On the Trail of Flood Cash… Myers Explains the Mystery

Last week, county boss Rob Astorino announced he was dishing out some flood cash to various communities. Readers asked – and so did we – why wasn't Rye on the list? MyRye.com put the question to county legislator Judy Myers about the confusing game of three card monte and it seems to be that we already got our share…

"The story with the flood money is a long one… I'll try to make it short. After the 2007 floods, the CE (Spano) announced that the county would spend a total of $50 million, or $10 million a year, on flood mitigation. A task force was formed,  I was appointed along with about 10 other people, and we spent the next 2 years developing and implementing a grant program to use the money for flood mitigation. Rye was the big beneficiary — I like to think because of my efforts — and received the very first grant ($1.2 million) for the sluice gate. Rye was one of 5 grants to move all the way to completion; there were about 5 more in the pipeline for further review by the end of '09.

Then came the change in administration… and an end to the task force. I was then able to draft and pass stormwater legislation to enable the county to enter into this kind of flood mitigation funding again… it was vetoed, tweaked, and then approved. This resulted in the current Stormwater Advisory Board, which is now in place and will be reviewing projects for recommendation to the Board of Legislators for approval. Additionally, I placed $5 million in the 2011 capital budget last year, which the administration found fault with and omitted from the printed budget, and another $5 million for 2012… which was approved. (The capital budget book has yet to be printed, but I'm thinking that it might actually show up this time.)

The projects that were specifically noted by the County Executive in his press conference were projects that had been in the pipeline before the work of the original task force was halted. In short, Rye was not left out… Rye got the benefit of the first round of funding before it was eliminated."

Confusing, huh?