A home destroyed during the landfall of Superstorm Sandy is pictured in Mantoloking, New Jersey March 22, 2013.  Credit: REUTERS/Lucas Jackson

reuters.com - by Barbara Liston - September 24, 2013

(Reuters) - More than a million homeowners living in older houses along the coastlines and riverbanks of the United States are being jolted by federal flood insurance rate hikes under a law passed in the wake of devastating storms.

Carol Giovannoni, 51, of St. Pete Beach, a barrier island community off Florida's west coast, is one of the people dreading October 1, when the law takes effect. Giovannoni said the annual flood insurance premium on her standard 1950s concrete-block, ranch-style home on the waterfront will jump from $1,700 to $15,000 over the next few years.

(READ COMPLETE ARTICLE)

CLICK HERE - Flood Insurance Reform Act of 2012

nyccah.org - September 23, 2013

Each year, the New York City Coalition Against Hunger produces updated, comprehensive guides, also known as "street sheets," to free food access in specific neighborhoods within the five boroughs.

Each guide also contains a map showing the locations of SNAP/Food Stamp office(s) and WIC site(s), as well as local soup kitchens, food pantries and farmers’ markets that accept food stamps as payment.

The Coalition is pleased to provide copies of the guides for you to download and print out.

- Read Guides Here -

nyc.gov

The National Park Service, New York City Department of Environmental Protection, New York City Department of Parks & Recreation, the City University of New York, and Natural Areas Conservancy are pleased to announce the Urban Resilience in an Era of Climate Change: Global Input for Local Solutions symposium at Kingsborough College, Brooklyn on October 17-18, 2013.

Protesters converged on Dimock, Pennsylvania, in 2011 over the effects of fracking on residents' water. Now an increasing number of communities are seeking to ban fracking outright, sparking court battles.  Photograph by Nina Berman/NOOR/Redux

Obama's trip to fracking territory underscores the controversy.

nationalgeographic.com - by Joe Eaton - August 22, 2013

As President Obama visits upstate New York and northeastern Pennsylvania this week to discuss his education agenda, a separate issue looms large in the background: fracking, a practice that has transformed Pennsylvania's economy and divided New York, where a moratorium is in place.

Protesters on both sides of the issue are expected to greet the President. And while his trip highlights many unresolved issues related to America's new wealth of natural gas and oil, a growing number of communities are taking matters into their own hands.

(READ COMPLETE ARTICLE)

uspirg.org

Released by: U.S. PIRG Education Fund Release date: Tuesday, May 14, 2013

The Driving Boom—a six decade-long period of steady increases in per-capita driving in the United States—is over.

Americans drive fewer total miles today than we did eight years ago, and fewer per person than we did at the end of Bill Clinton’s first term. The unique combina­tion of conditions that fueled the Driving Boom—from cheap gas prices to the rapid expansion of the workforce during the Baby Boom generation—no longer exists. Meanwhile, a new generation—the Mil­lennials—is demanding a new American Dream less dependent on driving.

(CLICK HERE FOR ADDITIONAL INFORMATION)

Report:  A New Direction - Our Changing Relationship with Driving and the Implications for America’s Future (69 page .PDF file)

nysandyhelp.ny.gov

Through the Community Reconstruction Zone
(CRZ) Program, New York State is assisting communities
to rebuild better and safer based on community-
driven plans that consider current damage,
future threats to community assets, and the community’s
economic future. In keeping with the National
Disaster Recovery Framework, CRZ Plans will consider
the needs, risks, and opportunities related to
assets in the following categories of recovery support
functions: Community Planning and Capacity
Building, Economic Development, Health and Social
Services, Housing, Infrastructure, and Natural and
Cultural Resources.

By completing a successful Plan, each participating
community will position itself to obtain funding to
implement that Plan to improve the community’s
future.

NY - Recovery Resources Center

Guidance for Community Reconstruction Zone Plans -
A Planning Toolkit for CRZ Planning Committees
(81 page .PDF report)

wastedive.com - Nicole Wrona - July 30, 2012

New York City's Mayor Michael Bloomberg, announced a campaign with the tagline "Recycle Everything." 

The new program promotes a breadth of recycling options, including food waste composting and the recycling of both e-waste and rigid plastics.

Additional sustainability efforts include the Re-Fashion campaign, a program implemented this year that promotes recycling clothing and textiles in the city.

- Read Full Article -

submitted by Dennis McKeon - where-to-turn.org

Salvation Army Sandy Case Management

homelandsecuritynewswire.com - July 19, 2013

A Sandia National Laboratories team is gearing up for hurricane season, readying analyses to help people in the eye of a storm. The team has two jobs: conducting annual “hurricane swath” analyses of probable impacts on the Gulf Coast and East Coast, and providing quick analyses of crisis response in the face of an imminent hurricane threat to the United States. A swath analysis looks at how a hurricane might interrupt critical services and at impacts to infrastructure specific to an area, such as petroleum and petrochemical industries in Houston or financial services in New York City. It also looks at such things as the economic impact of the storm or how it could upset food deliveries.

submitted by Dennis McKeon - http://www.where-to-turn.org/

submitted by Karen Jackson

Hello All,

Minutes from our general meeting on July 24^th are attached.

Here are some important pre-weekend updates:

The first of three LTRO sponsored help fairs is tomorrow, Saturday, July 27^th from 10am-2pm at Home Depot, 2750 Veterans Rd. W.FEMA individual assistance, disaster case management, World Renew, Red Cross, Project Hope, Single Stop, and many others will be offering services. There will also be a DJ and hot dogs! Councilman Ignizio will be stopping in from 10am-11am.

Our World Renew team has already been diligently conducting a needs assessment survey around the island. LTRO members will be asked to respond to ‘immediate need’ cases as they are discovered. Residents with remaining recovery needs can connect with World Renew at the HUBS and resource centers listed in the attached flyer.

The Coming Back Stronger Workshop on resources and incentives for businesses has been moved to Tuesday, July 30^th from 6-8:30pm at New Dorp High School. The first 50 attendees will receive a free one year of identity theft protection. Attendees will be entered into a drawing for a grant for a free website or tech marketing package for a business affected by hurricane Sandy. English and Russian flyers are attached.

We yearn for frictionless, technological solutions. But people talking to people is still the way that norms and standards change. Illustration by Harry Campbell.

newyorker.com - by Atul Gawande - July 29, 2013

. . . In our era of electronic communications, we’ve come to expect that important innovations will spread quickly. Plenty do: think of in-vitro fertilization, genomics, and communications technologies themselves. But there’s an equally long list of vital innovations that have failed to catch on. The puzzle is why.

(READ COMPLETE ARTICLE)

Rendering of Seeding Office plan for the waterfront development in the Rockaways.  Photo - Seeding Office

Four semi-finalists out of a field of 117 design firms from around the world were tapped to design a huge waterfront development that can survive the elements and please its residents.

crainsnewyork.com - by Matt Chaban - July 18, 2013

A gaggle of architects from around the world has descended on the Rockaways in Queens in an effort to tackle a simple question without a simple answer: How best should the city build on the waterfront in the wake of Superstorm Sandy? . .

On Thursday, the four semi-finalists were announced. Among them is a prominent New York firm and the largest architecture outfit in Scandinavia.

(READ COMPLETE ARTICLE)

submitted by Peter B. Gudaitis

nyc.gov - July 13, 2013

OFFICE OF EMERGENCY MANAGEMENT AND DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH AND MENTAL HYGIENE URGE NEW YORKERS TO TAKE PRECAUTIONS AND HELP THE VULNERABLE DURING HOT WEATHER THIS UPCOMING WEEK

Use air conditioning to stay cool, drink water to avoid dehydration, limit strenuous activity

More Than 400 Cooling Centers Open;
To Find the Nearest Center, Call 311 or Visit Cooling centers are open Sunday, July 14 through Thursday, July 18; to find the nearest cooling center, tomorrow call 311 or visit www.nyc.gov
or CLICK HERE - FIND A COOLING CENTER

Be sure to call and confirm the center is open before traveling in the heat. The agencies providing Cooling Center facilities are the NYC Department for the Aging, New York City Housing Authority, Brooklyn Public Library, New York Public Library and Queens Library and The Salvation Army.