On a beautiful Friday that feels like fall, hundreds of cars have lined up along Palm Avenue in Ybor City to get water, food and cleaning supplies at the headquarters of the Children’s Board of Hillsborough County.
A couple of miserable days brought them here: Hurricanes Helene and Milton.
“Got a big family and got to feed them all right now, and the refrigerator went on the blink when we had the hurricane and never came back on,’’ says Michael Urso, whose two sons, their wives and children – 10 people – live in his house near Lowry Park.
“So I’m here to get some food and a tarp to cover one of the cars that the window got smashed by a tree,’’ he says.
The giveaway was organized by Rebuilding Together Tampa Bay, a nonprofit that, among other services, repairs storm-damaged homes of low-income families so they can stay in them.
The event started at noon but cars were lining up by 9 a.m., says Jose Garcia, CEO of Rebuilding Together Tampa Bay. By 11 a.m., the line stretched down Palm Avenue and up the Avenida Republic. Enough supplies were available for about 500 families, Garica says. They ran out of supplies about 1:45 p.m. and informed the drivers still waiting in line.
As cars moved down the long driveway of the Children’s Board building, scores of volunteers directed traffic and loaded supplies into trunks and backseats. One box of food contained 12 ready-to-eat meals. In another were two soups, 4 to 4.5 ounces of chicken, 4 to 4.5 ounces of tuna and a can opener.
At the next stations, they received a tarp and a Home Depot bucket filled with cleaning supplies and chemicals. In homes that were flooded, the residents can spray the chemicals around the walls to keep the mold from spreading until the agency or other home restorers can get to them, Garcia says.
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Philip MorganRebuilding Together Tampa Bay CEO Jose Garcia“As people are coming in, the volunteers, the teams, are collecting information, and we’re going to make priorities on those that already have damage inside the house,’’ he adds.
Helping the community recover
Tara Berndt lined up to get a tarp and cleaning supplies.
“I’m still trying to clean up the mess from the aftermath of it,’’ she says, noting that she got through the hurricane “by the grace of God.’’
“I was very blessed, I don’t have much damage to the house, it’s more the yard and the trees,’’ she says.
Linda Maddox also came for cleaning supplies.
“I was in evacuation zone A and I had to move; we went to Kissimmee,’’ she says. “We had a lot of branches down, big limbs in the yards, and far as I know there’s no major damage to the property. It hasn’t been professionally checked over. I checked it over but I don’t see anything that I can recognize.’’
She got in line about 11 a.m. and it was moving well “until this lady just came up and pulled in front of me,’’ she says, pointing to the car ahead of her. “She skipped the whole line. That is so terrible.’’
Home Depot and others donated supplies. Among those helping out were volunteers from the Children’s Board and a large contingent from Sunshine Health, all wearing bright orange T-shirts advertising the company.
“You know, it’s just being part of the community,’’ says Troy Mills, an executive with
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Philip MorganTroy Mills, an executive with Sunshine Health parent company Centene Corp. Centene Corp., parent company of Sunshine Health. “These are folks that need help every day with their health care and so it felt like this was absolutely the right thing to do … We have folks who have been impacted themselves and are here helping out, which is really amazing.’’
Children’s Board Executive Director Rebecca Bacon says the event came about after Rebuilding Together Tampa Bay contacted her because the large Children’s Board property had ample space to stage the drive-through. The Children’s Board funds
one of Rebuilding Together Tampa Bay’s programs.
Bacon says a lot of families the Children’s Board serves have reached out for help after the hurricanes.
“We are having families come into our resource centers and also to our other funded partners to express additional needs,” she says. “A lot of it’s related to food and lost wages, so they’re having a hard time making ends meet and also critical support like cleaning supplies, household items, those kinds of things."
She says another challenge is to “get to the families that can’t come to us.”
“We’ll rely on a lot of our funded providers who do home visiting to go out and check on their families and see what their needs are,” Bacon says.
She adds that it’s an ongoing process.
“We’re a week away from the major impacts of the storm and we are still talking with partners who in turn are talking with the families they serve or the child-care providers,’’ she says. “We’re continuing to uncover impact, so I think it’s going to be a long road to recovery, and we’re here for that long road.’’
For more information on Rebuilding Together Tampa Bay and Children’s Board of Hillsborough County,