Families must evacuate FEMA trailers by Friday or pay rent on it

PENDER COUNTY, NC (WWAY) — It’s been a year and a half since Hurricane Florence slammed into our coast, but many are still rebuilding.

FEMA approved the state’s request to extend the deadline for families in trailers to June 13th, but families will have to pay rent on them and bills could top a $1,000 a month.

“My actual move out is tomorrow, the 11th, and so they’ll be coming and doing a walk through with me and they’ll be taking my keys and locking the camper down,” Aggie Randolph says.

Randolph is forced to say goodbye to her FEMA camper, a temporary home that she’s called her family’s saving grace since January 2019.

“I get real emotional,” Randolph said. “We had a lot of good friends and a lot of good people that helped us out, but we lost pretty much everything we had here at home.”

Randolph says Hurricane Florence raised flood waters 10 feet around her home and lingered for 11 days, so everything had to go.

“A lady walked up right after the storm and she told me about baptist men and so I contacted them right away,” Randolph said.

She says the NC Baptist Men volunteers gutted her home days later.

“We’re one of the first ones on the ground,” Mike Moser said. “Whether it’s a North Carolina, or right now we have a bunch of our folks and equipment ready to go to Nashville, Tennesee to help with that tornado.”

Moser leads the Pender County division of NC baptist men. He says volunteers have helped 45 families get back into their homes.

“We currently have about 35 active jobs working at a time and we still have another batch of jobs that are in the cue,” Randolph said.

Randolph says, after her home was gutted, she was on their wait list and worried she wouldn’t get her home restored, but volunteers started work months ago and are still doing work today. Randolph’s biggest hurdle now is getting her house to pass the county’s inspection before she loses her keys to her FEMA trailer.

She’s thankful for all the volunteers who have helped her get this far.

“If it wasn’t for them, I wouldn’t be in my home,” Randolph said.

From A/C units to plywood, the NC Baptist Men’s 5 acre garage is stocked with products for families that may need help and the Baptist men are on target to help at least 9 families get back into their homes by Friday.

The volunteer organization has had boots on the ground in Pender County since day one of Hurricane Florence recovery.

Moser says volunteers gutted 671 homes back in September 2018 and have since rebuilt 45 homes from the ground up.

“When we get through this crunch with FEMA trailers, then we’ll look on taking on more client,” Moser said. “Fortunately, most of our volunteer groups return and come back again.”

Moser says there are still gutted homes on a wait list they have not worked on yet.

Moser says some Duke University students are in Pender County helping families reach that Friday deadline.

The North Carolina Baptist men are still looking for volunteers to help with recovery. If you’d like to help, visit their website here.