“Hurricane Charley’s Aftermath”
Amid downed trees and aluminum siding from older mobile home sits a virtually unscathed home built to newer, post Hurricane Andrew building codes in the Windmill Village park in Punta Gorda, Florida, Tuesday, Aug. 17, 2004. (AP Photo/Gregory Bull)
Factory-Built Homes Stand Up To Storms
By DENNIS SCHRADER Special to The Tampa Tribune
Published: Aug 24, 2004
The post-Charley condemnations of ``mobile homes'' has come from totally ill-informed, shoot-from-the- hip print columnists, TV commentators, letters to the editor, editorial writers and others who see photos and TV footage of what the fury of 145 mph winds can do and suddenly become experts on factory-built housing. Witness Steve Otto's Aug. 16 column, ``Little Boxes Death Traps in Storm's Fury,'' and his statement that ``mobile homes ... have absolutely no chance ... yet we keep building them. ''These instant experts might try a little research. After all, in today's world, accurate information is just a click away. They would learn, for example:

* That after Hurricane Andrew, the federal manufactured home construction and safety standards were increased to a level comparable to site-built housing - 110 mph wind resistance in 14 counties (Zone III) and 100 mph everywhere else in the state. At that time, the National Institutes of Science and Technology said the new building code for manufactured homes was 25 percent more stringent than the code for homes built on site to the standard building code.

* That after the unprecedented 1998 Central Florida tornadoes, Florida increased its tie-down and anchor requirements to make them the strongest of any state.

* That most all of the manufactured homes damaged by Charley (and shown in endless repeat or ``loop'' video by the 24-hour cable news channels) predated the above requirements.

* That homes built and installed to the new standards fared very well, stayed secure and suffered only cosmetic damage on sites just a few feet from less fortunate older homes.

* That a state Affordable Housing Study Commission last year, after a 12-month study, concluded that manufactured homes are as safe and as well-built as site-built homes and much more affordable than site-built homes, and that manufactured housing is a ``viable housing alternative to conventional site-built housing.''

* That our governor, after touring the Punta Gorda damage, was quoted as saying that it's obvious that the new standards mentioned above are working. And so did Fox News and CNN in their reports. FMHA suggests that the Tribune editors do a major disservice to readers in the Hillsborough, Pinellas, Pasco and Polk market area when they let a housing form that has served Florida so well during its astonishing growth be slammed by those without any firsthand knowledge of what they are condemning. Charley played no favorites! Schools, churches, hospitals, stores and office buildings sustained major damage. Shall we stop building and occupying them too? Dennis Schrader is president of the Florida Manufactured Housing Association.