By Tom Tracy - Florida Catholic

PEMBROKE PINES | The nation watched in sadness and outrage at the deaths of eight elderly persons Hollywood without air conditioning and electricity following the historic passing of Hurricane Irma.

Members of nearby St. Edward parish in Pembroke Pines and the local Knights of Columbus, hearing the call to be good neighbors, prepared hot meals and set out to knock on doors and check in on senior citizen residents four days after the storm.

The group were given permission to go door to door with their hot meals and water supplies at the expansive Century Village Pembroke Pines housing development in western Broward County on Sept. 14.

Residents there reportedly had been without electricity and air conditioning for days, although power was being restored even as the parish volunteers were making their rounds here.

According to news reports, police confirmed earlier in the week that about 60 percent of the 15,000-person community of mostly retirees still didn’t have electricity and was under a boil water notice. Century Village is a community comprised of people 55 and over.

Compounding the hardships, many elderly citizens at Century Village were unable to get around the four-story buildings because the elevators were not working and some residents couldn't climb three and four flights of stairs.

The volunteers covered several of the building with hot meals consisting of Cuban food and pasta along with bottled water.

Scott O’Connor, Florida State Secretary and a resident of Pembroke Pines, noted that his own mother had lived in Century Village at one time.

“It is a large community built for citizens over 55 years old and in the early days it was primarily Jewish-oriented, but now it is quite an eclectic mix of people and a kind of self-contained city," O'Connor said.

“We are out here helping and that is what we do; it doesn’t matter what religion you are, we are helping everybody.”

One of the issues of this particular housing complex, he said, is that the residents are susceptible to loss of power and there is only elevator in each of these buildings.

“Sometimes you have elderly people who may have mobility issues and can’t get down the stairs, and so bringing meals and supplies in for them is really a necessity and something we can do to help,” O'Connor said.

“Normally when we get affected by storms it is localized. But in this particular case, Hurricane Irma affected really all of our Florida jurisdiction. And we still don’t have access to the Florida Keys here on the fourth day.”  

O'Connor said he believed the center Middle Keys were hit hardest, and that a sizable relief effort was mustered there. However, he noted that residents on Florida's west coast and in the northeast also had problems.”

Daniel Diaz, Florida Grand Knight of Council 14698 in Pompano Beach, helped coordinate the food delivery program along with five other Knights.

“Because they lost power here for about a week, all the food in their refrigerator went bad,” said Diaz, who said he rode out the hurricane with his mother at her residence nearby. “This was widespread and went straight up the entire state.”

Diaz, also state young adult and college council coordinator, said he will keep looking for ways the Knights can help in the local hurricane recovery. “We are going to keep our ears open and see how else we can serve our community.”

Irma will be remembered as one of the Atlantic’s strongest hurricanes on record, with peak winds of 185 mph and Category 4 strength when it landed in the Florida Keys. Some sources are predicting that insured losses from the storm could total $18 billion in the U.S.

Hurricane Irma also caused significant harm to populations in the Caribbean, including the U.S. Virgin Islands.

“Before Hurricane Irma, we set up the network in terms of communications and figured out who was doing the various positions in the state and with coordination with Supreme,” said District Deputy Peter Chiaravalle, a resident of Fort Lauderdale.

“We were lucky on the east coast of Florida -- we didn’t get hit as bad as we thought we might have," Chiaravalle said. "So a lot of preparation work really paid off.”

Joe Cox, public relations coordinator for Region Six of Florida, said he endured past hurricanes when he lived in the Tampa Bay area, and that Irma proved formidable from his vantage point at home.  

“This one was ferocious; we were 80 miles or more from the eye of the storm, but the winds were absolutely menacing. It is hard to believe the power of the storm that far from the eye.”

In the rest of Florida, Cox said he knows there are Knights down in the Keys already helping out and a supply truck from up north is waiting to go there. “It is in times like these that we find out who has a willing heart and a ready hand to do something for our fellow human beings who have suffered a lot,” he said.

“Just spending one night without air conditioning makes one realize what a serious issue it is this time of year, and how much these people need relief," Cox continued. "You just can’t drink enough water -- and a lot of people in some areas don’t have it -- and it's a challenge to get them resources just to survive.”

“The elderly certainly depend on the younger folks who are ready to give their time and help out. It's nice to see that, while there are many Knights who couldn’t give up the day to be here because so much has piled up since last week, we had a nice turnout today. And we look forward to whatever hand we can lend here at Century Village.”