Tucked away just south of St. Petersburg in Pinellas County, the coastal city of Gulfport prides itself on its old world charm: bungalows built in the 1960s, a plethora of small businesses and locals who've been around for years.
But after three major hurricanes and a quarter of its land being inundated, Mayor Sam Henderson said he's worried about how Gulfport may not look the same once the pieces are put back together.
Henderson has been the city's Mayor since 2013, after serving on the city council since 2009. This year, he is also a visiting professor of environmental science at USF St. Petersburg's Judy Genshaft Honors College.
"It's those kinds of things, the willingness of even when someone's having a tough time, that they want to reach out and be there for others," he said, reflecting on how his constituents' "benevolent spirit" has shone through during this time.
"I really salute that kind of behavior."
We spoke to Henderson about how Gulfport is trying to get back to a sense of normalcy, including what it's like to lead students, a whole city, and himself to recovery.
The devastating effects, he said, began with Hurricane Debby.
"That one kind of caught us by surprise, and so we ended up with a lot of vessels that came ashore, some storm surge, some coastal flooding," he said. "To me, that hurricane is kind of what started our journey, because it really kind of set the tone for the upcoming storms."
As mayor of Gulfport, could you briefly tell me how the city was affected by hurricanes Helene and Milton?
Helene was, of course, the most vicious in terms of damage. We had about 25% of our land area in Gulfport that was inundated. Lots of residents, lots of businesses were affected. Indeed, lots of our municipal facilities were also affected. And we're still in the process of getting through and just making those adjustments as we try to get cleared up and get people on the path to recovery.
So with the recovery efforts, is there a concern of gentrification or maybe a loss of long-time community members that have been present in Gulfport?
Absolutely, and we were already seeing some of those losses pre-hurricane, just with the spikes in the housing market and people being priced out.
If your structure was a loss, then you you have to build back at what FEMA refers to as base flood elevation, which is a height that could range from, you know, a foot to over 10 feet above that determined flood elevation, which means elevating structures, which changes the scale of the city, which vastly increases the cost of rebuilding.
So we're very concerned about that for our residents who are displaced, because that changes the demographic of who's able to live here, and that 100% is going to force some people out against their will, through no fault of their own. You know, roll the dice from Mother Nature.
And with such severe impacts, I wanted to ask you, beyond the physical damages, have you noticed an impact on people's mental health, including your own?
Oh, absolutely. I mean, I'm definitely a believer that hope and despair can occupy the same space. And on a daily basis, we see that, you know, there's days that are good days and days that are bad days, so there's a lot of sadness and grief and disbelief. And so the reality that we're seeing now is pretty hard on people, not only for their personal losses.
For example, people in the part of town that I live in that are higher up, we weren't inundated here on the north side of town, but it's just a general sense of just a loss of the Gulfport that we knew and loved going into this storm, you know, a real longing to get back to what we had.
Yeah, it's been pretty powerful, and it's pretty tangible. When you go out and you talk to people and you drive around and just see the difference in what the city looks like, and knowing how many people have been displaced and how many people are going through the struggles or trying to determine what their next move is, it's it's very unsettling
For you, personally, holding such an important position as Mayor of Gulfport, and then you're also a professor. I was wondering how you maybe have been balancing your own journey, your own recovery, with having to show up for the people you know, your constituents.
Personally, I feel like I haven't been balancing it well. In terms of my mental and emotional health, it's been hard to sleep. It's been a lot of jumping back and forth from one task to the other, but in terms of feeling like it's all kind of common work, whether it's helping students make this transition and get through their semester, whether it's helping residents and business owners get the answers and the results and the connections that they need with other agencies in order to move on.
It's been very uplifting in ways, but it's certainly exhausting, and there's a lot of people that have got way bigger load on their shoulders than I do, but definitely, it has been taking a toll.
