'We can't move on': For Bristol, a town grappling with poverty, Hurricane Michael still churns
Nada HassaneinBRISTOL — The storm hasn’t left. Not at the home of 66-year-old Debra Peddie.
When Hurricane Michael roared through her quiet Liberty County town of just under 1,000 people, it rattled the rural, one-red-light community. A year later, Bristol is still riddled with blue tarps and downed trees.
For half a century, Peddie and her husband have lived in their modest farmhouse on a patch of land off Peddie Lane. The couple is now caught in a battle between their insurance company and a contractor.
Do they fix the damages — or tear down the house?
"I don’t know where we’re going to be if we tear our house down. FEMA will not let us have a trailer to live in because we have insurance,” said Peddie, a retired prison security specialist. “We’re in litigation. They (the insurance company) don’t want to pay."
'Too old to start over'
On the farm, the Peddies have raised hogs for a form of compost: For about three decades, they contracted with the Department of Corrections, collecting leftover food from the Liberty Correctional prison as swill to feed their hogs.
But Michael leveled the farm.
It destroyed their barns and sheds and pens. The hogs had to go. The money went too. It was the main source of income for Peddie’s 75-year-old husband Wayne, a logger and farmer.
"He has no retirement,” Peddie said. “When our contract ran out at the end of June, we had to get rid of everything … so, the farming’s over. We’re just too old to start over again."
Hurricane Michael one year later:
- Marking the Hurricane Michael milestone: Looking back one year later
- 'Collectively we've forgotten them': Hurricane Michael survivors hanging on one year later
- Everyone has a Hurricane Michael story. Here is how our story and your stories intertwined
An adjuster estimated a 70% loss, she said. On a late August day, Peddie sifted through photographs she's kept of the destruction. At first glance, the remaining damage isn't so obvious.
But the house, seated atop a concrete foundation, is “crooked” due to hits from two fallen pecan trees Wayne's grandfather had planted on the property decades ago. The floor creaks and slopes. A shattered window by the broken chimney is covered in plastic and foil. The back porch has since been torn down. The storm crushed the septic tank and laundry and utility rooms.
Only recently was Peddie able to wash her clothes in her own house since the storm.
The frustrations make it feel like Michael blew into town and the storm is still churning.
“The storm is still here. It’s like it’s still hitting us, because," Peddie said through tears, "we can’t move on — until we know, we don’t even know what to do.”
Afraid but 'determined to recover'
A few miles away, Sinatra Hall, 62, stands on crutches in the doorway of his trailer and remember's Michael's wrath.
He said the storm blew “just about everything down” in his neighborhood.
That included his mobile home. It toppled it sideways – while he was inside, he said.
“It scared me some… It was a big shock, because we weren't really looking for it to come here,” he said of his small town about 55 miles from where the powerful storm made landfall near Mexico Beach.
“It just gives us a warning that things like that can happen,” Hall added. “I just hope it don't come back again – that's all I got to say about it. I hope it don't come back.”
Michael's impact on Bristol:
- 'Don't forget about Bristol': Liberty County towns still reeling 5 months after Hurricane Michael
- Giant crater opens up in Bristol threatening homes and cemetery
- ‘Forgotten’ burgs feel real forgotten one month after Hurricane Michael | Mark Hinson
- Liberty County baseball coach, wife added to Hurricane Michael death toll
- Melissa Peddie on Hurricane Michael's forceful toll on 'idyllic' life in Liberty County
About a quarter of Liberty County's residents live in poverty, with a median household income of $36,741 compared to the state's median of $50,883, according to American Community Survey data.
Along with generations of farmers like the Peddies, timber workers make up an important part of the county's economy, explained 87-year-old Johnny Eubanks, volunteer executive director of the Liberty County Chamber of Commerce.
"The major longstanding effect is the loss of the forests," Eubanks said. "Liberty County is a forest-product county and a vast amount of the timber has been destroyed through the storm ... those areas will be several years before they’ll be able to replenish and start producing wood again."
More:'PANIC LEVEL': Hurricane Michael's impact on Florida, Georgia timber farms generational
According to a FEMA report, more than 400,000 cubic yards of debris have been removed throughout the county. That's roughly 25,000 dump-truck loads — lined up from Tallahassee to Jacksonville, estimated Dan Hill, a Tallahassee city engineer.
"Unless we can find a replacement for the timber business, forest business, it’s going to affect the economy drastically," Eubanks said. There have been talks of exploring hemp cultivation.
"We are determined to recover — and we’re going to," he said.
Peddie hopes and prays for that.
“I believe in God and I know he has a plan and I know it’s going to be good — and I keep telling Him, how much longer do we need to wait? What did we do to deserve it?" she said. "If I’ve done something wrong, I’m sorry. But I know, I know in my heart that things are going to be better."
Reach Nada Hassanein at nhassanein@tallahassee.com or on Twitter @nhassanein_.
MARKING THE MILESTONE
Continuing through the month, we will revisit some of the hardest hit communities and have daily datelined stories from more than a dozen towns in North Florida and South Georgia.
Help us write the next chapter
The Tallahassee Democrat has won a $25,000 Facebook grant to continue chronicling the recovery after Hurricane Michael. We will pay community correspondents – writers, photographers and videographers – who live in the hardest-hit areas to help tell the stories of the storm's aftermath and recovery. To apply, email us at letters@tallahassee.com.
How to Help
Donate or volunteer at rebuild850.org or learn ways to Give, Go and Serve at www.onenorthflorida.org/
Explore the trajectory of tragedy
Visit michael.tallahassee.com to take a virtual tour of Hurricane Michael’s destruction from the coast to the Georgia state line as seen through the eyes, stories, photos and videos of our journalists and neighbors.
Storms of Our Lives
Join us at 6:30 p.m. on Friday, Oct 18 at the American Legion Hall on Lake Ella for a special Storytellers night with the theme "Storms of Our Lives." A fundraiser for Lee's Place, it will feature about five local storytellers taking to the stage to tell you true stories about their own storm experiences (in the literal or figurative sense). Details at tickets.tallahassee.com