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Sen. Cory Booker speaks at a Capitol press conference Jan. 19 to oppose proposals for allowing oil drilling off the Atlantic Coast. At left is Sen. Robert Menendez, who spoke earlier. (Jonathan D. Salant | NJ Advance Media)

(Jonathan D. Salant | NJ Advance Media)

WASHINGTON — U.S. Sens. Robert Menendez and Cory Booker have asked the New Jersey attorney general's office to investigate whether insurers were purposely underestimating Hurricane Sandy damages suffered by homeowners.

The two Democratic senators, in a letter to Acting Attorney General John Hoffman, said they were concerned that insurance companies had been rewriting engineering reports to avoid payments by claiming that damage was caused by factors other than the hurricane.

"If left unaddressed, these practices threaten to stunt our state's recovery from Superstorm Sandy and leave many families without the ability to rebuild their homes and move on with their lives," the senators wrote. "They are not asking for a handout - only what they deserve and what they've been paying premiums for."

Federal Emergency Management Agency Administrator Craig Fugate in December ordered insurance companies that evaluate the damage for FEMA to release the engineering reports they use to make their determinations. FEMA also joined the senators' staffs and insurers to develop a solution to the current practice of firms being penalized for overpayments to victims but not for underpayments.

A federal magistrate judge in New York, Gary Brown, ruled in November that an insurance company denied a Long Island homeowner's claim after an engineering firm secretly rewrote a report that blamed damage originally attributed to Hurricane Sandy to soil movement. Brown said the issue "exposed reprehensible gamesmanship."

Union Beach second anniversary after Hurricane Sandy 34 Gallery: Union Beach second anniversary after Hurricane Sandy

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Jonathan D. Salant may be reached at jsalant@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @JDSalant. Find NJ.com Politics on Facebook.