Schumer pushing to prevent claw-back of Sandy funds

U.S. Sen. Charles Schumer called on the Federal Emergency Management Agency on Tuesday to allow the Town of North Hempstead and the Long Beach School District to keep millions of dollars in Hurricane Sandy relief funds, following the release of federal reports recommending that the funds be disallowed.

According to a report released on Sept. 2 by the Office of the Inspector General, Long Beach schools were awarded a noncompetitive contract totaling $8.4 million for emergency remediation and repair work after Sandy. Though FEMA determined that the cost was reasonable for the work performed, an OIG audit found that the district’s contractors marked up invoices with ineligible costs for overhead and profit, totaling $668,430.

Federal regulations strictly prohibit such markups, the report stated, recommending that FEMA not reimburse the district for those costs. The OIG also audited $36.6 million in grants awarded to the Town of North Hempstead after Sandy, and recommended that FEMA disallow $9.9 million in funds that were ineligible, unsupported or unused.

Schumer voiced his opposition to the inspector general’s findings at a press conference in Port Washington, where he was joined by Town of North Hempstead Supervisor Judi Bosworth; Long Beach Schools Superintendent David Weiss; Michael DeVito, the district’s chief operating officer; and Thomas Devaney, of North Hempstead’s emergency management team.

“Sandy funds we helped deliver to hard-hit communities like North Hempstead and Long Beach need to stay on Long Island,” Schumer said. “These communities worked in good faith to recover quickly after Superstorm Sandy, and that’s why I am publicly urging FEMA not to claw back these funds. Whether it was removing dangerous debris, making immediate repairs or performing work at local schools, these federal funds helped make a difference in the lives of Long Islanders, and to claw them back — at the expense of local taxpayers — could be an unwarranted punch to the gut for all of Long Island.”

The school district received $35.5 million from the New York Division of Homeland Security and Emergency Services, a FEMA grantee, for debris removal, emergency protective measures and permanent repairs to buildings and facilities. The OIG audited six large projects and one small project, totaling $26.5 million, between October 2012 and November 2015.

School officials noted that the audit concluded that the district had “generally accounted for and expended FEMA public assistance funds properly.” They added that the inspector general had a problem only with the way an invoice was written — with separate line items for overhead and profit — by Copiague-based Renu Contracting, which helped with emergency debris removal immediately after the storm.

“We greatly appreciate the efforts of Senator Schumer in his advocacy on behalf of Long Beach City School District,” DeVito said. “He knows that the original FEMA determination was that all of the district’s expenditures were reasonable, and he wants to ensure that the district receives reimbursement for the full amount of Sandy-related costs.”

DeVito said the district did a great job overall in following the public assistance program’s regulations, and added that the audit found “a small technical violation.” He noted that in addition to Schumer, the state Division of Homeland Security and Emergency Services is advocating for the district.

In a letter included in the audit report, FEMA wrote that it would “review the costs associated with the markups and will deobligate any costs found to be ineligible.” The agency’s decision is expected to come at the end of November.

“We’re hoping FEMA sets aside the OIG’s audit recommendation,” DeVito told the Herald, “and just says, ‘Overall it was reasonable, and therefore we’re not going take back the money.’”