From Eloise Waelti
Lake City, Fla.
To the editor:
This is the first time I've ever written a letter to an editor of any paper. Most of Mr. Searles letter (published in the June 3 edition of The Monroe Times) seems to be a repetition of how everyone should be forced to build homes with basements or be, at least, a story and a half. Well, I guess I'm one of those "idiots" who live in a tornado and hurricane prone area. I live in Florida where the majority of the population lives along the coasts - I don't, however, but tornados and hurricanes don't differentiate. The majority of homes here can't have basements. If you live on the coast, you are too close to sea level to allow a basement, plus the sand beneath is very unstable. Even the Vertical Assembly Building at Kennedy Space Center had to have poured concrete pilings under the building corners when it was built in the early '60s.
I grew up on a dairy farm near Monroe and lived on the east coast for 40 years. We lived on a "high" area about 3 miles in from the ocean and we were at 29 feet above sea level. No basements. Patrick Air Force Base was directly across the Intercoastal Waterway from me, right on the ocean - all housing was one story and most office buildings that were multi-level were all constructed of concrete block. So that was how homes were built here - concrete block. But there are several beautiful very old homes built when Florida was first settled that are still standing and are multi-level. They were very well constructed of quality wood and beam - you know, like the many beautiful barns still standing in wonderful Green County.
Frame houses are not what the government should be building in any kind of disaster-prone areas - look at what "Sandy" did to New Jersey and New York last fall. The government will always build "on the cheap" unless it's for their own projects. So, I have a suggestion - since we taxpayers are always footing the bill for any service we get, why don't we treat natural disasters like the hated "Obama Care"? Make every homeowner and business carry insurance and make the "fat" insurance companies pay up for a change. I know I pay a small fortune for my insurance every year. Maybe we would get a better built home/business if we had some say in it.
Lake City, Fla.
To the editor:
This is the first time I've ever written a letter to an editor of any paper. Most of Mr. Searles letter (published in the June 3 edition of The Monroe Times) seems to be a repetition of how everyone should be forced to build homes with basements or be, at least, a story and a half. Well, I guess I'm one of those "idiots" who live in a tornado and hurricane prone area. I live in Florida where the majority of the population lives along the coasts - I don't, however, but tornados and hurricanes don't differentiate. The majority of homes here can't have basements. If you live on the coast, you are too close to sea level to allow a basement, plus the sand beneath is very unstable. Even the Vertical Assembly Building at Kennedy Space Center had to have poured concrete pilings under the building corners when it was built in the early '60s.
I grew up on a dairy farm near Monroe and lived on the east coast for 40 years. We lived on a "high" area about 3 miles in from the ocean and we were at 29 feet above sea level. No basements. Patrick Air Force Base was directly across the Intercoastal Waterway from me, right on the ocean - all housing was one story and most office buildings that were multi-level were all constructed of concrete block. So that was how homes were built here - concrete block. But there are several beautiful very old homes built when Florida was first settled that are still standing and are multi-level. They were very well constructed of quality wood and beam - you know, like the many beautiful barns still standing in wonderful Green County.
Frame houses are not what the government should be building in any kind of disaster-prone areas - look at what "Sandy" did to New Jersey and New York last fall. The government will always build "on the cheap" unless it's for their own projects. So, I have a suggestion - since we taxpayers are always footing the bill for any service we get, why don't we treat natural disasters like the hated "Obama Care"? Make every homeowner and business carry insurance and make the "fat" insurance companies pay up for a change. I know I pay a small fortune for my insurance every year. Maybe we would get a better built home/business if we had some say in it.
