A year after tornado, Angus residents are all back home

WATCH ABOVE: It’s been a year since a tornado ripped through Angus, Ont., and all residents are back home. Though questions about compensation still remain. Mark Carcasole reports.

A year ago, Stonemount Crescent in Angus, Ontario was a much different scene than you’d see today.

It was June 17, 2014 when dozens of homes in the fairly new housing development took various degrees of damage when a tornado tore through the community. From ripped-off roofs to busted windows, streets and backyards were strewn with debris. Residents were left displaced from their homes for months in some cases.

Miraculously, no one was seriously injured.

On the eve of the incident’s anniversary, Global News caught up with some of those affected.

“The key to this tornado, more than any other thing, is everybody is healthy, lives are going forward,” says Essa Township Mayor Terry Dowdall.

Tweet This Click to share quote on Twitter: "The key to this tornado, more than any other thing, is everybody is healthy, lives are going forward," says Essa Township Mayor Terry Dowdall.

The debris is gone. Most of the reconstruction work is complete aside from one home that still has siding ripped off and a plank of wood sticking out. The home was never sold, still owned by the developer.

READ MORE: Clean up underway after tornado rips through Angus, Ont.

The home of Ann-Marie Mackay and Richard Singh was in much worse shape — it was so badly damaged that all but the front facade had to be torn down and started from scratch.

In the meantime, they were fortunate enough to rent an undamaged home on the same street, finally moving into their newly-rebuilt home at the end of January. It was a tough road, but they found comfort in neighbours.

“I saw the community come together like I’ve never seen it before,” says Singh.”It made us fall in love with the community that much more, seeing how close everybody came together in a time of need like that.”

Tweet This Click to share quote on Twitter: "I saw the community come together like I've never seen it before," says Singh."It made us fall in love with the community that much more, seeing how close everybody came together in a time of need like that."

Their daughter Tiffany Pottinger’s room was completely destroyed by the EF-2 tornado. It was upsetting to her at the time, but today, she sees the silver lining.

“I changed the colour, I changed the furniture and it makes me feel like a big girl now because my room’s not pink like it used to be,” she says with a smile.

Not every recovery story ends with a smile though.

Some are finding their repair work in need of repair itself. Annika Bienvene and her family didn’t live here during the tornado. They moved in just a couple months ago after the damage their home sustained was fixed.

“We started to notice that our grout was cracking and the cabinets…that’s all cracking.”

She claims their contractors have been “ignoring” their calls.

There are still some hard feelings lingering over the province’s decision to not provide the town with requested relief funding. Officials decided the town did not meet the criteria.

“I would say that was probably the largest disappointment,” says Mayor Dowdall.

The township managed to bring in over $140,000 in its own fundraising to cover damages not looked after by insurance. An arm’s length panel of residents not affected by the twister and not affiliated with anyone who was is accepting submissions and deciding how to disperse that money.

There are no official gatherings planned to commemorate the anniversary of the freak storm. Many residents say they’d rather focus instead on moving forward with their lives instead of looking back.