Another try for Sandy recovery help

With the federal and state governments urging victims of Superstorm Sandy to have their insurance claims reviewed, at least one Baldwin resident said she would reapply for aid.

Terry Van Bellinghen said she would ask the Federal Emergency Management Agency to reopen her case with the hope of getting more money to repair her once-flooded basement/crawl space and help elevate her house.

In May, FEMA announced it would reopen all 144,000 Sandy-related insurance claims following widespread allegations that engineering reports were doctored and that homeowners were underpaid. The deadline to have a claim reviewed is Sept. 15, and it is not expected to be extended.

Roy E. Wright, the recently appointed director of FEMA’s National Flood Insurance Program and the agency’s deputy associate administrator for insurance and mitigation, was in Long Beach last week meeting with homeowners and stressing the importance of having claims reopened.

“We should have got this right the first time,” Wright acknowledged. “It is very clear that there were errors. There were too many errors made. And it is our job to set those errors right, and more importantly, make sure that will never happen again.”

Wright emphasized that the September deadline is merely for beginning the process, and that anyone is free to opt out of it at any time once a review has begun. Homeowners do not need legal representation to go through the process, he added, and it is designed so they can do it on their own.

When Sandy hit in 2012, Bellinghen had just about finished renovations to her century-old house.

“We re-did the whole thing. We were just finishing laying down the dining room floor,” she said. “We had put down Pergola [laminate flooring] in the kitchen.” All that was left were some minor finishing touches.

Then Sandy rolled in. The basement of the house, at 1060 Van Buren St., which is essentially a crawl space, was flooded to the ceiling.