Darrick Virgil walked WRAL through his rebuilt home
Wednesday after Hurricanes Matthew and Florence severely damaged his family
home.

“It still feels like a dream,” Virgil said. “Even though I
lost a lot, I gained a lot.”

Now, Virgil is saving up his money to buy furniture.

In 2024, WRAL talked
to Virgil about his struggles with to get a new home through ReBuild NC.

At the time, the program called off their deal to build him
a new home on his land – saying the home would be too big to rebuild on his
land.

“A lot of times I wanted to give up, but I’m not a quitter,”
Virgil said.

WRAL’s reporting inspired Sarah Hill Waters to get involved.

“There was no way I could continue and not help out. I knew
I could help out,” she told WRAL Wednesday. “I said, ‘We’re not going to let
them leave him in this position.’”

Waters’ persistence led to Brightspeed donating a portion of
the land needed to rebuild the home, removing one of the biggest barriers to
making the project happen. The company also funded the required land survey,
helping clear the way for construction to begin.

WRAL asked Pryor Gibson, the director of the North Carolina North
Carolina Office of Recovery and Resiliency, why the process took so long.

“In this case, he didn’t really own enough land to do a
rebuild of his home. It took us over a year just to get the environmental parts
and the infrastructure parts put together,” Gibson explained. “When we got that
done, we realized he didn’t have enough land to do a septic field. That’s where
Brightspeed came in, gave a little portion of their property. We were able to
convince the county that Mr. Virgil deserved the house, and we were able to put
it in place.”

Generally speaking, he said, coordinating funding between the federal government and the state took a long time.

Struggles with ReBuild NC

WRAL’s Documentary Unit has extensively covered the
program’s struggles in Aftermath:
North Carolina Hurricane Left Behind. 

ReBuild NC was tasked with using nearly $800 million in
taxpayer funds to help uninsured residents like Virgil rebuild their homes
after Hurricanes
Matthew (2016) and Florence (2018).

However, delays, red tape and mismanagement left many
waiting years for help. 

As of April 8, 2026, ReBuild NC reports 4,140 homes have
been completed through the program; another 105 homes still need to be
completed, according to spokesperson Bridget Munger. All but one of them is
officially in the construction phase.

“We certainly wish it could’ve been faster; we certainly
wish we could’ve done it with everybody being happy. But, we did make 4,200
folks happy,” said Gibson.

Last October, homeowners
filed a lawsuit against the state, claiming discrimination based on
disability.

A couple months later, WRAL Investigates questioned ReBuild
NC about the quality of the homes built through the program after receiving
complaints.

WRAL asked Virgil what he would say to others still waiting
for their homes.

“Stay strong,” he replied.