PINELLAS COUNTY, Fla. — As Pinellas County beach communities meet to discuss the “State of the Beaches” Thursday, work is already underway to address the hardening of infrastructure for future storms.

For more than a year, Pinellas County has been working to help beach communities fund the undergrounding of power infrastructure along Gulf Boulevard.

The process has been lengthy, as each community is working with individual property owners and Duke Energy to secure easements to bury power lines.

In North Redington Beach, the east side of Gulf Boulevard has already been completed, that’s where Sage Cafe owner and local resident John Messmore says he was able to re-open after Hurricane Ian last year in record time.

“That hurricane hit on Wednesday and we were open at 5:30 Thursday morning," Messmore said.

Messmore has lived on North Redington Beach since childhood, when he says the island resembled more of a state park than the tourist mecca it is today.

And with development comes the need to protect the power grid from storms that threaten to knock power out for days, weeks and in extreme cases months.

Just 12 hours without power to the Safe Cage’s walk-in freezer could cost Messmore thousands in lost product.

“If that things goes down, I mean we are looking at a bare minimum $10,000 to $12,000,” Messmore said.

Walking across town, North Redington Beach Mayor Bill Queen says protecting the beach power grid by undergrounding makes sense, but unfortatenly isn’t as cheap as it was 20 years ago when North Redington neighborhoods had power lines buried.

But despite the higher costs today, which the county is helping to supplement along with federal funds, Queen says all power lines could be buried by next year.

"We could probably complete this whole project in a little over a year once we get going,” Mayor Queen said.  “It’s getting going that seems to be the problem.”

Although the east side of Gulf Boulevard now has all it’s power lines buried, the west side where most hotels are located, still have power poles and above ground lines.

Queen says the city is continuing to work with business owners to agree on easements that Duke Energy can use to bury lines.

Also during Thursday's State of the Beaches, communities are expected to address beach parking, traffic, short-term rentals and beach re-nourishment.

This is a free program from 5:00 p.m. to 6:30 p.m. on April 27.

The program will be available virtually via the ISPS website and in person at the Treasure Island City Hall, 120 108th Ave., Treasure Island. People can register here.