NY has more than 400 FEMA home buyout applications - NEWS10 ABC: Albany, New York News, Weather, Sports

NY has more than 400 FEMA home buyout applications

ALBANY, N.Y. (AP) - More than 400 New York homeowners could benefit from buyout applications before the Federal Emergency Management Agency a year after tropical storms Irene and Lee struck the state. Eligible homes are typically destroyed and the property must revert to open space.
    
Approved residents will get a partial reimbursement for their losses - and a chance for a new start.
    
The federal acquisition program is designed for buildings with damage substantial enough to make it cost effective to remove them. The 405 applications forwarded by state officials to FEMA late last month are mostly from Binghamton and surrounding Broome Tioga and Chenango counties, where flooding from Lee was the worst in New York.

(Copyright 2012 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.)