A Westchester County lawmaker took it upon himself to track down people in his district who had unclaimed funds in New York state.

The move followed a Turn To Tara report in December that revealed $18 billion was waiting to be claimed by New Yorkers.

"It's just maddening to me how so much of government is basically like failure to do a mail merge effectively right," said Westchester County Legislator David Imamura.

How did he do it? Imamura reached out the state comptroller's office and requested a list of everyone in his district who had unclaimed funds. He then sent out a big mailer and started working the phones.

"I was looking at the list, and I would call people I knew who had moved and said, 'Oh, you should check to see if money on this website because I see you have money on this website,'" he said.

Imamura said one lucky resident received the surprise of his life - he was owed $70,000. Another one was owed $8,000.

He said he helped a total of 3,000 Westchester residents connect with money they didn't even know was theirs.

There are now efforts to expand the initiative to other municipalities across the state.