CLERMONT, Fla. — Storm season is now over, but some Central Florida residents are still dealing with debris.

What You Need To Know

  • Lake County officials say the goal is to finish picking up debris by Jan. 11

  • They say the average dump truck holds only about 30 cubic yards, which means the cleanup is a long-term effort

  • County officials estimate they've picked up 200,000 cubic yards of storm debris with about 50,000 cubic yards remain

Lake County officials say the goal is to finish picking up debris by Jan. 11.

Officials say Clermont should expect more trucks in the area within the next two weeks, but some neighbors in Lake County are frustrated.

David Palka lives outside Clermont city limits, in Lake County. He has piles of tree debris and says all the grass is dying underneath it.

“It’d be nice if they finally come and take them away, when its sitting here for a couple months, it gets to be a little bit of a pain,” he said.

Lake County officials say they’ve picked up an estimated 200,000 cubic yards of storm debris with about 50,000 cubic yards remaining. In context, all of that is enough to fill UCF’s football stadium.

Palka says Hurricane Debby left some debris, but nothing like after Hurricane Milton.

“They picked that one up really quick, but Milton is when everything happened and we’ve just been waiting for them to finally come back and pick that up,” he said.

County officials said the average dump truck holds only about 30 cubic yards, which means the cleanup is a long-term effort. The county says residents should be patient.

"The county employees and contract workers have worked extensively to accommodate the debris in Lake County, with over 32 trucks in the area," said a Lake County spokesperson in a statement. "We are committed to restoring our community as quickly and efficiently as possible. We appreciate the residents' patience and understanding during this time."

Additionally, members of the Lake County Board of Commissioners say they purchased two new 30-cubic-yard grapple trucks to support ongoing removal efforts, and secured a debris contractor in the first week of November.

Palka said he’ll start preparing for the next hurricane season that kicks off on June 1.

“Aa soon as all this is picked up, we’ll start thinking about the next one,” he said.

Spectrum News also reached out to public works officials in Orange County, where some people still have debris. Orange County says they’re seeing people piling stuff on the curb and calling it storm debris, but it’s not debris generated by the storm.

County officials say some people are taking advantage of the process. Those officials say overall, Hurricane Milton created enough debris to activate debris removal contractors. They’re working to finish up by Christmas.

They’ve picked up over 123,000 cubic yards of debris, that’s about 4.8 Olympic-sized swimming pools.