MERRITT ISLAND, Fla. — A new year means more broken promises for homeowners who are still waiting on a state program to repair or replace their homes damaged by Hurricane Irma more than seven years ago.

For nearly a year, First Coast News has been investigating and reporting on the taxpayer-funded Rebuild Florida program. Complaints continue to pour into our newsroom from across the state. We hit the road and traveled 150 miles south to Merritt Island,where a woman battling cancer says the program intended to make her life better has made it an absolute nightmare.

“I was told it was a three-month remodel,” Denise Rotolante said. “It’s been three years now.”

From shoddy work to appliances she says she can’t use, Rotolante says her Merritt Island home is far from finished. “The dishwasher, it works, it goes on, but there’s no water to it.”

Florida Commerce, the state agency overseeing the Rebuild Florida program, told us her home is now complete. 

Rotolante says initially she was elated to join the program after Hurricane Irma damaged her home in 2017. 

“I was running around crying, telling everybody what a blessing it was,” Rotolante said. “I assumed everything was with good intention. Little did I know and find out later that everything was done for them to create the most work possible for them to make the most amount of money.”

Now she doesn’t know what to do now. As she walks around her house she points out all the problems.

Rotalante showed us the siding in her home. “My house had this Merritt Island pine, and it’s like concrete. They insisted it all had to come off and they’re putting siding on and they put on the cheapest, absolute thinnest siding. So, this is my only barrier to the outside now.”

Her roof now has vegetation growing out of it, a problem she says she did not have before she joined the program.

“I mean, it’s insane. I got a whole freaking garden up there,” Rotolante said.

Her list of complaints is lengthy. 

“The septic, the air conditioner, the floors. I want to be reimbursed for my move and storage fees,” Rotolante said. “There’s so much. There’s still mold, black mold coming through, and I have a leak.”

Jason Wall was hired by a subcontractor to work on Rotolante’s home.

“There was some black mold that I complained about that needed to be cleaned out, that basically the house needed to be scrubbed,  you know, for the black mold and whatnot. None of this was done,” Wall said. “New insulation was stuck in the roof to cover it up, drywall covered over it.”

We found him through a fraud and licensed work complaint he filed with the Attorney General’s Office about his former employer, who he is now suing over a compensation dispute.

“Do you feel like her home is better built than it was before hurricane?” First Coast News asked.

“No, ma’am. That home was solid before we messed with it,” Wall said.  

Battling multiple myeloma, Rotolante says the stress of being in the Rebuild Florida program has been overwhelming.

“Multiple myeloma is a blood cancer that eats your bones. And stress is the number one bad thing, and guess what? I got nonstop stress,” she said.

Rebuild Florida required her to move out of her house. The program paid for storage pods,  but Rotolante is having to foot an $1,100 a month bill to store her belongings that didn’t fit in the pods,  even though she says she was verbally told she would be reimbursed, something Florida Commerce disputes. She says the financial toll this project has had on her has been devastating.

“It takes everything I have monthly,” Rotolante said.

She says the biggest problem with the program is that no one is held accountable.  It’s a complaint we’ve heard from Rebuild Florida homeowners across the state.