Found money

Ambulance corps discovers $9K — and the state may be holding a stash for you too CHESTER — Finding change under the couch cushions, or a $20 bill tucked in the pocket of a jacket you haven’t worn in awhile, can make you feel suddenly rich. So can finding money at the New York State Comptroller’s lost and found, otherwise known as the department of unclaimed funds. Your money might be there, hiding in plain sight. You probably don’t realize you’re missing it. But a few clicks on a searchable online database will reveal whether a little pile of money awaits you. That was the experience recently of the Tuxedo Volunteer Ambulance Corps, which hit the jackpot: $9,960 owed to them since 1994 by the Insurance Company of North America. To be sure, most unclaimed funds are for amounts much smaller than the sum to be recovered by the ambulance corps. According to the comptroller’s fact sheet, 52 percent of unclaimed funds amount to $100 or less. The state’s biggest unclaimed account totaled more than $4 million, paid to an individual in 2008 from a stock claim. As the state’s Lotto slogan goes: “Hey, you never know.” And even small amounts can come in handy these days, when money is in short supply. Noel Spencer of Chester, a county legislator running for re-election this November, led the ambulance corps to its stash after a conversation with his friend Thomas R. Suozzi, the county executive in Nassau County. He told Spencer about the online database: www.osc.state.ny.us/ouf/index.htm. Spencer, a financial analyst, was amazed that he’d never heard about it. The assistant comptroller for the state, Assistant Comptroller Joseph Ruggiero, told Spencer he’d found $10,000 owed to Ruggiero’s grandmother. Interest is paid in the first five years on interest-bearing accounts. The current rate is 2 percent. So Spencer set about searching for unclaimed funds in his district. He came up with 92 individuals, businesses, and governmental entities, including Chester Elementary School and the Village of Chester. He believes the village is owed at least $1,000 because the source is unpaid taxes. In Monroe, unclaimed funds await the town justice, tax collector, and volunteer ambulance corps, along with PTA council and girls’ softball team at the Monroe-Woodbury school district. Spencer is working on finding out the totals owed to his constituent schools, villages, and towns. Incidentally, Straus News in Chester, the publisher of The Chronicle, is also on the list.

Facts about unclaimed funds in NYS
Funds unclaimed: $9.9 billion
Number of accounts unclaimed: 23 million
Source of funds (April 2008-March 2009): Banks, 33 percent; corporations, 29 percent; brokers/dealers, 3 percent; insurance companies, 12 percent; state court funds, 4 percent; other, 19 percent.
Source: New York State Office of the New York State Comptroller