MIDDLEBURG, Fla. — One of the very first homeowners whose story we shared when we began investigating the state’s Rebuild Florida program now has a brand-new roof thanks to help from the USDA and a Jacksonville company.

When we visited Mary Gill’s Middleburg home in April 2024, she showed us her dilapidated roof that had been leaking since Hurricane Irma damaged it in 2017. The holes were getting worse. She told us she had been trying for years to get repairs through Rebuild Florida and showed us a letter from intake specialist with the program dated 2021 that said Hurricane Irma damage had been confirmed on her home and her application was pending an environmental review. 

We took her concerns to the head of FloridaCommerce, the department that oversees the housing repair and replacement program.

“Mary Gill, unfortunately, she’s never actually been in the program. She applied well more than a year after the program’s application window closed,” FloridaCommerce Secretary Alex Kelly told us when we sat down with him in Tallahassee in May 2024.

“It got me so upset when they said I wasn’t even in the program, and I have been talking to people and I have a case worker. I have a case and then to say I’m not even in the program, that just blew me away there. And then when I call and check on it, I’m in the program,” Gill said in 2024.

Thursday, Mark Ivy with Synergy Solar and Roofing reached out to First Coast News to let us know his company installed a new roof, saying our investigation helped raise awareness about Gill’s situation. 

“As you shared in your original piece, Miss Gill had been struggling to get her roof replaced through the “Rebuild Florida” program. I’m happy to report that her roof is now finally being repaired,” Ivy wrote. “Your reporting truly makes a difference. Without dedicated journalists like you, people like Miss Gill might continue to be overlooked. Your story not only brought attention to her situation but also put pressure on the process—something that is clearly still moving slowly for others in similar situations.”

Ivy says she Gill was awarded a $10,000 grant through the USDA to have her roof replaced. 

“What the grant was supposed to do was bring her back to a spot where she can actually live in there because I stopped there one time when it was raining and the front porch. You might as well just have an umbrella while you’re sitting on the front porch,” Ivy said. “It was important for me to reach out to you to show, yes, she was going through that bad situation, but we were able to help her with this. And it touched me how happy she was for us to come in and actually help her with her roof because she’s been dealing with this for so, so long,” Ivy said.

To learn more about the USDA Single Family Housing Repair Loans and Grants click here.

You can read our original story including Mary Gill at this link.