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Posted on: April 10, 2024
By: Alan O'Neill
Posted in: Houston News

The original article and videos are on the Click2Houston website »

ANGLETON, Texas – A massive wind storm, combined with heavy rains, ripped through Angleton on March 15, tearing down trees and pulling entire buildings apart.

Tonika Sasser, who is blind and lives alone with her four dogs, could only sit trembling inside her small home praying she would survive.

“I really can’t explain it. It was really bad and really loud, almost sounded like a train,” Tonika said.

Luckily Tonika was not hurt, but a massive tree in her backyard came crashing down, tearing down the power lines and completely destroying the electrical box that feeds all electricity to her house.

The damage made Tonika’s home unsafe and unlivable.

“I mean, I was homeless, homeless and trying to find someone’s couch to sleep on every night,” Tonika said.

For weeks, Tonika had no place to stay and was unable to return home because of the fried wiring at her home.

She contacted the United Way, the Salvation Army and the American Red Cross.

The Red Cross was able to help with money for temporary lodging at a few motels and money for food and medical needs, but no one was able to help with the $20,000 repair bill it was going to take to make her home livable and safe again.

That’s when she went to Pamula Goodson with the Coalition For Barrier Free Living and Pamula contacted the Spencer Solves It team.

”She was just terrified she was going to lose her home altogether and to be honest I didn’t know what to do. That is until someone suggested I contact Bill Spencer,” Pamula said.

That’s when Pam contacted me and I immediately contacted the electrical pros at Abacus Plumbing, Air Conditioning and Electrical.

Now, the people at Abacus are all set to make those repairs, more than $20,000 worth, for Tonika absolutely free.

As for Tonika, she says her prayers for help have finally been answered.

“I was really scared I was going to lose everything. Thank you so much,” Tonika said.

The Abacus team will be starting work on Tonika’s house right away and we will be bringing you the results of their work next week.

In the meantime, if you are ever hit with storm damage and unable to afford to make repairs, the American Red Cross has a great resource.

If you go to resources.redcross.org and enter your zip code, you will automatically be able to pull up a large list of local relief groups who can help you with your damage.