JACKSONVILLE, Fla. – The Jacksonville School for Autism (JSA) suffered a devasting flood last Wednesday that displaced dozens of special needs students.
The owner spoke to News4JAX as disaster recovery crews were busy at work to restore the campus. Everything from drywall to flooring to books and school supplies will have to be replaced.
“Our beautiful campus is a complete disaster right now,” Michelle Dunham said while looking around at the damaged school building.
Dunham opened the Jacksonville School for Autism 20 years ago out of a personal need.
“My son, Nicholas, was diagnosed with autism back when autism affected one in 250 individuals. Fast forward to today, and it’s one in 36 individuals,” Dunham said.
Last week was when everything changed. JSA staff had to quickly evacuate students as water came rushing into the building from sewage pipes.
Dunham said this wasn’t the typical flooding we saw from heavy rain last week. The school is not in a flood zone and no water came into the building from outside.
“It quickly went within a matter of minutes from bubbling in the floor drains to flooding in the floor drains, and then it just became a full-on crisis where we had to emergency call out to the whole staff and get all the students out of the building immediately,” Dunham said.
61 students are now displaced at locations across town. Deermeadows Baptist Church, We Rock the Spectrum, Play Works Therapies, and Good News Church in World Golf Village are all hosting the students temporarily while JSA’s campus is rehabbed.
Teachers remain committed to their student’s educations, adapting without the supplies and facilities they’ve become accustomed to.
Dunham said there was no time to save their program materials.
“It’s emotional. This is a building. We’ll get the building fixed, but it’s the cost on our families and students that’s crushing my soul, because our kids can’t just go to their aunt’s house,” Dunham said. “They can’t just watch an iPad and hang out and go to the office with mom and dad. These are children that are here for a reason, so that our staff can make a difference in their lives.”
JSA is asking for the community’s help to rebuild as standard insurance doesn’t usually cover water damage from sewer backups. Monetary donations will help rent school buses to take students to the four different temporary learning locations and cover some of the rebuilding cost.
Donations of used items would also be a big help.
“If someone out there has a lot of toys or puzzles, things that we could use with the kids, we’re at different locations right now, so we don’t have a lot of supplies, and we’re trying to just refresh those, because we can’t really move the kids around like we do our campus,” Dunham said.
Already, Dunham said the community has stepped up in more ways than one to get the students back to learning while the damage is repaired.
“We talk about this in the autism community, kind of riding that wave of autism and our families are seasoned veterans at that. What I have seen come out of our staff and our families is simply remarkable and amazing,” Dunham said.
JEA is investigating the cause of the flooding at JSA’s facilities. In the meantime, Dunham is focused on repairing one building at a time to get students back on campus.
JEA gave a statement in response to the flooding.
In the 24-hour period of Sept. 3-4, the rainfall totals for the southeastern portion of Jacksonville, including the Jacksonville School for Autism on Southside Boulevard, received heavy rainfall, an estimated 5-9 inches. JEA’s wastewater system was inundated and overwhelmed with the flows due to such heavy rainfall in a short duration.
JEA Spokesperson
The 5-9 inches of rainfall during a 24-hour period marks the highest amount on a given day in Jacksonville dating back to the mid-1870s, according to a StormGEO meteorologist.
If you’d like to help, the organization has set up an Amazon Wishlist. You can also donate directly on their website.