Pensacola veterans and families are being priced out. Here is what David Jolly would do about it.

Why Pensacola is being priced out

Pensacola sits where two crises meet. A coastal insurance market in freefall. And a working-family and veteran community whose paychecks are not keeping up with the cost of a roof. For some, this is called an affordability crisis. For families near NAS Pensacola, it goes deeper than that. It is a question of whether they can afford to stay on the Gulf Coast at all.

The insurance story is the sharpest edge of it. Florida led the nation in homeowner-insurance non-renewal rates in 2023, at 2.99 percent of policies, with the second-highest state well behind.^[2] National carriers pulled out or curtailed coverage between 2021 and 2024, citing hurricane-loss volatility.^[4] On the Gulf Coast, where the storm risk is highest, that withdrawal hits hardest. Florida is consistently ranked the most expensive state in the country for homeowners insurance.^[5]

The rest of the math follows. Florida's median single-family home price was $420,000 at the end of 2024, above the national median.^[6] The average age of a first-time homebuyer has climbed toward record highs.^[7] And roughly half of Floridians cannot cover a $1,000 emergency, which means that when a hurricane deductible or an insurance dispute lands, there is no cushion.^[8] David Jolly names it plainly: for too many people, in pure economic terms, the state is now out of reach.^[9]

The approach: three tools, one goal

Jolly's answer is not a slogan. It is a stack of tools that already exist and could be scaled. The first is insurance. On day one as governor, Jolly says he would introduce a package for a state catastrophic fund to fully remove hurricane and wind coverage from the private market, projecting savings of 60 to 70 percent for homeowners.^[1] Florida already runs a version of this mechanism. The Florida Hurricane Catastrophe Fund, created after Hurricane Andrew, held a $7.12 billion balance as of the end of 2024 and backstops private insurers.^[10] Jolly's plan expands that role rather than inventing a new one.

The second tool is the monthly bill. Florida's largest investor-owned utility is authorized to earn a 10.95 percent return on equity, among the highest in the country.^[3] Jolly would cap investor-owned utility profit at the national average, still close to a 10 percent return, but fair to ratepayers.^[1] Rent or mortgage is the biggest line item. Electricity is the next one. For a family stretched thin near the base, that difference is real.

The third tool is supply. Jolly would scale up workforce and affordable housing sited by income, trade, and proximity to work, pointing to public-private partnership models the campaign describes as successful from Miami to Pensacola.^[1] Florida already has the financing machinery through SAIL, SHIP, and the Live Local Act's 10-year commitment.^[11] The question, in his framing, is not whether the tools exist. It is whether Tallahassee will use them.

What Tallahassee blocked

Jolly draws a line here. He says the current governor and legislature are ideologically opposed to these housing solutions, and that Republican leadership has failed to invest in the workforce housing models that work.^[1] He frames it against the party he first joined: one that believed in local control and keeping government out of your community.^[12] Government closest to the people knows best, he argues, and Tallahassee should stop preempting local communities from making their own decisions.^[12]

This is not politics as usual for Pensacola. It is a policy story on home turf. Different backgrounds. Different beliefs. Same understanding: hard work should be enough to keep a family near the base and the coast they serve. For a full picture of the affordability plan across housing, insurance, and utilities, see the campaign's main affordability page.