DeSantis met with local, state and FEMA officials at the A.D. Harris Learning Village in Panama City on Wednesday to hear from local leaders how Panama City, Springfield, Parker, Lynn Haven and other impacted areas are struggling with debris costs and asking for reimbursement from the federal government.
"I'm instructing my department of emergency management to greenlight and expedite some of the money for debris removal. There's things we can do. We can expedite these worksheets the communities have to do so they can get 50 percent of the costs upfront," said DeSantis, who also visited Mexico Beach on his first full day in office. "We want to provide whatever financial resources we can so they can meet this. It's a monumental effort. ... I am going to talk to the President about increasing the share of FEMA reimbursements. I think this warrants it."
President Donald Trump helped DeSantis during his campaign, and the two are known to have a good working relationship.
FEMA Administrator Brock Long said large-scale disaster recovery takes "many years" and the agency faced an "unprecedented" amount of disasters in recent years, which required rebuilding communities across half the globe.
"We understand housing is an ongoing issue. Housing is incredibly complex," said Long. "You try to first move people out of shelters into places they can rent, into hotels, more permanent solutions. ... Trying to find housing when you've had a tremendous amount of the housing stock damaged is incredibly difficult so we have to pull out all the stops, and that's what we're working on. It's a frustrating process to get everybody stable and we continue to do that."
Callaway Mayor Pamn Henderson said she was encouraged by DeSantis's visit.
"The discussion with the Governor was very positive. It is encouraging to see that he is keeping the focus on Northwest Florida and that he is concerned with our recovery," said Henderson. "His statements regarding reversing the policy on advance funding were especially encouraging, as funding for debris removal is foremost for all the cities in Bay County."
Local leaders requested DeSantis push Trump to have FEMA reimburse 90 percent of the debris removal costs, one of the most significant expenses so far. DeSantis agreed to pursue the request.
"If you looked at Hurricane Irma, which affected in one way or another all 67 Florida counties, there was a little bit more than 2 million cubic square yards of debris for the entire state," said DeSantis. "This storm, much smaller area affected, over 20 million cubic square yards of debris. This is a massive clean-up effort."
DeSantis also had a scheduled visit to Tyndall Air Force Base while in town that press was not invited to.
"I'm a big supporter of maintaining the mission there and I'm glad the administration is supportive of doing that. I think, given the assets they will end up having there, they may end up coming out stronger on the other end of this," said DeSantis. "I think it's important to the community here, an important part of our active duty mission and important part of who we are as Floridians. That's something I will continue to fight for."
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