NY City Leaders Fed Up with Sandy Response
MALVEAUX: City leaders in Long Island towns hit hard by Sandy say they're fed up with the slow response to the disaster, and they're not going to take it anymore. More than 172,000 area residents still don't have power more than 11 days after Sandy hit.</s>TONY SANTINO, SENIOR COUNCILMAN, HEMPSTED: This is a crisis of epic proportions. This is a natural disaster. We are here as one community together to send a message -- we've had enough.</s>MALVEAUX: Politicians directed their anger at the Long Island Power Authority. Now, the company says it has more than 8,000 linemen and tree trimming crews making progress. Some Sandy victims, they are just now returning to see their homes, the devastation that this storm left behind. CNN's Susan Candiotti caught up with one couple on an emotional tour of their flooded house.</s>SUSAN CANDIOTTI, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): With Sandy's storm clouds gathering, Sue Kosakowski evacuated, but over her objections, husband, Bill, stayed behind. It was traumatizing.</s>BILL KOSAKOWSKI, STORM VICTIM: I road out the storm until Friday morning. Friday morning, I said I couldn't take anymore because they turned the gas off. When they turned the gas off, that was the end for me. I told my wife I would walk across a bridge if I had to but I was getting off.</s>CANDIOTTI: Armed with the police pass, the retired New Jersey fire chief, married to wife, Sue, for 23 years, joined other residents allowed back on Pelican Island for a few hours to take stock of the devastation.</s>SUE KOSAKOWSKI: What a sight. Yes, they broke -- everybody is just broken down, yes.</s>BILL KOSAKOWSKI: That's my boat.</s>SUE KOSAKOWSKI: This is his boat.</s>CANDIOTTI: Ripped from a lift behind the house, the storm surge swept his boat into the street. Inside the house, they get a look at breathtaking damage. Sue, for the very first time.</s>SUE KOSAKOWSKI: Oh my, god. This house was spotless.</s>CANDIOTTI: Marks on the ceiling show how high waves got inside.</s>BILL KOSAKOWSKI: When the water was up over my knees, I thought I might be able to save something, so I put the chairs up on the top of the table. Didn't do any good.</s>CANDIOTTI: As things got even worse, Bill retreated upstairs to the couple's bedroom overlooking the bay and huddled with his retriever, Blink.</s>BILL KOSAKOWSKI: I've never been so scared if my life.</s>CANDIOTTI: Their dream retirement home is in shambles, but with all they lost, Sue is grateful she didn't lose Bill.</s>SUE KOSAKOWSKI: The house is stones and bricks and windows. I thought I lost him, and would have been -- losing him would have devastated me. I wouldn't have known how I would have gone on if I would have lost him.</s>BILL KOSAKOWSKI: Come down here and expect the rest of your life in calm and peace, and in one fail swoop, everything washed away.</s>CANDIOTTI (on camera): Even knowing the danger of riding out a storm, Kosakowski stayed behind with the hope of salvaging something meaningful, something valuable. But as a former fire chief, he recognizes nothing is worth that kind of risk. Susan Candiotti, CNN, Pelican Island, New Jersey.</s>MALVEAUX: Some Sandy victims are just now returning to their homes to see the devastation left behind. And if you would like to help, you can always go to CNN, Impact Your World.