Cleaning debris in SWFL left behind from Hurricane Ian

We are two weeks past Hurricane Ian but in many ways, the cleanup is just beginning. Piles of debris start to clutter outside people’s homes who just want to leave Ian in the past.

Collecting all of the storm debris mostly falls on the county, and they’re doing a lot to get it done.

Picture a football field that’s covered with storm debris piled nearly three feet high, then multiply that by 25.

That’s how much has been collected so far in Lee County, and in Collier County, there’s even more.

Skip Pardee from Naples Park shared some thoughts with WINK News about what’s being done.

“You can’t, I mean as they were taking stuff out of their houses it had to be whatever was there, they had to start taking out. They can’t say, ‘oh I’m going to do recyclables and I’m going to do construction material.’ So we’ve tried to at our house. We’ve been trying to get it separated but we didn’t have the loss as our neighbors did,” Pardee said.

Collier County solid & hazardous waste putting out maps and graphs to get a better understanding. Once you add all the numbers up, nearly 170,000 cubic yards of debris has been collected in Collier County.

If you’re able to separate the waste this is how they would like it to be done.

Make six piles of waste. Normal yard waste, vegetative debris, construction & demolition materials, household hazardous waste, electronics, and appliances.

WINK News reached out to Lee, Collier, and Charlotte Counties on Tuesday, and Charlotte was the only one we heard back from.

WINK News was told there is no timeline or deadline to collect debris, simply the work will be done until it’s gone.