Laurel Meadows residents say neglected infrastructure contributed to 2024 flooding.
By Noah Lechtenstein
Original Air Date: August 7, 2026
Host: Today’s hearing marked the next step in a growing legal battle over who’s responsible for the 2024 flooding in the Laurel Meadows subdivision. Homeowners are suing Sarasota County, arguing that neglected infrastructure—not just record rainfall—is what turned their neighborhood into a disaster zone. WSLR’s Noah Lechtenstein has the details.
Noah Lechtenstein: Sarasota County is facing a lawsuit from over 50 plaintiffs who were affected by flooding from tropical storm Debby. According to Sarasota County, during Debby rain reached up to over 16 inches in just 72 hours.
Laurel Meadows, where all the plaintiffs lived at the time, experienced flooding for the first time ever during Debby. Laurel Meadows is located east of I-75, directly off Iona Road near Lorraine Road. It’s a development subdivision within the county and most residents moved into their development in 2003.
84 of the 85 homes in Laurel Meadows were flooded, and 56 plaintiffs are seeking $15 million to $20 million in damages. The county moved to dismiss the case in June, although they were unsuccessful in their efforts.
The complaint document in the lawsuit states homes inside Laurel Meadows had flooding between 12 and 24 inches of water, which stayed inside the homes for days. All of this was caused by a breach in the western dike on Cow Pen Slough, which the complaint alleges the county failed to maintain.
County employee statements showed that the breach may have existed for decades. Inside the complaint form, an engineering modeling analysis shows that without the breach of the dike, flooding of the interior of the homes in Laurel Meadows would have never happened.
Under county code, the county is responsible to maintain Cow Pen Slough, including any infrastructure surrounding it. The lawsuit claims that the county knew or should have known of the breach in the dike.
The complaint included appraisal records that demonstrated the property value of the plaintiffs’ homes decreased by hundreds of thousands of dollars after the floods.
One of the plaintiffs in the suit, Caroll Landsberg, said that she and her family didn’t move back into their home for almost a year.
Caroll Landsberg: We’re out tens if not 100-something thousand dollars. It put us back with a lot of plans we had.
NL: Caroll added what she would like to happen with the case.
CL: I’d like the truth to come out so the public really understood what happened to us and what caused it.
Allison Cavallaro’s dog, Vinny, stands in front of the family’s Laurel Meadows home after Tropical Storm Debby caused mass flooding in the neighborhood in August. Photo courtesy of Allison Cavallaro via Suncoast Searchlight.
NL: Sarasota County did add a new stormwater department over a year after Debby, and as the case goes on, the county is in danger of losing more money. The department requested close to an additional $35 million for the 2026 fiscal year. If approved, the department’s budget would balloon to over $80 million.
Stephen Hutton is the attorney representing the homeowners, and the case resides under the “Major Trial Division” with Judge Hunter W. Carroll ruling on the case.
A hearing for the case happened earlier today, with dates being set for multiple trials and a summary judgement. The first phase will include a non-jury trial, which will focus primarily on the liability aspect of the lawsuit. That will take place in July of 2027. The second phase will include a jury and focus on the damages aspect. That will come later in 2027.
The summary judgement, which is a legal ruling made by a judge before any trial begins, will happen in March of 2027.
Hutton is happy with how things went in the hearing today.
Stephen Hutton: We wanted to get a non-jury trial on the issue of liability as soon as we could, and as you heard from the judge, July was as soon as we can. I wanted to keep the jury trial on damages on for late 2027. It sounds like he’s also going to be able to do that. So, yeah, we got everything we wanted to get done today.
NL: The county has a defense when it comes to liability. They may argue the “Act of God” defense. In Florida, if a disaster or storm qualifies as an unforeseeable event, the government is usually protected from liability. Stormwater infrastructure is built to withstand up to 10 inches of rain in a 24-hour period. Since the storm brought rain that exceeded the standards of a “100-year storm event,” the storm could be labeled as unforeseen.
Reporting for WSLR News, Noah Lechtenstein.
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