RIVERVIEW, Fla. — It wasn’t Hurricane Maria’s winds and rain, but the lack of infrastructure following the storm that drove Arelys Gomez, her husband, three kids and grandparents out of Puerto Rico.
“We came to start a new life, a better life,” said Gomez of their decision to move to the Tampa Bay area.
With the help of FEMA and a local organization called Somos Puerto Rico, the family spent two months in a hotel before finally moving into a new apartment.
We got a place with four bedrooms for our family of seven now. We buy stuff like beds and stuff for the kids,” said Gomez, “We were happy.”
But in a flash, the life they’d been working to rebuild was gone. Lightning sparked a fast-moving fire at the family’s apartment complex in Riverview last Wednesday leaving them homeless once again. This time was an even bigger blow than the hurricane.
“When we came from Puerto Rico we had the basic stuff. We had clothes, we had birth certificates, our documents. Now we have nothing, " said Gomez.
Jeannie Calderin is the founder of Somos Puerto Rico Tampa and has spent the last year working to help families, including the Gomez’ find new places to live.
"Everything was going according to plan and then all of sudden the fire came along so the little that they had they lost as second time,” said Calderin.
But despite the major setback, she refuses to let the family give up hope.
“She was so down and so distraught,” said Calderin. “I told her, ‘we did it once we can do it twice.’”
Many other families were also impacted by the fire. You can visit the Facebook page for Somos Puerto Rico Tampa for more information on how to help.
Click here to visit a special GoFundMe page for the Gomez family.
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