A year after Hurricane Irma, 'some of us are just getting home'

Eve Samples | Treasure Coast Newspapers

Courtney Crowley was born and raised in Florida. And when Hurricane Irma approached the peninsula last September, she did what Floridians do.

"You get your supplies, you put them at home, you make a plan," says the 33-year-old Fort Myers resident.

Then you decide if you're staying put.

That's where it got complicated for her.

Crowley and her husband initially planned to ride out the storm at their home in a wooded neighborhood not far from the Orange River. Then, less than 48 hours before Irma's landfall, they regretted the choice.

The storm's projected path had shifted toward Southwest Florida, and its intensity was still terrifying.

Hurricane Irma puts life into perspective for Fort Myers woman | Florida Voices Courtney Crowley, of Fort Myers, shares her experience being displaced from her home because of Hurricane Irma flooding.

"We can’t stay here," Crowley's husband told her. "We have so many trees, we have got to go.”

So they packed their dogs (three black mouth curs), two cats, a few books, clothes, computers and one of her husband's guitars, and they fled to stay with family in Boca Raton.

"I was pretty hysterical," Crowley recalls.

Before striking Florida, Irma was a Category 5 hurricane for 60 hours, longer than all but one hurricane on record. The storm made landfall seven times, including in the Florida Keys and Southwest Florida, where it arrived as a Category 3 on Sept. 10, 2017.

Irma was one of the strongest and costliest Atlantic hurricanes on record, according to the National Hurricane Center.

Crowley is among the Floridians who suffered major losses and is still recovering.

Several days after Irma, the water in Crowley's neighborhood finally receded enough for her and her husband to survey the damage. Even then, they had to park their car at a main road and wade through their yard.

"The first thought was relief: It’s there, my house is still standing. I don’t have a tree through it," Crowley recalls.

But the front door was swollen shut. They had to jimmy a window open.

Inside, a watermark reached almost a foot up their walls.

Almost everything was damaged beyond repair: furniture, mattresses, appliances, cabinets. Their refrigerator stunk from all the food left behind.

An avid reader, Crowley had a custom-built bookcase along one of her walls. It and many of the books were ruined, too.

Her wedding dress survived only because it was tea-length, so it hung above the water that had pooled inside her home.

Crowley considers herself lucky in many ways. Because she and her husband evacuated, they didn't experience the terror of rising water.

Another blessing: Crowley works in accounting and was well-equipped to handle the complicated paperwork required to fix the $90,000 worth of damage their home sustained (not including their lost possessions).

Perhaps the biggest saving grace: They had a place to live while they rebuilt.

"My aunt took me in with my husband and three dogs. I can’t imagine other people doing that," she says.

From there, they waited — for insurance adjusters, for FEMA, for contractors.

In May, 8 months after Irma hit, Crowley and her husband moved back to their rebuilt house. Packing was easy: All they had was what they fit in their two cars before Irma.

“This is the aftermath, guys. It’s a year later, and some of us are just getting home,” Crowley says.

Now, they are slowly replacing furniture and instruments that belonged to Crowley's husband, a musician. Their insurance policy covered only $1,000 in household contents, but the couple has been helped by furniture donations from United Way.

Crowley's work at Community Cooperative — a nonprofit that serves the hungry and homeless in Lee County — has helped keep her own loss in context.

“I see how much worse it was for so many other people," she says. "And there’s so many that are still not home.”

In May, the same month she returned to her house, Crowley earned her bachelor's degree in accounting from Florida Gulf Coast University. She completed the degree even as she was rebuilding her home, working full time and working another 20 hours a week as a tutor. She's now about to start a master's program.

The degrees represent freedom for Crowley. In years past, she juggled multiple jobs just to cover her rent and car payment. She wanted a living wage with opportunity for growth. Returning to school was a long-term strategy for financial stability.

“It’s not just thinking about today anymore. It’s thinking about what happens if there is no social security when I’m older,” Crowley says.

The semester Irma struck, she considered leaving school.

“In hindsight, I’m really glad I didn’t.”

How would you describe Florida at this moment in history?

Population has grown so exponentially. And we’ve made some really, what’s turning out to be bad decisions, so that we could cultivate Florida as a tourism spot.

We divert water, we drain the Everglades, and then we get red tide and algae blooms.

How do you sell yourself as a tourism state when people who have asthma can’t stand on the beach?

Let’s make smart choices, and let’s fix what we did.

How has your life in Florida changed over the past 8 years?

In 4 years, a whole lifetime has happened to me. I got married, I bought a house, I lost my house, I rebuilt my house. I got three dogs.

I would say the biggest choice was I went back to school. I figured out what I needed to do to make money so that I could support myself and support my family. I fought people for grants, and I paid stuff out of my pocket.

And that was so important. Because you cannot live off an office job … without a degree.

What issues are on your mind this election year in Florida?

More living wages and sustainable growth in Florida, both economically and environmentally.

How do you find the truth? That’s the hardest thing for me. How do I find (a candidate) that represents me as a person? I’m just trying to keep my head down and pay my bills and live my life, and not destroy the place I live. How do you find somebody that represents that?

When you think about the future of Florida, what worries you?

It’s actually really personal to me. What worries me is having children. This environment, the school system, is not a place I want to have a child.

It’s so far from how I grew up. My parents pushed you out the door and you had the imagination, and you played in the yard. Now I feel like you have to keep your kid on lockdown.

What makes you hopeful about the future of Florida?

I have tons of hope for Florida because it only takes one super-passionate person to stand up, and they just create an avalanche.

Florida Voices is a project of the USA TODAY Network-Florida that spotlights issues important to Floridians this election year. Learn more, including how to nominate a Floridian.

Courtney Crowley

Age: 33

Occupation: Coordinator of finance and administration at Community Cooperative in Fort Myers

Lives in: Fort Myers

Election issues: Living wages, sustainable growth, food insecurity