Politics & Government

Suffolk County Still Seeking Storm Aid

Levy issues letter to FEMA to help Individual property owners.

Suffolk County Executive Steve Levy urged Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) officials to provide assistance that would restore private properties that were damaged as the result of a March 29-30 rainstorm that devastated the area.

At a press conference Monday, Levy shared details about a letter sent to FEMA Administrator W. Craig Fugate on April 16. In the letter, the county executive points out that FEMA has two avenues for providing disaster-based aid: Public Assistance, for entities including hospitals, non-profit organizations, and municipalities, and Individual Assistance, for private property owners.

Levy noted that heavy rains from the storm caused widespread flooding and damage estimated at $6.6 million in Suffolk, well above its $4.6 million damage threshold for seeking federal storm-recovery aid. However, as New York State did not appear likely to reach its threshold of at least $24.8 million in damages from the storm, Levy said the state's failure to meet this threshold could preclude private property owners in Suffolk from receiving funding other than low-interest loans.

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"Suffolk County believes that there is reasonable intent in the consideration of the localized impacts for individual assistance as well as for public assistance," Levy wrote in the letter. "In a heavy rainstorm such as this, floodwaters know no bounds and do not delineate between damaging a public property and a private property.

"We submit that localized damage must be considered and should trigger the positive declaration for individual assistance. In Suffolk, we had 34 homes and 8 businesses with major damage, and 425 homes with minor damage."

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The cost of bad weather to Suffolk as a result of the four storms is more than $76 million, according to Suffolk's Department of Fire, Rescue and Emergency Services, according to the County Executive's office.

Suffolk has also been joined by New York State officials in asking the federal government to provide low-interest Small Business Administration loans to homeowners, renters and businesses in Suffolk that were damaged during the two March storms, his office said.


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