Last Tuesday, a Dumpster sat in the parking lot of Velocity Sports Performance in Elmsford, filled with bits of Drywall, flooring, furniture and pieces of equipment that were ruined when the facility was flooded after the big storm.
The last big storm, that is.
In the end of March, the 18,000-square-foot Elmsford sports club, which sits just yards away from the Saw Mill River, was flooded with between two and three feet of water after the area was walloped by a particularly strong storm.
Despite previously having taken out a flood insurance policy with The Hartford that was backed by the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), Brian Fee, president of Elmsford”™s Velocity Sports Performance, said the insurance company fought the claim every step of the way.
To date, Fee said, all he has seen from the insurance company is a check for $30,000, just a small percentage of the sports club”™s repair bills stemming from the March storm that totaled nearly $500,000 between the building cleanup and various equipment replacements. The renovations and repairs were completed just last week.
For Velocity Sports Performance, Tropical Storm Irene was déjà vu all over again.
“The (March) flood came, and they (insurance company) said, ”˜Don”™t worry, you”™re going to be taken care of.”™ But they fought us every single step of the way,” Fee said. “For me to see this next one coming, it made me kind of nauseous. I look at it almost as a Ponzi scheme. They”™re selling the policies and then they”™re not paying.”
The Hartford and FEMA did not respond to requests for comment on this story.
Prior to leasing out the space in early 2008, Fee said, the sports club exercised all due diligence and despite the building”™s proximity to the Saw Mill River there had not been an insurance claim filed on the property since Hurricane Floyd hit in 1999.
Fee said the insurance company, in its initial denial of a claim following the March storm, told Velocity Sports that “the zone had changed” and that to maintain the same flood insurance coverage the club needed to pay an extra premium.
Fee said he paid the additional premium but the insurance company continued to be uncooperative. He said he has spoken with town of Greenburgh Supervisor Paul Feiner and with representatives of U.S. Rep. Nita Lowey, D, N.Y.-18 and both have pledged their support.
Additionally, Fee said he brought in a public adjuster to survey the damage, who advised him to hire an attorney.
“The public adjuster said he”™s never seen anything like it,” Fee said. “I shouldn”™t have to get an attorney to fight for it.”
In the wake of Tropical Storm Irene, significant numbers of business owners may be left stranded due to a general lack of flood coverage among area businesses, insurance companies have reported.
While early cost assessments of the damage wrought by the storm range from $7 billion to $10 billion, Kinetic Analysis Corp. is projecting that insurers may be on the hook for less than 40 percent of the total cost because much of the damage was the result of flooding.
“I would say most of the people who carry flood insurance are homeowners, not businesses,” said Edward L. Schultz, president of commercial lines at Allen M. Block Agency Inc., a Tarrytown-based personal and business insurance firm. “Most don”™t take flood insurance unless they are in a specific, flood-prone area. I”™d say the bulk of our commercial accounts don”™t have flood insurance.”
In New York state, losses due to the storm are thought to be slightly above $2 billion, with estimated insured losses at roughly $500 million, according to Kinetic.
However, initial damage assessments rarely turn out to be accurate, said Pat Walsh, area president of the White Plains office of Arthur J. Gallagher and Co., an international insurance brokerage and risk management services firm.
“The early estimates are never really right,” Walsh said. “You can”™t understand the extent of the damage until you take the time to understand it.” He said it could take weeks for certain issues, such as mold resulting from flooding, to become apparent.
Walsh added that the prolonged loss of power that resulted from Irene compounded issues for business owners, in many cases making it difficult to pump water out of stores and offices.
“It”™s hard for people to operate without electricity,” he said. “When you have a hurricane and you have multiple losses, it may be weeks before many of the commercial clients and homeowners can really recognize what the true extent of their damage is because one thing tends to lead to another.”
At Arthur J. Gallagher”™s White Plains office, a deluge of claims came in last Tuesday, Walsh said, adding that most of the company”™s local business clients did have flood insurance policies.
Despite the state of businesses in some of the harder-hit areas along the Long Island Sound and located near the Saw Mill and Bronx rivers, Walsh said homeowners and businesses were much more prepared than they were back in early 2007 when a nor”™easter crippled the area.
“Without question, people did a very good job (of being prepared),” he said.
Preparedness was much better on the coast and inland, what could anyone do with so much water falling? Tough times and it seems it getting tougher.