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STORM RECOVERY

DADE CITY, Fla. — Homeowners in Dade City are still feeling the repercussions from Hurricane Milton four months on.

What You Need To Know

The hurricane left residential areas completely under water, leaving homeowners stranded and unable to get to their homes. Residents are wondering what to do next.

“We’re not able to access our property because we can’t get to it, because it’s wet,” Kim Barnes said.

For the last 20 years, Barnes and her husband have been living on their property. But nothing would prepare them for what they witnessed last fall.

“Luckily, my son has a canoe, and we had to rescue the people that lived here and the people that were here who had a toddler,” said Barnes. “We had to keep going back and forth because we still had a cat in our house to feed and to take care of. We got the pumps here Nov. 1. It took probably about mid-December for the waters to recede a little bit.”

Their home and surrounding property was submerged under water after flooding of a nearby retention pond from Hurricane Milton. Something that could have been avoided, Barnes says, had the county listened to their previous concerns.

“We’ve been to so many meetings, fighting it and contesting it,” Barnes said. “Everything on record saying, ‘if you build this development, it’s going to make things worse.’ Not only does it make it worse for us, it makes it worse for everybody downstream. It makes it worse because the water comes from here, from Happy Hill, it comes down, and, actually, affects the people down in Hickory Hill and Fort King.”

With water now receded, the couple’s attention is working on bringing back their home while remaining hopeful of a solution from the county.

“I have no idea what they can do to fix this,” said Michael Barnes. “Even if they brought the level up here, which, you can see, would take a ton of dirt, it would displace insane amounts of water on other people.”

The Barnes say they plan to stay on their property knowing full well what can potentially happen again.

“It’s just scary because we’ve lost our vehicles," said Kim. "We had a total loss of our vehicles. I don’t want to lose our vehicles again, I don’t want to be out of our home again.”

A Pasco County spokesperson says following the hurricanes and heavy rain, the state provided pumps and trucks to help relieve flooding in some areas. However, those pumps were redeployed outside of the county in early December. The county also says if homeowners applied for FEMA assistance, they suggest following up with them.

Picture hundreds of glowing lanterns lighting up the night sky over Dade City. “And at last I see the light!” Ever wanted to live out the dreams of Rapunzel in the Disney movie Tangled? Well you’ll have your chance to live your princess dreams at the Siagon Night Market Floating Lantern Festival in Dade city on March 15 & 16. It’s not an actual Disney event, but whenever I hear about a lantern festival, my mind immediately thinks of the Disney classic.

The fun starts at noon and goes until 10 p.m. each day. The big moment comes at 8 p.m. when everyone releases lanterns into the night sky. You can buy tickets ranging from $6 to $22.50 online ahead of time.

Once everything wraps up, cleanup teams will pick up any fallen lanterns from the area. The lanterns are made with eco-friendly materials that decompose naturally, keeping local wildlife safe and helping protect the environment.

People can enjoy real dishes as food vendors serve up favorites from all over Southeast Asia. In between eating, folks of all ages can play games or enjoy rides spread across the grounds.

Safety is top priority – staff members will show everyone how to handle the lanterns properly. Kids need to stay with their parents during the nighttime release.

With people coming from all around Tampa Bay, this festival looks to bring communities together while brightening up the Florida night. Get more info here.

The Lightning have seriously tightened up their defense, letting in just 1.67 goals per game across their last 12 games. That’s way better than their earlier 2.84 average. With 9 wins in their last 10 games, they’re right on the heels of the Atlantic Division leaders, only three points behind.

They’ve locked things down for six straight games now, giving up no more than two goals, looking a lot like their defense during that 2021 championship run.

The goals are coming from all over these days. The bottom two lines have chipped in big, scoring nine times in the last ten games. Just look at that Columbus game: They jumped out to a quick two-goal lead on their way to winning 6-2.

“Scoring two in the first minute and a half was big for us,” said Lightning captain Victor Hedman. “We got the puck in the zone and got close to the net. We wanted to do the same thing in the second and we got two quick ones and we’re able to hem them in. If you can do that, good things will happen.”

In goal, Johansson looked sharp coming back from his five-week layoff from injury, stopping 31 shots. He’s now got a 7-5-1 record this season. Vasilevskiy continues to shine with a .924% save percentage.

Getting McDonagh back on defense has been huge. The timing couldn’t be better as they try to catch Boston and Toronto for the division title. And now the team welcomes back another Stanley Cup champion, Yanni Gourde, who was traded back to the Lightning from the Seattle Kraken yesterday (3/5). Although Yanni only has 6 goals on the season (battling injuries and playing on a mediocre team), he has proven himself in the playoffs to be a great two-way forward.

The new guys have finally found their groove in the system. You can see that championship DNA showing up again in how they play.

DADE CITY, Fla. — Gasparilla isn’t the only festival taking place in the Tampa Bay area this weekend.

While the pirate-themed spectacle take over Tampa, another festival will take place celebrating a certain fruit.

Dade City will be celebrating its 28th annual Kumquat Festival, a significant event that plays a large role in the local economy.

What You Need To Know

On a chilly Friday afternoon, a special open house took shape at the farm of Kumquat Growers Inc., with general manager and kumquat grower Greg Gude leading the tour.

“It’s a unique fruit, because you do eat the peeling and all,” he said. “Normally, because the citric acid is down, this would normally have sprayed out. But you can see how it brings the sweetness to the peel, and then all you do is pop that in your mouth and chew it up.”

Gude said the fruit has been made sweeter thanks to chilly temps. A universal fruit, he said it can be made into just about anything.

“There’s kumquat jelly — we have kumquat strawberry marmalade," he said. "We have kumquat barbecue sauce, kumquat vinaigrette, we have kumquat honey.”

Right now, kumquats are in their peak season.

“You’ll come and visit to go to the festival and you’ll see some of the shops," said Vicki Wiggins, president and CEO of the East Pasco Chamber of Commerce. "They might be super busy, so, a lot of times, people will come back so that they can go through the shops and really explore what we have to offer.”

Gude said his farm managed to avoid losing any crops from this past hurricane season. He said disease has been a minor setback for the growers, but things have started to rebound.

“The trees are getting better," Gude said. "We’re making some headway with disease. Hopefully, next year we’ll have more of the Meiwa round kumquat to take to the festival.”

Dade City’s 28th Annual Kumquat Festival is free to attend, with festivities getting underway at 9 a.m. Saturday.