park Avenue. That’s what jammed the water up that backed up into 10 houses. 10 of us got flooded out.”
Despite the damage, Hazel tells me she’s grateful for the contracted workers who cleaned up her home after the storm.
Recovery teams have done a lot in the 30 days since the storm.
I checked on the city and Lowndes Emergency Management Services’s partnership on hurricane relief.
As of September 24th, the Public Works team and outside assistance removed over 260,000 cubic yardage of debris.
As of Thursday, their emergency restoration plan had distributed 3,838 cases of water, 1,740 hygiene kits, 444 cleaning kits, and 249 tarps to equal 8.921 neighbors helped.
Another neighbor who is getting back to normal…
Nancy Griffin.
She lives off White Water Road towards Lake Park and has dealt with…
“Just a lot of oak limbs, pine trees, came down. But we were very fortunate because our neighbor across the street has a lot of oak trees down.”
With hurricane season stretching through the end of November…
People in this community say they’re hoping no more storms come this way because…
“I mean, they got a lot of work to do.”
Contracted debris pickup is scheduled to end next Thursday, October 5th. I’m Malia Thomas, your neighborhood reporter, ABC27.
