After the deluge, paperwork

This story was reported by Brenda J. Buote, Caroline Louise Cole, Marcia Dick, Katheleen Conti, Kay Lazar, Kathy McCabe, Steven Rosenberg, and Phil Santoro, and written by Lazar.

As the cacophony of sump pumps eased, homeowners, businesses, and community leaders in Boston's hard-hit northern suburbs have started calculating the steep costs of the Flood of 2006. Damage estimates from the four-day deluge are reaching into the millions of dollars, and officials warn the numbers are preliminary.

With more than 10 inches of rain having fallen on large swaths of the region between Saturday and Tuesday, hundreds of homes were flooded, scores of residents evacuated, major roadways shut down -- including large sections of Interstate 95 and Route 1 -- and dozens of schools closed, some for two days. Governor Mitt Romney said he planned to ask the federal government to declare the state a disaster area, and mayors in several cash-strapped northern communities said they have been told by state officials that federal and state aid may reimburse up to 75 percent of losses.

But those funds typically take weeks -- and piles of complex paperwork -- before they arrive.

''The city is going to get the reimbursement, but the key is to get the average family through the process to rebuild," said Melrose Mayor Rob Dolan. He and his wife and their 8-month-old son were forced from their home by the waters. In Dolan's city, the Department of Public Works yard lay under waist-high water, equipment worth thousands of dollars was destroyed, sewers were backed up, and 500 residents had been evacuated from their homes -- half of them placed in hotels at the city's expense. Dolan estimated that the damage and cleanup costs affecting Melrose and its residents would run as high as $2 million, with private properties the hardest hit. He said the city planned to set up an emergency center in the next two weeks to help residents file loss claims, and he advised homeowners to carefully document losses with photos as soon as possible.

In Gloucester, the Babson Reservoir gushed over its spillway over the weekend, leaving the city's DPW yard under water and forcing the evacuation of about 100 nearby homes.

The Red Cross secured hotels for them, said Stephen Aiello, deputy fire chief in Gloucester, who estimated overtime costs for his city's Fire Department -- after it had responded to more than 400 flooding calls -- at $10,000.

''Two weeks ago, I was praying for rain at a 50-acre brush fire, doing a rain dance, praying for rain," Aiello said. ''I think we prayed too hard."

Lynn Mayor Edward J. Clancy Jr. called the rain ''unprecedented" in terms of flooding and damage to his city's streets, parks, and buildings. It also forced the evacuation of two housing complexes for the elderly.

''You can put out a fire but you can't stop water from flowing," Clancy said.

He noted that homes in west Lynn, along Michigan, Huron and other streets named, coincidentally, for the Great Lakes, had some of the heaviest flooding. ''A lot of people have experienced a tremendous amount of property damage. I don't know how they'll go about trying to fix things."

Clancy could not estimate how much the city would be spending on overtime and other storm-related costs, but he warned that the bill could be more than is initially apparent.

''The sneakiest part of this whole storm, which people don't often realize, comes once the water is gone from the naked eye. That's when the sustained damage of a storm of this magnitude is known.

''The water gets into hot top, loosens it, and it starts to disintegrate. There are untold hidden costs and damages that you won't know for a while."

Next door in Salem, where officials are still trying to plug a projected $4.1 million budget deficit for the current fiscal year, tabulations on Tuesday placed the city's storm-related overtime and equipment costs at $75,000, and damage estimates to homes and businesses at $500,000, said Jason Silva, chief administrative aide to Mayor Kimberley Driscoll.

''A large bulk of that damage is on Canal Street, where a lot of businesses were engulfed and will need to be largely rebuilt, particularly the McDonald's," Silva said.

In Haverhill, a break in the main sewer line over the weekend sent millions of gallons of sewage into the Merrimack River. Haverhill Mayor James Fiorentini said that fix alone probably would cost $1 million.

''The city doesn't have reserves," he said, ''so we are going to be looking to the state for help."

About 13 streets, mostly along the river, and the Groveland Bridge were closed during the height of the storm, and many homes were flooded.

''People are telling me this is the worst flood that ever hit the city," Fiorentini said, ''but I have a picture on my desk from 1936 showing that the flood washed out the entire central business district."

The storm's aftermath found leaders looking for ways, large and small, to ease cleanup miseries for residents.

In Revere, the City Council held an emergency meeting Monday night during which Councilor at Large John R. Correggio discussed his proposal to ask Mayor Thomas G. Ambrosino to establish a consumer program allowing Revere residents to purchase sump pumps from a home-supply store at discounted prices. He is scheduled to present it for a vote Monday at the council's next regularly scheduled meeting.

Swamped with more than 10 inches of rain, the city's fire and DPW departments were flat out helping residents pump water and sewage out of their homes.

The agony in Peabody, however, appears to know no end.

From his third-floor office in City Hall, which overlooked 4-foot-high waters in Peabody Square, a frustrated Mayor Michael Bonfanti on Monday afternoon said his desperate city repeatedly has begged for state and federal help. Major floods have shut down Peabody Square in 1956, 1968, 1979, 1988, 1996, 1998, 2001, and 2004. The floods occur during heavy rains when water from two brooks converge underground at Peabody Square. Bonfanti said the city needs $16 million to help widen the brooks and to install wider underground pipes to handle the increased flow during the storms. He said the city had $3 million to spend on the project, and has asked the Legislature for another $2 million. He also said he planned to ask the federal government for $11 million for the project.

''It's absolutely essential because we can't keep doing this every couple of years," he said.

Bonfanti estimated that Sunday's flooding caused as much as $1 million in property damage to downtown businesses and residences.

If there is a silver lining in the considerable storm damage, Aiello, Gloucester's deputy fire chief, is determined to find it.

''I have been getting calls from nursing homes and private homes offering beds and rooms to people who have been flooded out of their homes," Aiello said. ''Since Katrina, it has opened everyone's eyes as to what happens in a situation like this. Everyone is pulling together.

''There is a clothing manufacturer on the North Shore, who wishes to remain anonymous, who donated clothing. There is still a lot of good will, thank God."