Florida’s DFS Sets Up Hurricane Assistance Locales

Four South Florida locations where consumer service professionals will be assisting victims of Hurricane Katrina have been announced by Tom Gallagher, Florida’s CFO.

“Here in Florida thousands of Floridians experienced major flood and wind damage and we want to help get their lives back to normal as soon as possible,” Gallagher said.

Department of Financial Service specialists will be at: Publix Shopping Center, 12850 Biscayne Blvd. N. Miami; and Home Depot, 13501 S. Dixie Hwy., Kendall.

Specialists will also be at Miami-Dade disaster assistance sites located at: Caleb Center, 5400 NW 22nd Ave, Miami; and South Dade Government Center, 10710 SW 211 St, Miami.

Insurance specialists will be available to help Floridians from 8 a.m. to 6 p.m.

DFS hurricane insurance assistance in Broward County will be available at 499 NW 70th Ave., Room 301B, Plantation or by calling (954) 797-8325.

In Pensacola, the DFS Consumer Services office is located on 610 E. Burgess Road, phone (850) 453-7800.

“We certainly send our thoughts and prayers to our neighbors in Alabama, Mississippi and Louisiana who have seen incalculable devastation from Hurricane Katrina, and we will be looking to assist them in every way we can,” Gallagher said. “The death, damage and destruction in Mississippi and Louisiana are beyond comprehension. My director of the Division of the State Fire Marshal has been deployed to Mississippi to help oversee search and rescue efforts.”

Gallagher detailed law enforcement detectives to join six teams from Florida to aid in law enforcement and search and rescue efforts – these efforts presently are concentrated in six lower Mississippi counties and along the Gulf Coast. He also is assisting in providing ambulances and fire engines to the impacted areas.

Consumers can also obtain assistance by calling the DFS Hurricane Hotline at (800) 22-STORM.