After Ida Storm Destroyed Inwood Homes, Help Is Hard To Find

DYCKMAN, NY — Upon hearing the rain, Carla Gomez's nine-year-old daughter turned to her mother with a question, "Will the apartment flood again?"

Gomez and her daughter are having the conversation in the Dominican Republic. A couple of weeks earlier they were fleeing their Inwood garden apartment, along with Gomez's mother and aunt, as the rain from Hurricane Ida caused the water to rise four feet inside the family's home at 200 Nagle Avenue.

"She's scared of the rain now," Gomez told Patch about her daughter.

The family home was one of four apartments below sidewalk level on Nagle Avenue that was flooded and destroyed the night of Sept. 1.

A man had to break a window to escape, a dog survived by floating on a couch, a cat drowned and everything was covered in sewage.

The Gomez's fled to a longtime family friend's house across a sunken inner courtyard that quickly turned into a lake of sludge.

“My God, we lost everything and now what will become of us? We have nowhere to go," Gomez's aunt, Iris, told Patch.

The rainwater on Sept. 1 submerged and destroyed the family's beds, kitchen appliances, food, clothes, furniture, documents and Gomez's work supplies.

Gomez had arrived recently in Inwood from the Dominican Republic when the storm hit. In the days after the flooding, she made the difficult decision to move with her daughter back to the DR.

"It is hard being without a house with a girl starting school," she told Patch.

As the Gomez's sought refuge at their neighbor's house the night of Sept. 1, Ramon was fighting for his life one door down at 198 Nagle Avenue.

Like the Gomez family, Ramon, identified by only his first name, also lives in a basement apartment, meaning that his home is below sidewalk level.

His apartment had filled up with water — unable to get through the front door because of flooding he had no other choice but to break through a window to escape, neighbors said.

While he was able to drag his dog along with him, who had previously been floating on a couch, he wasn't able to save his cat from drowning.

The Aftermath

While Gomez and her daughter returned to the Dominican Republic, many of the other Nagle residents who were left without a habitable home after the storm took up with neighbors.

The rest of the Gomez family went to live with the mother-in-law of Araina Sepulveda, whose house they ran across the courtyard to the night of the storm.

The families are long-time friends, and Araina and her sons have done their best to help the Gomezs, including in the effort to clean the 200 Nagle Avenue apartment.

“These are really humble families. They don’t ask for anything. There was a box of canned goods that was just covered with grime and I went to trash it and she said ‘no, no, no’, that’s food we can’t throw away, we’re going to clean that,'" Araina told Patch.

"It looks like the hurricane happened inside the apartment. Everything was lifted and tossed," Araina said. "The family cried for days. It's like PTSD. You barely get out with your life and you're left with nothing."

Lilmor Management is the property management company that serves as the landlord for the 198 and 200 Nagle Avenue buildings.

Araina told Patch that the company denied the Gomez's request to live in a vacant apartment in the building that wasn't damaged by Hurricane Ida.

"They (Lilmor Management) hired a random guy to use a power wash opposed to a specialty place to get rid of sewage, and that’s what they did the first time, they just power washed it, the water made it under the bed, but somehow they were able to salvage the mattresses the first rainfall," Araina said. "But the second rainfall went over 4 four feet in the apartment — so nothing was salvageable."

Araina's mention of the "first time" is in reference to the rainstorm on July 8 that flooded Washington Heights and Inwood. Gomez, her Aunt Iris and Ramon all confirmed to Patch that their apartments also flooded on the date earlier in the summer.

“Nothing, absolutely nothing," Iris said when Patch asked if the building management company helped other than power washing the 200 Nagle Avenue apartment.

Lilmor Management did not respond to multiple calls and an email from Patch.

The Government Response

Local governments in Bronx, Queens, Kings, Richmond, Westchester, Suffolk and Sullivan County qualify for federal relief over Hurricane Ida flooding.

Manhattan, which overall was not hit as hard by the storm as the above areas, does not.

Despite Manhattan not being put on the list of counties that could receive FEMA money for Hurricane Ida, Gov. Kathy Hochul visited Inwood the Saturday after the storm to survey damage in the neighborhood along with local politicians.

"We will make sure our neighbors get the help they need," Hochul wrote in a tweet about the day.

Visited Inwood this afternoon with @RepEspaillat, @RJackson_NYC, @CnDelarosa, @MarkLevineNYC and saw the effects of Ida's devastation first-hand.

Heavy rains caused part of a parking garage to collapse here.

We will make sure our neighbors get the help they need. pic.twitter.com/ns5IobaHvj
— Kathy Hochul (@GovKathyHochul) September 4, 2021

"There was no assistance from anyone in government, just us cleaning up everything and staying with neighbors," Gomez told Patch.

Hochul's office did not respond to Patch's request for comment about Inwood residents' frustration over the lack of government help.

Rep. Adriano Espaillat's office did, however, respond to Patch's request for comment.

Here is the complete response from a spokesperson within the Congress Member's office.

“Earlier this month, Congressman Espaillat joined New York Governor Hochul, New York City Councilmember Mark Levine, New York State Assemblymember Carmen De La Rosa and others to assess the impact of Hurricane Ida across his district and saw firsthand the devastation and impact to families.

"He spearheaded a bipartisan letter to the leaders of the House Appropriations Committee, of which he’s a member, urging legislation to provide the highest amount of federal funds possible for New York and continues to work in collaboration with federal agencies, state and local community partners to help support the ongoing cleanup efforts.

"Our office is working with a number of constituents who have reached out following the storm and our team is helping them navigate the federal assistance application process and utilize both federal and state resources available to them during this ongoing recovery efforts.”

Twenty days after the storm, the Gomezs are still working to clean up the 200 Nagle Avenue apartment.

“Something more needs to happen," Araina told Patch. "It’s not enough that only my family is there for them. I can’t replace three bedrooms of furniture, a dining room, a living room, their yard."