2012-12-06

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Freeport Tree lighting
Saturday, December 8,5 p.m. at the triangle!
followed by a Holiday Celebration!
5:30 p.m., Freeport Recreation Center
www.freeportbaldwinleader.com
FREEPORT LIBRARY
144WMERRICKRD
FREEPORT NY 11520-3726
lament working for the
Freeport: FEMA director William
Hardwick. See story page 6.
Fugate (left) with Mayor Andrew Baldwin: Tow"n Councilman Tony Santino, Town Supervisor Kate Murray and
Baldwin resident Keith Eckels at the press conference.
Seeking penalty-free access to investment funds
by Laura Schofer
Keith Eckels stood in the living room
of his two-story house on Barnes
Avenue in Baldwin. Brand new sheet
rock had replaced the water-soaked
walls damaged by superstorm Sandy.
"It's a good beginning," said Mr.
Eckels, but more needs to be done, much
more. "My contractor said it will cost
$125,000 to repair the damage and that
doesn't include the contents," he said.
And like many other residents whose
homes were damaged by superstorm
Sandy, his savings "are depleted. There
just isn't any way to move forward
right now," said Mr. Eckels.
But Town of Hempstead Supervisor
Kate Murray and Councilman Tony
Santino have proposed a way to help
homeowners and businesses make the
road to recovery a little smoother.
At a press conference at Mr. Eckels
home on Tuesday, Supervisor Murray
called upon the Town of Hempstead's
federal delegation - Congressional rep-
. resentatives Carolyn McCarthy, Peter
King and Gregory Meeks, as well as
New York's United States Senators
Charles Schumer and Kristen Gillibrand
- to sponsor legislation in Washington
that would waive penalty fees for pre-mature
IRA withdrawal for homeown-ers
seeking to make house repairs in the
wake of Sandy.
Supervisor Murray said the proposed
legislation would also strike down pre-mature
withdrawal penalties on other
deferred payment investments such as
40IK plans.
"We have a responsibility to help our
homeowners," said Supervisor Murray.
"That is what we do and as issues arise
we, in government, must address^them
to help people;"
Supervisor Murray said a letter was
sent to federal legislators asking for
their assistance. "Long Island has a
long road to recovery ahead as a result
of superstorm Sandy's devastating
landfall here over a month ago. The
extent of damage to many homes, busi-nesses
and infrastructure throughout
our area is staggering, and the cost of
repairs is daunting," she wrote.
Flooding and wind damage, mold and
sewage remediation, home heating oil
spills, fire damage, all from Sandy, are esti-mated
to be in the billions. To date, Nassau
County has received its first installment of
$16 million in Federal Emergency
Management Agency (FEMA) reimburse-ments
to pay for damage.
Supervisor Murray said there were
over 11,000 homes in the unincorpo-rated
Town of Hempstead that suffered
some damage, including 1,100 homes
that had significant damage.
Although FEMA is administering
reimbursements to pay for some dam-age
expenses as well as administering
the STEP Home Repair Program,
homeowners and businesses may need
to initially lay out money for the cost
of necessary repairs. At the same time,
many Americans have money invested
in Individual Retirement Accounts and
other deferred payment investments.
However, penalties are imposed for
premature withdrawal. Under these
dire circumstances residents need
access to their capital without penalty,
said Supervisor Murray.
For example, if a homeowner needs
access to money for a new roof, they
would pay a 10%'penalty for withdraw-ing
the needed funds form their IRA.
Some financial institutions also charge
a $40 administrative penalty fee as well.
"People are hurting financially. No
one anticipated the destruction and the
costs involved to save their home,"
said Councilman Santino. "This is a
commonsense solution to help people
put their lives together.
Supervisor Murray and Councilman
Santino are also asking federal legisla-tors
to consider a measure that would
implement five-year income averaging
for income tax purposes. Such a meas-ure
would mitigate the income tax
implications of a one-year spike in
income associated with a large with-drawal
from deferred payment plans
that would be used for Sandy repairs,
said Supervisor Murray.
Will federal officials sponsor and
endorse such legislation?
"I spoke with Congressman King
this morning and he is on board," said
Supervisor Murray.
Town spokesman Mike Deery said
federal officials are "looking into it."
"Senator Schumer is currently work-ing
on a number of ways to help those
devastated by superstorm Sandy and
that includes ways to allow them to
reduce their tax burden," said a pre-pared
statement from the Senator's
office.
NAMES MAKE THE NEWS: Read about your neighbors! 76 local people's names were in your community newspaper this past week. Maybe yours is in this week! See inside.
Freeport board honors
volunteers
page 3
Sanitary district vote
December 12
page, 5
FEMA comes to Freeport
.page 6
Giblyn School to re-open
December 10
i tpjage 15