FORT MYERS, Fla. — Residents in Dean Park are frustrated that no plan has been created to divert water from their low lying area.
The City says there's a solution, like building a wall around the city and putting pumps behind it, similar to New Orleans.
The resident, Joy Schwartz, says she is fed up and wants answers.
"It's a disaster."
Shwartz has lived in Southwest Florida all her life.
She says she's tired of cleaning up and paying for damage every time this area floods.
"I'm very unhappy with what's happening with the irrigation system," says Schwartz.
On Thursday and Friday, a city official told Fox 4 that they had four pumps running, but at certain points of the storm, they said the tide was too high, and flooding was inevitable.
Schwartz says that her neighborhood is like a giant fish bowl, and she wanted to know what the city had planned to fix their flooding issue in dean park.
Your Fort Myers Community Correspondent, Miyoshi Price, spoke to Schwartz on Wednesday when the city kicked off the debris pile pickup.
MESSAGE FROM THE CITY:
Starting today, Oct. 2nd, the City of Fort Myers Solid Waste Division is collecting residential construction debris as a first pass. Pick-up will continue through Monday, Oct. 7th. A second pass will begin on Monday, Oct. 14th. Please have your items out on the curb before 5 p.m. each day.
The water receded Friday but the damage is lingering.
Price reached out to public works to see if the city could do anything about Schwartz's concerns.
The public works director peter Bieniek explains.
"Water is going to find a path of least resistance," says Bieniek. "You can build a wall at one spot, and it's going to go down a little further and come around. The only way to solve it is literally ring the city in walls and then put pumps behind it, kind of like New Orleans."
He says no one wants a big wall behind their house, and a project like that would cost billions of dollars.
Bieniek explains what they have done to assist when it comes to grants and more.
"We did paperwork that allowed the residents to go through work, you know, I won't say allow, but said, in conjunction with the city, we would, you know, sponsor or support FEMA supplying funds either raise the house, buy a house out and then never build on that lot again.
Schwartz says her family of eight wants to stay in this home in this neighborhood but its proving impossible.
"I can't, in good conscience, live here if we don't resolve some of these huge issues," says Schwartz.
The city posted on Facebook what individual homeowners and business owners can do to get relief:
For Hurricane Helene updates and recovery information, including business and residential permitting details, please visit www.cityftmyers.com/1914/Hurricane-Center.
