Dam It Defense receives The Community Partnership Award from the City of Holmes Beach

We did not start Dam It Defense to win awards.

We started it because our own homes flooded during Hurricane Helene in 2024 and we knew that too many Gulf Coast homeowners were facing the same loss with no real solution in place. No sandbags. No generic kits. Just water coming in.

So when the City of Holmes Beach invited us to sit on the flood preparedness panel at Holmes Beach City Hall on Anna Maria Island, and then presented us with a Community Partnership Award recognizing our resilience work coming out of Hurricanes Helene and Milton, it meant something we were not expecting.

The Panel

The event brought together community leaders, city officials, and residents of Anna Maria Island to talk honestly about flood preparedness. What worked in 2024. What did not. What homeowners can do before the next storm is named.

Anna Maria Island is one of the most flood-vulnerable communities on Florida’s Gulf Coast. It sits in a Level A evacuation zone. Hurricane Helene brought direct storm surge to the island in 2024. The community knows better than most what it means to be in the path of a storm and to watch the water rise.

The conversation at the panel was exactly the kind we think should be happening in every Gulf Coast city. Specific. Practical. Focused on what individual homeowners can actually do to protect their properties. Not just evacuation plans and emergency kits, but the physical infrastructure of a home and the points where water enters.

The Award

The City of Holmes Beach presented Dam It Defense with a Community Partnership Award for Hurricane Helene and Milton 2024, recognizing our work supporting community resilience during and after both storms.

We are proud of this recognition. Not because it validates what we do, but because it came from a community that experienced the storms firsthand. Anna Maria Island residents do not need to be convinced that flood risk is real. They lived it. Being recognized by that community as a trusted partner means we are doing the work right.

What This Means for Sarasota and Manatee County Homeowners

Anna Maria Island is part of Manatee County, and the flood story of 2024 extended well beyond the barrier islands. Tropical Storm Debby sent 500 Sarasota residents to be rescued from their homes. Manatee County rescued 186 more. Three storms hit the region in three months.

FEMA’s updated 2024 flood maps expanded high-risk zones across both counties. Approximately 6,000 additional Sarasota County properties moved into mandatory flood insurance territory. The Myakka River corridor, Wellen Park, and communities far from the coast found themselves newly classified as high-risk.

The infrastructure was not designed for back-to-back storms. And it has not been fully repaired.

A Dam It Defense aluminum flood barrier system is engineered to your specific openings, fabricated in St. Petersburg, and installed by our in-house team. No subcontractors. No generic kits. A permanent, deployable system built for the Gulf Coast.