Longtime residents of the Florida Keys are being driven out by tidal flooding, skyrocketing costs and turbo-charged hurricanes. Many want to stay, but can they survive the dual threat of rising seas and wealthy investors?
Dwayne Hope stands next to his car destroyed by Hurricane Irma on Big Pine Key, Fla., in September 2017. Hope lived on a boat for 20 years and tried to shelter in the car before retreating to a nearby house. The Category 4 hurricane took all his possessions. Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images
By ARIANNA SKIBELL, Politiico
Climate change is making it more dangerous — and much more expensive — to live on the subtropical islands at the southern tip of Florida.
Daniel Cusick writes that extreme heat, tidal flooding and severe hurricanes are driving out longtime residents of the Florida Keys and driving up the cost of basic needs: rent, food, water, power and gasoline.
That has meant the departure of more low- and middle-income residents, many of whom work the service and labor jobs undergirding the Keys’ multibillion-dollar tourism industry. Now people with greater wealth and more mobility are moving in, further increasing housing prices. Meanwhile, the climate clock is ticking as sea levels rise.
This is all happening in a state with a governor who has described himself as “not a global warming person.” Gov. Ron DeSantis, a potential Republican presidential nominee, once prefaced resilience plans for sea-level rise with assurances that Florida was just a “flood-prone state.”
Necessary retreat? The population of Big Pine Key dropped 15 percent after Hurricane Irma in 2017. The area is now home to about 4,800 people.
While Big Pine Key is rebuilding, real estate values have nearly doubled since Irma.
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